What Computers Know About Time Management That You Don't: Batch Processing

On your desk lies a stack of miscellaneous papers, some are forms to fill out, others reports to scan. Your computer monitor is surrounded by a sunflower of yellow post-it notes: stuff to google, people to call, errands to run. And the morning tide of email and voicemail is coming.

. . . → Read More: What Computers Know About Time Management That You Don't: Batch Processing

How to Run a Successful Weekly Review

The weekly review is the linchpin of the Getting Things Done method. When I started GTD, I bypassed the weekly review, thinking it was unnecessary and that I could get by without it. Turns out I couldn’t. The weekly review is, fundamentally, a time to synchronize your system with real life . . . → Read More: How to Run a Successful Weekly Review

Why 'Next Actions' Make Big Projects Easy to Tackle

One of the key ideas of Getting Things Done, is the ‘next action’. Like much of GTD it’s a simple idea that makes a big difference.

Next actions are the steps you take to complete a project. For example, your project may be ‘sell my old CD collection. That’s a typical . . . → Read More: Why 'Next Actions' Make Big Projects Easy to Tackle

Beware the Hawthorne Effect: Why You Feel More Productive When You Try a New System and Why it Doesn't Last

Between 1924 and 1932 the Hawthorne Works Telephone Factory commissioned a series of experiments on their workers. The owners wanted to find out what environment would make the workers most productive. While the researchers never did figure out the best environment, they did stumble on one of the most famous effects . . . → Read More: Beware the Hawthorne Effect: Why You Feel More Productive When You Try a New System and Why it Doesn't Last

How Merlin Mann Gets Stuff Done

There’s an interview on LifeHacker that details how the excellent Merlin Mann of 43 folders actually gets his work done. Many organizational gurus talk in broad principals of work in an ideal world, but Merlin gets down into the nitty gritty tactical details of getting things done.

Read the LifeHacker Interview with Merlin . . . → Read More: How Merlin Mann Gets Stuff Done

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