184: Getting Things Done, with David Allen
Coaching for Leaders
Dave Stachowiak
4.8 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 16 March 2015
⏱️ 47 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
David Allen: Getting Things Done
The Getting Things Done steps:
- Capture—collect what has your attention
- Clarify—process what it means
- Organize—put it where it belongs
- Reflect—review frequently
- Engage—simply do.
The methodology has not changed in the revision of the book, but what has changed is the number of people who need it.
If what’s most on your mind right now is thinking about what should be on your mind, then it’s time to spend more time clarifying what is most important.
“Not only do you need to spend time thinking, you need to spend time not thinking – absolutely daydreaming.” -David Allen
Your biggest job is to define what your work is.
“The big secret about Getting Things Done is it’s not really about getting things done. It’s about creating appropriate engagement with your life.” -David Allen
“The people most attracted to what we teach, the GTD methodology, are the people who need it least.”
David recommended The War of Art* by Steven Pressfield
One of the best habits you can develop is to do the thing first that you are least looking forward to. Perfectionism is a huge obstacle for procrastination.
David recommended Brain Chains* by Theo Compernolle
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | If you've ever searched for a methodology on how to be more productive, you've inevitably come across getting things done. |
| 0:06.5 | Today I welcome David Allen to the show on the revision to his book which launches this week. This is Coaching for Leaders, episode 184. |
| 0:16.0 | Produced by Innovate Learning, Maximizing Human Potential. human potential. Greetings to you from Orange County, California. |
| 0:27.7 | This is coaching for leaders and I'm your host Dave Stahoviac. This is a weekly show to help leaders improve their communication, strategy, coaching, |
| 0:38.8 | productivity and personal mastery. And if you're like me and you care a lot about productivity |
| 0:45.1 | and you're always thinking about what are the ways you can maximize your |
| 0:48.8 | effectiveness at being productive the person you need to know is David Allen. David Allen is the author of the Blockbuster |
| 0:57.0 | Best Seller Getting Things Done. It first came out over a decade ago now and David is releasing a new version of the book coming up here in March 2015. |
| 1:08.6 | I thought it would be the right time as a result to talk with David and to ask him to share some of his wisdom on the |
| 1:15.1 | getting things done methodology and also about how his thinking has changed as |
| 1:21.1 | as his work has evolved and as time has gone on from the original book. |
| 1:25.4 | And so David, I am so thrilled to welcome you to coaching for leaders. |
| 1:28.6 | Hey, delighted to be here Dave, thanks for asking me. |
| 1:31.0 | Well, we're going to approach this conversation very much from the standpoint of I know many people |
| 1:36.2 | in the listening audience are familiar with the getting things done methodology and I've actually |
| 1:41.5 | asked our audience for some questions on social media and have a bunch for you. |
| 1:46.0 | But before we do that, for the benefit of those who may not be familiar with the methodology, |
| 1:51.0 | I'm wondering if you could just give us a brief overview of what |
| 1:53.9 | getting things done means and how it works. Well in there's several simple |
| 2:00.0 | ways to describe it. One is the way you get things done is you define what done means and what |
| 2:06.0 | doing looks like and where it happens. So outcome and action thinking actually is part of the |
| 2:11.7 | sort of the fundamental essence of what this thought process is |
... |
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