GTD in Large Corporation

sesteph6

Registered
I am so jealous because I see so many GTDers discussing how they implement Trello, or Omnifocus. How the newest release of IOS will help with going 100% ipad, etc etc.

My question, for those of us working for very large corporations, where getting wunderlist on our laptops requires VP approval. What are some of the most common effective tools and implementations?

For example, as I prepare for wunderlist to go bye bye.... we are a lotus notes shop. There is a huge appeal to use the lotus notes implementation of GTD. Especially given the easy conversion of email to tasks (I average 200 emails a day). Do I put my personal tasks on lotus.... Our systems either attract or repell us correct? has lotus notes ever attracted anyone? ever? Or do I begin the process of getting evernote, todoist, Nirvana, etc on my lap top.

Some other things... like many, I do not want to split my personal and work systems. I know David does not, so, I dont want to double the place I look at. Also, I cant go with an all on line solution, as I have big blocks of laptop time when Im on planes or over seas where I have no online access.

So I just wanted to get a conversation started for those of us who are in these larger environments. How have you made GTD work, What are your best practices?
 

kelstarrising

Kelly | GTD expert
"has lotus notes ever attracted anyone? ever?" Ha ha ha.

I used Lotus Notes for about 20 years, but only as my primary list manager and calendar for about 2 years. I never warmed up to it, honestly. Although converting emails to To Do's was appealing, for sure, especially with the eProductivity Add-in. I mostly kept my system in other places over the years, even though I needed to use Notes for work calendar and work email. During those years on Notes I used Palm Desktop, paper planner, and Evernote (and there may be a few others I'm forgetting). These days I'm on Wunderlist and will use it until they pry my fingers loose and make me move to something else. Could be I go back to Evernote or check out something like Todoist. I am pretty sure I won't move to the new Wunderlist replacement by Microsoft.

BTW, Evernote notebooks can be offline, for what that's worth. I needed that during work travel as well. It's not a traditional list manager, but the Setup Guide I wrote shows you how to make it work.

Hope that rambling helps!
 

Mark Jantzen

Registered
I'm in a similar environment with no control over software decisions or the ability to customize any installations. I also deal with a lot of confidential & internal information tied to internal policies that I will not compromise. It's a constraint to manage but not a roadblock to a good GTD system.

For single action emails I find that a simple ".Action" folder within my company system is effective. Not perfect but good enough. The email as the reminder works well and I can do the work within my company systems and not compromise any policies.

For my projects & next actions lists I use OmniFocus completely outside my company's system. But OmniFocus doesn't contain any internal or confidential information (CRITICAL). It only acts as a "map" that manually points me toward my company's systems. No information policies are compromised.

A next action example is, "Email personX re: ABC meeting". It would violate policies for me to email from outside my company's email system (Outlook) so this OF action merely triggers me to open Outlook on my company system and take that action. If the next action is "draft email" I'll do that within Outlook as well.

In practice it works much smoother than I make it sound. You could easily do the same thing with a paper-based list.
 

sesteph6

Registered
Thank you for the replies.... I think I can push IT to give me access to an outside product 1 more time.... I was successful with Wunderlist. Im HEAVILY leaning toward evernote, just because I am VERY strict with my implementation. Mark, Im deffinately not bright enought to manage a seperate system in omnifocus. For about 2 months I carried 2 Iphones.... one for work and my personal one. 40 days in I was a broken man. I was in the fetal position in my office trying to remmber where I put an appt. So now Im down to just the 1.

I deffinately need to be able to open my 1 device, laptop... and see everything in one place. I think I can pull it off nicely with evernote. I also dont think (Jinx) that evernote will vanish anytime soon. If I start the process now hopefully I can have it approved should I wake up and be forced into a Microsoft todo app....
 

Gardener

Registered
I split my systems. I don't want to reveal my whole personal life to a work-based system, and I suspect that using a work system for personal task tracking would actually violate policy anyway. And putting work details in a personal system would absolutely violate policy.

At work, very recently, I'm moving to using Jira. Even if I weren't a programmer, I think that Jira would work pretty well for me--though that's affected by the fact that I'm more and more going to a Kanban/GTD combination.

In my personal system, I'm going back and forth and back and forth with the fact that (1) I really like Jira and (2) Jira's mobile access is pretty bad. So far, I've moved the garden--my most complex project by far--to Jira, I've shifted from OmniOutliner to Reminders to Trello as my primary list manager and I think I'm about to abandon "list" software and move the lists to Scrivener, I'm still using OmniFocus for non-garden projects, I'm using Scrivener for text-based project support material, and Someday/Maybe keeps bobbing from place to place. The fact that I keep moving Someday/Maybe without actually moving its contents suggests that entering items in Someday/Maybe is largely just a meaningless ritual for me anyway.

Whee!
 
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