Ever notice glaring non-GTD behaviour in others now?

[CosmoGTD]

Look for whatever reason you have not read my text, and are projecting something onto it that was never said or implied. Fine!
I never said that talent and organization don't go together. Each person is different. But SOME people are TOO organized and obsessive and spoil their creativity. Some are very organized and do great work. Like me.

And by the way, who said i am stressed? I LIKE working with cool people.
If you work freelance in the actual universe you run into all sorts of characters. What i am saying is how to STOP yourself from being stressed about it.

Why am i talking to myself?
I must like that too.

Coz

If you want to subject yourself to the stress of working with people who can't or won't deliver, that's up to you. I'm just saying that it is flat out incorrect to claim that "talent" and "organizational skills" are inherently incompatible.

Katherine

 

[kewms]

This is why i dislike work in "corporate" environments. These bloody "manager" types trying to control everyone need to just get out of the way.
Come to think of it, i LIKE the fact i get to work with cool crazy people, some of who don't even really have a datebook.
The corporatist attitude that expects everyone to "follow the same system" makes my stomach turn.

Mine too. That's part of the reason why I'm self-employed.

I don't care what system someone uses. I very much care whether I can trust them to honor their commitments or not.

Katherine

 

[Unregistered]

I don't care what system someone uses. I very much care whether I can trust them to honor their commitments or not.

Katherine

Bingo! And I think that's what's generating that 'weird' feeling for me.

I don't really care whether or not they use GTD either... I just feel that, by ignoring the collection phase, they are already behind the curve. Now, maybe they have a system in their head that works great for them... could be. But I have no way of knowing that. All I've seen is that their system is either incomplete or non-existant.

Unless I know them well and trust them (based on fulfilled commitments in the past) then I've just created a leak in MY system by handing off something to someone who has just visibly demonstrated a potential serious leak in THEIR system to me.

I realize that I can't control others behavior, only my own, and that the potential impact of broken commitments can be mitigated by careful use of open Waiting For loops, etc.

The point of my original question was just to see whether others had experienced this strange 'discomfort' and lowering of trust levels (especially for relative unknowns) once the GTD habits start to take hold.

 

[AMS]

I feel the same. So much, in fact, that it has caused me to switch jobs. Trust had been lowered to such a level that no one could be trusted deliver on anything. I know I can only manage myself, but I was starting to feel as if I couldn't even do that in that environment. I'm hoping my new environment is a little more serene, but I figure it definitely isn't going to get worse!

 

[CosmoGTD]

In the end what i was trying to say is really very simple.

I don't know one person i work with who does GTD. Zero.
Lots of people i work with are rather disorganized yet still manage to get things done in their own way, and many people i know in my personal life are quite disorganized as well.
They are fallible humans. Imagine that. They write numbers down on scraps of paper and lose them. Imagine that.
I know a guy who makes over $150 grand a year, and he didn't have a pocket datebook! Imagine that. He's talented and he does things his own way, and he can get away with it.

If i use concepts from REBT-CBT, then if i have a SHOULD/MUST that says, "others SHOULD be organized like i am", then i am going to UPSET myself all the time with that "irrational" belief. They are not the problem, my belief is the problem.

To put this type of SHOULD/MUST onto others makes ME upset.

But if i just change my own MUST belief into a preference, then i can say, "I would PREFER if others were more organized, but if they are not its no big deal and it doesn't have to bother me".

So the bottom line is if you don't want to upset yourself when others don't behave the way we think they SHOULD, then you get rid of the should.
So everything isn't perfect, too bad. Life goes on.

Not all of us can be like DA and hire people who do GTD.
I work in a very random universe, in the real world, and i have to deal with family members, and other "artist" types who barely have an appointment book.

It does not bother me in the least anymore.

I just use my GTD system to manage my commitments, and to follow up on things.

This is all i am saying.
You don't have to upset yourself if others do not follow GTD or anything like it.
We upset ourselves when we have these SHOULDS we throw at people.
When we think,
"people SHOULD or MUST behave like i think they should. They SHOULD always keep their commitments like i do, etc"
then all we do us UPSET ourselves.

If we can stop shoulding on other people, then life is much easier, and we lose the need to upset ourselves daily over fallible human nature.

Coz

 

[ceehjay]

If we can stop shoulding on other people, then life is much easier, and we lose the need to upset ourselves daily over fallible human nature.
Coz

LOL! It has been my experience that we tend to should on ourselves far more than we should on other people. (One of my long-time favorite expressions, Cosmo.)

Carolyn

 

[ProfDD]

Dealing with others not meeting GTD system standards

If someone you depend on doesn't seem to be 'collecting' the commitment you think they are making, there are a few possibilities for what is going on.

1. Maybe they are not really making the commitment you seek;

2. Maybe they are successfully keeping track in their heads; or

3. Maybe they are not capable.

I have a recommendation that, IMHO, works no matter which situation applies. Send written communication to the person summarizing the commitment you thought was made, with copies to whomever is appropriate. You may surface the fact that they haven't really accepted the commitment, you may find out that they kept track, or you may provide them the reminder that they need. Each outcome is better than what would happen without that summarizing communication.

Could there be drawbacks ? Someone could get upset that you were trying to box them in or that you had misrepresented what they said. This suggests that you might to express things cautiously. ("I would like to clarify our discussion of earlier today. As I recollect, you said ....")