Why GTD reminds me of the 7 Habits

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[Lisa Haneberg]

Rosa:

I must admit that I find this puzzling....perhaps I need to re-read GTD. And I blogged on it for several days! But honestly, the system did not click with my style. A few of the techniques are priceless and I am glad I read the book for those alone.

Now 7 habits, that's another thing. I totally click with and get how Covey realates to effective and meaningful success.

I know this might be a bit sacreligious in the blogshpere, but I'm just not hoping on the GTD wagon yet. But your post and connection of GTD/7 has me rethinking whether I should give it another try.

[Rosa]

Lisa, thank you sooo much for this comment and for your priceless honesty: you know how much I have always valued your opinion and your terrific coaching as a management guru (yes, you are!)

Allen’s GTD (and the blogosphere fanaticism about it) has been one of those books that gets me to say to myself, “damn, why didn’t I read this earlier.” However like you, I feel I already have a “style” of time management that works pretty well for me, and I’m not willing to discard it.

Unless I missed this on my first reading of his book (and I may have), what Allen does not address sufficiently for me is our memory investment in our old existing systems. What I mean is, that no matter how faulty they may be, if we have an existing organizational system that works, in some ways it may be foolhardy to discard it now. An example: If we are creatures of habit in the way we pay our bills, and they always get paid on time, there is no reason to chuck the next billing statement that arrives in the mail in your new “GTD inbox” per his system. Another: If my desk looks like a mess, but it is a “habitual mess” in which I can always find exactly what I’m looking for, I am not going to reorganize it. I know I can’t rely on my short-term memory to remember where the new place for what I want is.

Covey’s 7 Habits are now part of that “existing organizational system” that works for me, and I remain a huge Stephen Covey fan. However I am intrigued by the possibilities Allen offers me into updating myself electronically because I’ve always loved using Outlook, and I stopped using my traditional Franklin-Covey planner a long time ago in favor of the Outlook calendar and task functions.

So this Covey-GTD project I have found I’m very impulsively launching into, is my late-to-the-GTD-game way of personally culling all the great stuff I keep hearing about in new-found GTD effectiveness with who I already am: A composite of belief (and exceptionally strong belief and conviction) in strengths management and my values-centered, timeless principle-effective, managing with Aloha. If I were to describe myself in a single equation of brutal honesty, it would probably be:

Rosa = Gallup Strengths Management (the way I internalized it) + Covey 7 Habits (the way I internalized it) + Values of Aloha (the way it revolutionized my effectiveness as an ethical, feels good about myself manager).

I suspect that David Allen and GTD may be giving me a way to update myself within my new world of digerati (okay, I hope he is). We shall see!

In so many ways I am much too busy to give in to my impulses and launch myself into a new project here, but there’s this voice in my head telling me I can’t afford not to, precisely because I am so tipping point crazy-busy right now.

Thank you Lisa, the more opportunities I get to think out loud and write my thoughts on this, the more I can make my own sense of it!
A hui hou, Rosa

Postscript: Two notes for any Talking Story readers listening in:

1. Click here for the “project” I refer to: http://www.sayleadershipcoaching.com/talkingstory/2005/06/pala_ole_and_yo.html
You may be interested if your personal "equation" is similar to mine.

2. If you missed it, be sure to read the interview Lisa just did with Miss Jane on Lip-Sticking:
http://windsormedia.blogs.com/lipsticking/2005/06/smart_woman_onl.html

[Stephen Covey Blog Owner (Click on me for my blog)]

As a blog-master concentrating on exploring Covey's ideas, I am very supportive of the ideas in this article...
David Lobel

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