One of the main ideas behind GTD is that you have a place where you put all your thoughts and tasks into and then based on where you are and who you are with, it’s easy to pull them out of and check them off as done. I tried OmniFocus, ToodleDo, Things, Remember The Milk, and a few other applications, web based and desktop alike. All served the purpose very well, but I just wasn’t comfortable with them. When someone asks me about how I do GTD or what application is best, I always say “whatever works for you.” If it’s something that doesn’t just slide into your life and you have to shoehorn it in, you’ll never use it. It has to be something that’s automatic for you.

For me, there’s nothing that’s more automatic than the countless number of emails I get on a daily basis. Also, my calendar goes everywhere with me. It’s on my desk, phone, and of course laptop. I do use Google Apps in order to make sure that everything stays together. When I receive an email, I pretty much know exactly what that email will trigger as far as a task goes for me based on the person who sent it and the content of that email. I will go into this in more detail in a later post, but for the purpose of this post, emails come regardless of whether I want them or not, so I don’t have to do anything else other than read them to slide them into my GTD. If a date is involved either by talking with someone or in an email, it triggers me to open my calendar immediately (on my phone or laptop) and put it right in.

What becomes a little more complex is my daily tasks on the projects I’m working on. This is where my whiteboard comes into play. I actually have 2 of them, one in the kitchen and one above my desk. The one in the kitchen is more of a dumping ground for random thoughts that come to me at odd times. The one above my desk is tasks broken out into projects.

Between my email, calendar, and whiteboards, GTD is automatic for me. It’s not something I have to think about, it’s just what I do. The tools I use are nothing that I have to shoehorn into my life, they are just there, hence automatic. I can’t stop people from sending me emails (no matter how hard I try ), I can’t stop people from using dates, so why try? The projects are a little more involved, but again, not really. You should not be wasting cycles on figuring out how to do GTD. Just let your brain work on the tasks themselves. Think about how you get “things” coming into your life, then think about the easiest way to process them at that moment to getting it done, and you’ll find your GTD.

As you can see in the picture, my desk is pretty clean with some exceptions.  You can see my flightdesk off to the left inside the desk.  But for the most part my desk here is clean and I’ve been getting tons of work done lately sitting in that chair.  Today, after lunch I cleaned up my desk at work and the afternoon was a productive one.  So my advice to you, and you can take if you want to (this is my blog, so I’m going to say it anyway ) is if you are having a tough time getting started with a project or task, take a look around you and see if you can straighten up the place a little, you’d be surprised how well less clutter will work.

Posted via email from Jason Resnick’s posterous

1. 

   OmniFocus - The Must Have App for GTD

   Understand GTD and Use OmniFocus to Make It Happen
   Reading up on Getting Things Done (aka GTD) and learning what that methodology speaks to.  Along with my must have tool, OmniFocus by OmniGroup, I figured out a way to trap all that I need to get done.  Without OmniFocus, I don’t know where I would be right now.  This application is my lifeline to all the tasks and projects that I have to do.  I use it each and everyday, all day long.  Every thought, email that requires more than a quick reply, notion, comment, speaking point I have gets put into OmniFocus so that I can take care of it or review it at some later date.  Even if I’m dreaming of some idea that I may ever do in my lifetime, like make a TV show, will go into OmniFocus.

2. What To Do When Out and About
   I have the OmniFocus iPhone app, which helps me remain organized when I’m not sitting in front of my computer.  What is a really nice feature that I use all the time is the Geocoding for Contexts.  This is basically marking a specific location to where you can accomplish your tasks.  For example, I have a context called Grocery Store and I’ve set that to my local Stop and Shop.  Whenever I know I need to buy something, I put it into OmniFocus as an action and assign it to my Grocery Store context.  Then when I make it to Stop and Shop, I bring it up on my iPhone, hit the location button, and that context and all my items that I need to purchase appear right on my phone.
3. GTD in the car
   What I found to be the toughest situation are those where you aren’t in front of a computer or can’t type a task into the iPhone, but have a thought that I need to get down.  An example of this is like when I’m in the car and I get an idea for a project I’m working on.  This is where Evernote has come into play.  If you haven’t checked it out, do so – Evernote!  They too have an iPhone app, but what it can do is be able to take a voice recording and then once I get to my computer, I’ll sync up my Evernote Desktop App and then process those “Untitled” notes into OmniFocus.
   

   My Flightdeck

4. The Flightdeck
   This is not an original idea of mine.  I heard about this first on Paul Boag’s Posterous microblog.  The idea is called “flightdeck” and made perfect sense for me.  When I come home from wherever I may have been, I always walk past my desk.  I empty my pockets of my essentials.  This consists of my wallet, keys, iPhone, sunglasses, and my card pass for work.  These will always be at the front part of my desk where I know that they will be at all times and I will not forget any one particular item.

So there are a few of my tips on having a productive day.  I know that I’ve tried a few different methods over a year now and this is what works for me.  Hopefully you can take something away from this and maybe use it in your day as well.  I know that I’ll be talking more about this topic as we grow, but I figured this post would be a good introduction to it.