It would be easy to make fun of the Getting Things Done Summit were it not for its laudable and eminently practical subtext of bailing us out of our data-sodden lives.
The inaugural GTD Summit, held in San Francisco this week, had a little of the evangelical about it, a smidgeon of personality cult, the confessional aspect of an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting and shades of a secret society – for most people, GTD remains a mysterious acronym.
David Allen, 63, a “productivity guru”, was the personality in the spotlight, receiving Oprah-like ovations at the show.
His 2001 best-selling book, Getting Things Done, appears to have been turned into a lucrative franchise.
The David Allen Company is built around its success as are an analogue and digital ecosystem of leather-bound stationery and software productivity tools aimed at neatening the untidiest minds. The conference is the newest addition to the cult of GTD.
I must confess to not having got things done in the sense that I’ve not finished reading Mr Allen’s worthy tome, but its essence is about bringing method and clarity to the lives of time-poor, email-besieged individuals, relieving them of the anxiety of having so much unfinished business.
He advocates a “trusted system” for organising and taking action on projects and tasks, using any tools that are at hand. The method is to collect information and decide what to do with it in short order – if it will take under two minutes, do it straight away; if longer, defer or delegate.
He teaches how executives can prevent themselves from being overwhelmed by the enormity of projects facing them or their To Do lists by taking the first practical step towards their goals in each instance. This relieves them of the worry of things undone preying on their consciences and clears their minds to allow creative thinking.
GTD has a big following among the technorati, buried under email, Twitter, RSS readers and countless other social networking obligations. Blogs like 43 Folders, inspired by GTD, and Lifehacker are full of tips for enhancing productivity.
The GTD summit began with Mr Allen being interviewed by Guy Kawasaki, a well known Web 2.0 entrepreneur, followed by a series of testaments to GTD’s efficacy from other noted figures.
Delegates confessed to “falling off the wagon” – losing their grip on the dataflow and the GTD methodology – and then getting back on again.
GTD probably works best with one-on-one or group tuition. They are a key offering of Mr Allen’s company and a “Getting Email to Zero” workshop at the conference was one of many that were well attended.
But the book and its follow-up, Ready for Anything, are a printed aid and Mr Allen now appears to have an army of disciples to help him spread the word and the book like a Gideon Bible.
James Fallows, the journalist, went as far as to describe the summit as like the first meeting of the founding fathers.
“Celebrate GTD for the practicality which allows us to do things that are most valuable to us as human beings,” he said.
“I think there is a real value here and we can take this message to a wider public.”
