When choosing a software application to implement GTD with you should ensure it at least allows you to do the following.
- You should be able to separately add ‘Projects’ and ‘Next Actions’. And it should not be difficult to easily navigate around your list of these items.
- The capability to add text notes to a Project or Next Action so you can dump your thinking at the time you create the task and at any later time when you come back to carry out the Next Action.
- The ability to assign ‘Contexts’ to your Next Actions.
- The ability to sort / filter your list of Next Actions to only show those Next Actions planned for a defined time period, e.g. allow you to only see those planned for today or today & tomorrow.
- The ability to ‘tick off’ Next Actions as you complete them.
- Everything else is a bonus!
I would highly recommend considering the complexity-functionality sweet spot for your software.
- It is quite easy to get hung up on a piece of software with an enormous amount of functionality but which, in the heat of battle every day at work, is too cumbersome or onerous to use. Sure, it works fine on a Sunday afternoon at home while you plan your week but in real-time, it is just too much hassle to use.
- Similarly, software that is too simple won’t be capable of keeping up with the complexity of your life and how quickly things change.
- There’s a sweet spot in there and you’ll need to find what works best for you.
My Software Choice?
- My software choice for implementing GTD has been the MyLifeOrganized product from www.mylifeorganized.net, otherwise referred to here as ‘MLO’.
- It certainly hits the sweet spot for my life and allows me to effectively implement GTD for everything I am committed to in my personal and work lives. I have used it now since 2010 and, despite the upgrades its been through, have never found it out of sync with that sweet spot. It has also expanded platforms to be available on Windows, iOS and Android.
- If you wish to give MLO a go, the author offers a 45 day trial with full functionality. This is plenty of time for you get started with GTD and decide whether MLO works for you or not.
- I have developed my own approach to implementing GTD with MLO and, whilst there are guides out there on how to do this, I have written up the setup procedure I implemented in MLO so you can also get moving quickly. This is a one time setup procedure that will take you about 15 minutes to do. I have put in loads of screen shots so hopefully everyone will be able to easily follow them.
- Below is a form that allows you to download an Adobe PDF of the Setup Instructions for MLO on Windows – Temporarily offline …
Note: GTD® and Getting Things Done® are registered trademarks of the David Allen Company.
