WR #3 (ish) for May!
All, I've been remiss about posting here. May has been a crazy month so far. I've continued to squeeze in SOME sort of weekly review every week on Saturday, but they have been less than stellar in terms of completeness. My next actions lists are somewhat in disarray, though they are actually shorter than they were a month ago. I think I am becoming a little more judicious about adding more projects and maybe just slightly more realistic about adding to my lists. Maybe...
Today's weekly review is going to be split up. I had work to complete this morning before I started and I have family commitments this afternoon. I will need to continue early tomorrow AM. Today I am focused on updating my project lists.
In terms of my personal journey:
I had listened to the GTD audio book many years ago and had incorporated at least some of the principles into a system that I used. It worked fairly well for me at the time. Then, a few years later, I was promoted to a national middle management role for a large technology company. It pretty much blew up the organizational system I had used for prior roles. The amount of information that came at me every day was much higher (200-300 emails per day) and I was desperate to find a way to keep up and manage all of my new responsibilities. So I re-read the entire GTD book, followed by Making It All Work and Ready for Anything. I also started listening to GTD podcasts. I really got serious about GTD in late 2011 and took some vacation time to assemble my system that year. After that, it took me about a year and a half, but at some point it really started to work well for me.
Since then, It's been quite a journey. About 12 months ago, having held that same management role for nearly 5 years, I decided to take a VP role for a small technology startup, which is my current role. Once again, it has put my organizational system, which seemed to be working quite well at the time, to the test and I've had to adapt and change how I do things.
I'm in a very interesting season in life right now. My job requires me to change gears mentally very frequently -- probably more than any other job I have ever held. Also, due to the fact that I have a wife and young children at home, my personal life is actually busier than ever as well. I can't imagine getting through any of this without GTD. Even when my system is out of date and my lists are unruly, I never stop using it. Even when my weekly reviews are shortened and not as focused as they should be, I never stop doing them. For better or worse, I just keep plugging away. I try to roll with the punches. And once in a while, if I keep an open mind, I learn something new about how to find more control and perspective.