

Ask YC: Is anyone here using GTD? - papersmith

David Allen's system for organizing tasks from "Getting Things Done" was fairly popular on reddit in the early days, then the name seemed to have fell into oblivion.<p>At first I thought it might be a fad, then I gave it a read and the system does make a lot of sense.  It may be an overkill for most people, but for things like running a startup, the amount of juggling may be able to justify the system's complexity.<p>I was wondering if anyone else here is using some form of GTD to organize your work and/or non-work related tasks.  Why and why not?  How do you use your GTD system?  How do you organize if you are not using it?
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raju
I use my own hacked version of GTD, albeit very simplified, partly because,
well, I guess I don't have that much to do :D. GTD still has a cult following
and has several sites that cover it a lot (<http://www.43folders.com> and
<http://www.lifehacker.com> among several)...

There have been several discussions regarding GTD at YCNews
(<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15450>) and I am sure these should
answer your question.

My approach has been explained well at lifehacker
([http://lifehacker.com/software/feature/practicing-
simplified...](http://lifehacker.com/software/feature/practicing-simplified-
gtd-335269.php)). I came across another article
([http://www.emaginacion.com.ar/cym/get-organized-with-
hipster...](http://www.emaginacion.com.ar/cym/get-organized-with-hipster-
pda/)) and currently trying to build that into my system.

If you were to use searchYC.com you will find several discussions regarding
GTD (<http://www.searchyc.com/GTD>)

At the end of the day, GTD is merely another tool that aids in keeping track
of everything you do. But its __effectiveness__ lies in your
ability/dedication to sticking to the system. Although over time my simplified
system has served me well, I do occasionally find myself slipping. A little
tweak here, a little tweak there, wash, rinse, repeat...

Hope this helps.

~~~
papersmith
Thanks for all the info. I kind of have the feeling that in the end it depends
on how much you can stick to it, like every other time management methods. :)

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drcode
Yes, I've used it for years. I think it's pretty good. Here's the biggest
problems with it, by my observation:

1\. It's easy for your "next action list" to keep growing and growing and...
until your head explodes and you fall off the system. I guess the only way to
avoid this is to be ludicrously conservative about what you commit yourself to
do.

2\. You have a deadline on a project that is falling behind, so what you
decide to do is postpone all your other todos and just work on this one thing
for a few days. In this time, you're not really "on the system" and it again
falls apart.

3\. You're in a lazy period and just plain don't care about the system and it
falls apart.

If you can avoid those three problems, it may work for you.

In terms of technology, I recommend you sit down with Y combinator startup
appjet.com and write your own implementation- that's what I did... If you
don't customize it to your own quirks it doesn't work as well, from my
experience.

~~~
slim
can we use it? or is it private?

~~~
drcode
It's too idiosyncratic so I have it as private- Just writing all the
instructions for the non user friendly commands would take me too long and the
program would be incomprehensible without knowing them. I want to strip it
down and make it usable to others as a starting point for writing their own
app, but don't have the time right now...but it is a plan I have...

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modoc
I use iGTD (a great GTD-style application for the Mac) to manage most of my
life. For real dev tasks I use Jira, everything else goes into iGTD: Phone
calls I have to make (call mom, return recruiters message), errands I need to
run (pickup dry cleaning, drop off library books), work tasks (write arch doc
for phase 5, review code for project X), personal projects, home tasks (run
laundry, spent an hour reading a book and drinking tea), etc... Being able to
switch between viewing tasks by project and by context is a HUGE win for me,
and having a single repository for my tasks, with easy hot key input from any
application is great.

My stress level has gotten so much lower since I started using iGTD.

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cvx
I've incorporated GTD into my daily workflow (I use Emacs and have written a
GTD module). Personally, it's worked very well for me - especially in reducing
my stress levels.

The key (I've found) is to capture _everything_ in buckets. You can then
process each bucket based on your energy-level/schedule.

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stillmotion
I find the best way to get things done is to write them on a notepad
(Moleskine highly recommended) and do them. My weakness is procrastination
(which I am doing now) and I the only advice I will give is don't even think
about trying to get over procrastination, just do what ever you need to do.

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thorax
I touched on a bit of my process here recently:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=122203>

I use a Google spreadsheet (or Excel) and sort/execute it all according to its
value divided by its cost (ROI).

~~~
papersmith
That was a great post. Actually that post is the reason it got me thinking and
started this thread. I sounds like it would fit every well with GTD. The book
gave a very general idea of how to prioritize tasks, and you method would plug
in very well for work-related tasks. Thanks for sharing!

