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GTD SOP#2 – 48 minutes

[This is part of a series covering the Getting Things Done Standard Operating Procedures I use to manage my goals, priorities and workload. I thought I'd share these because they've made and continue to make a huge difference in my productivity, and I hope they will for you too!]

 

Timer… and WatchDog

What: An easy to read digital timer for blocking my days into 48 minutes of working time followed by 12 minutes of slack time.

Use: When blogging, writing, programming or anything requiring serious thought; to put a limit on how long I read posts, RSS feeds, surf the net and process email.

Source: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0007Q6NI0/102-9962585-8260124

How:  Two ways: I block significant (revenue related) work into 48 minute concentrated bursts followed by 12 minute slack times to check email, reload coffee, etc. I can string together five or so blocks and still stay in the flow – the 12 minutes is long enough to attend to life, short enough not to break my concentration. Secondly, when on the net the timer goes on so I don't lose all the productivity I gain (see this post at Web Worker Daily – they nailed it)!

Why:

Life is a marathon, not a sprint and this way I can go nine rounds with my daily workload without turning my brain cells into grey goo by the end of the day and without being tied hand and foot to the clock – I don't give a damn whether I start task x at precisely 10 am – it's the results that matter. Being in the flow let's me be at my most creative with the least amount of stress.

As I get closer to my 50th birthday, my memory is simply not as good as it was 20 years ago. More importantly, I have about five times more to do, read, process, code and write than I did then.

Notes:

The timer is such I have present it to two intervals – 48 minutes on the top, 12 on the bottom half of the display. I can flip a switch in the back to go back and forth. The big display makes it easy to read. I think this big display timer is made for sparring rounds such as in Tae Kwon Do – which sounds just like my day!

So do you have a Standard Operating Procedure for alternating between focused work and taking a breather? If so, what? If not, would you be more productive with such an SOP?

 

A very cool productivity tool- Direct Access

Any software application that makes my computer life easier and my efforts more productive gets my attention as fast as cold beer on a boiling hot day and Nagarsoft's Direct Access is exactly such a tool. Once you install this Vista-friendly utility (30 day free trial, $39.95 USD), you start making your life easier by clicking the New Command button and -

Creating autotext. Everything from how you sign your emails and forum posts to blocks of text you use frequently in emails ("Thank you for your order of MasterList Professional" becomes ord plus the F12 key)

Launching applications. You can jump in and out of applications you need just by typing the abbreviation you create – or let Direct Access create for you! See below. This really speeds up the workflow.

Shortcut Websites. Now I can launch Firefox, start my favorite forum site I check a dozen times a day in a second. I just type "biz" anywhere – the desktop, in word, wherever – see the little flag Direct Access puts up to let me know it recognized "biz" as a keyword, click F12 to confirm and Firefox opens the Joel On Software Business of Software forum for me faster than I can.

Once you get the idea of the program, you wonder why this is not build into Windows in the first place – and the easiest way to get how Direct Access works is to spend five minutes with the screen cast – that's all the explanation you'll need. What's more, Direct Access is not a tool only programmers could love, like AutoHotKey and does not tie my system into knots like ActiveWords – two applications I've tried but uninstalled that promised but failed – at least for me – to deliver.

The only quibble I've found so far with Direct Access is that the Command Wizard – which automatically creates a whole set of Direct Access commands for the apps I have on my PC is buried at the end of the New Command dialog. Definitely use it.

I have some ideas re how to use Direct Access I want to talk over with the founder of Nagarsoft, Andrea Nagar, but already Direct Access is changing how I work for the better. Highly recommended.

Other brands recalled

A quick follow up on the last post re the major recall of cat and dog food in the US.

Three more major brands have been added to the recalled cat and dog food listings since this morning: Iams and Eukanuba and Good n Meaty. The updated cat list is at: http://www.menufoods.com/recall/product_cat.html The updated dog food list is at: http://www.menufoods.com/recall/product_dog.html

This US FDA site (http://www.fda.gov/bbs/topics/NEWS/2007/NEW01590.html) lists press releases containing lot factory info from:

Nestlé Purina PetCare Company Press Release

Hill's Pet Nutrition, Inc. Press Release

P&G Pet Care Press Release (Including Iams and Eukanuba)

And, this resource: RSS Feed for FDA News Releases [what's this?]

Important US/UK pet food recall

Associated Press (AP) is reporting today a recall by a major cat/dog food manufacturer of some 60 million containers of wet pet food. Some sort of food contamination has caused numerous cases of acute kidney failure and death.

 

Here is the story: http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/03/17/petfood.recall.ap/index.html?eref=rss_topstories .

The company has published on its web site an information number (1-866-895-2708) about the recall. The company, Menu Foods, produces food sold under many brand names.

Here is - as of today - the cat and dog food brands affected by the recall. Only certain lots of each food from one of two factories are being recalled - as of now:

1. Check the brands you've bought for a match on the lists below.
2. If you bought a brand on these lists, click it and an Excel workbook will open listing the specific lots. The two key columns are the Buy Date and Description 1.
3. Check the individual containers of food for a small line of text printed on the package (see image). This will be either the Buy Date, the Lot number or both.
   
4. If you find a match, do not use that food! In the US Call 1-866-895-2708.
5. Watch for further information on this story. Recalls are often expanded in the days and weeks after the initial event.

Recalled Cat Product Information

    Recall Information 1-866-895-2708

1. Americas Choice, Preferred Pets
2. Authority
3. Best Choice
4. Companion
5. Compliments
6. Demoulas Market Basket
7. Fine Feline Cat, Shep Dog
8. Food Lion
9. Foodtown
10. Giant Companion
11. Good n Meaty
12. Hannaford
13. Hill Country Fare
14. Hy-Vee
15. Key Food
16. Laura Lynn
17. Li'l Red
18. Loving Meals
19. Main Choice
20. Nutriplan
21. Nutro Max Gourmet Classics
22. Nutro Natural Choice
23. Paws
24. Presidents Choice
25. Price Chopper
26. Priority
27. Save-A-Lot
28. Schnucks
29. Sophistacat
30. Special Kitty
31. Springfield Pride
32. Sprout
33. Total Pet, My True Friend
34. Wegmans
35. Western Family
36. White Rose
37. Winn Dixie

Recalled Dog Product Information

    Recall Information 1-866-895-2708

1. Americas Choice, Preferred Pets
2. Authority
3. Award
4. Best Choice
5. Big Bet
6. Big Red
7. Bloom
8. Bruiser
9. Cadillac
10. Companion
11. Demoulas Market Basket
12. Fine Feline Cat, Shep Dog
13. Food Lion
14. Giant Companion
15. Great Choice
16. Hannaford
17. Hill Country Fare
18. Hy-Vee
19. Key Food
20. Laura Lynn
21. Loving Meals
22. Main Choice
23. Mixables
24. Nutriplan
25. Nutro Max
26. Nutro Natural Choice
27. Nutro
28. Ol'Roy
29. Paws
30. Pet Essentials
31. Pet Pride
32. Presidents Choice
33. Price Chopper
34. Priority
35. Publix
36. Roche Bros
37. Save-A-Lot
38. Schnucks
39. Springsfield Pride
40. Sprout
41. Stater Bros
42. Total Pet, My True Friend
43. Western Family
44. White Rose
45. Winn Dixie
46. Your Pet

I very seldom talk here about "off topic" topics, but this is important and a minute or two of effort on your part could prevent a horrible tragedy.

I've verified this is a real story about a real recall and I implore you to take a moment for the sake of your companions to make sure you do not have food covered by this recall. Please check with any of your cat/dog owning friends who may have not heard about this recall.

Plans, hard work, and you

Plans are only good intentions unless they immediately degenerate into hard work." -Peter Drucker

The well respected late Peter Drucker was right about plans as he was about so many things. I’m prone to overplanning what I want to do, and not immediately putting those plans into practice.

If you’re too into planning, ask youself if you’re over-planning because there are issues – emotional, financial, practical – that your plans don’t address but need to? It’s not a comfortable question to ask yourself – but it does pay to ask it.

If you have plenty of plans, but not enough hard work, what’s holding you back and how do you start turning some of those plans into action? What are the 3,5 or 8 specific next physical actions you can take to start acting on your plans?

Now that’s a plan I hope Peter would approve of!

Tags: Peter+Drucker, overplanning

Six ways not to go Crazybusy

Most of the time I feel I’m just this side of crashing and burning in this Web 2.0, Future Shocked, too much to do, too many decisions world. If you feel the same, it’s time to confront this and start getting a handle on it.

Crazybusy is a term coined by Dr. Edward Hallowell, a New England psychiatrist, who believes many of us are suffering from environmentally induced attention deficit disorder, brought on by technology and activity overload. His book, Crazybusy, is required reading if you want to avoid being run digitally ragged.

If you don’t have time (yet) to read it, here’s the gist of what he recommends from a very good Businesweek.com story by Anne Tergesen:

• Set aside time to work before you check your e-mail or snail mail or voice mail, before you allow the world to intrude on your fresh and focused state of mind.
  
• Do not allow the world to have access to you 24/7. Turn off your BlackBerry and cell phone. Stretch or have a five-minute conversation. When you sit down again, you'll be focused.
  
• Prioritizing is crucial. If you don't, you'll find yourself spread so thin you'll only be able to see your good friends on the first Tuesday in February.
  
• Give yourself permission to end relationships and projects that drain you.
  
• Do what you're good at and delegate the rest. This is important, because when we do what we're good at, the work can take on the quality of play.
  
• Keep in mind that some of our best thoughts come when we're doing nothing. Downtime is a forgotten art.

Tags: Crazybusy

David Allen is working on a new book

There was a broad hint of this in last week’s GTD Connect conference call, but it’s confirmed now by no less a source than Time magazine: David Allen is working on a new book:

To spread his productivity gospel, David Allen is writing a third book on how to get things in order.

There’s nothing yet showing on Amazon – knowing what I know having written two books, I will bet sometime in time for Christmas 2007, but not much before.

I’ve noticed that David’s thinking about GTD and how it gets done has been evolving as of late: Recently, David posted on GTD Connect that there’s nothing at all wrong with having a daily To Do list - as long as you’re prepared to update it during the course of the day as things change.

That’s a change from his assessment of to do lists in the past – and welcome news to me since I sell MasterList Professional that makes managing your Current list of to do’s dirt easy.

This Time article also has five tips from David on implementing GTD that you probabably know already if you practice GTD, but it never hurts to review!

Tags: David+Allen, GTD