How much energy do you have right now? Our energy levels dictate how well we can focus, and sometimes, it’s useful to take stock of how much energy you have to make the best decisions about what we should engage in next.
Boxer, the horse from George Orwell’s classic text Animal Farm, had one answer to adversity: “The solution, as I see it, is to work harder.” It is a poignant allegory for Stalinist exploitation of working-class Russian revolutionaries. But it is also...
Growing up on the US-Mexico border, a feature of my childhood friends’ birthday parties was the piñata. For those unfamiliar, it is a colourful papier-mâché figure, ranging from a traditional donkey to a popular cartoon character, stuffed to the crêpe-paper...
I’ve found myself in a number of conversations recently with people who seem seriously unhappy with how little they are reading these days. In certain cases, I know this is not even close to being true because I’m party to what is hitting their inboxes on a daily...
How easy it is to feel smug, you’re up and running with GTD®. You’re completing a Weekly Review®, your ‘ins’ are at zero, your lists are in order, higher horizons aligned and you’re looking through your ‘waiting for’ list to see who you can chase to prove your system...
Last Christmas I was given a gift so special I became teary-eyed. It was a book by my favourite author and inside the cover was a touching handwritten message from him to me. However, what I found even more remarkable about it, I realised only later, wasn’t the gift...
I had a lovely exchange with a taxi driver the other day. That might not seem like news enough for a blog, but if rarity drives value, then such a thing in a London cabbie is very valuable indeed. They are a self-selected bunch, and the filters for job success seem to...
‘Seriously? They’re posting business-critical information as a reply to a private Facebook thread?’ I was as incredulous as my client at this lack of basic ‘communication hygiene’ – expecting colleagues to find what they needed to...
Christina Wallace found love on the internet quicker than most by recognising that online dating was good at expanding her dating pool, but not good for spotting chemistry, intelligence, charm, politics, marital status, creditworthiness, hygiene and anger issues. She...
“Sweet dreams are made of this / who am I to disagree? / I travel the world and the seven seas / everybody’s looking for something.” -Eurythmics Sleep means energy, and energy is precious. Just ask any new parent, shift worker, or long-haul pilot. In...
“Not my circus, not my monkeys.” Ever heard that one? It is one of my favourite linguistic imports. If you are not familiar with it, it is the very visual Polish take on staying clear of problems that are not yours to solve, and for me it captures what might be a...
Start with WHY. If you’ve kept current with leadership content on the web in the last decade then you might know that this is Simon Sinek’s thing, making him famous after a 2009 TED talk that went viral The talk itself looks slightly retro if you watch it again now –...
“All that is very well,” answered Candide, “but let us cultivate our garden.” -Voltaire I was fuming. I could feel the blood surging up to my head, fuelling a litany of judgmental thoughts. Brexit. Trump. That maniac on the M1. Something had...
How to Reduce Friction in Your Life with GTD® (Video) Todd Brown talks about how Getting Things Done® (GTD®) helps to reduce or optimise the friction in your life for maximum personal benefit.
Are you lazy? If you’re reading this, probably not. As my colleague Todd Brown explains over on our YouTube channel, GTD® tends to attract people who are already motivated and successful. To paraphrase Steve Jobs, GTDers are usually folks who are looking to put a dent...
Toni Basil. Los del Río. Baha Men. You may not recognise these band names, but if you lived through the 80s, 90s, and 00s, you are almost certainly familiar with “[Hey] Mickey”, “Macarena”, and “Who Let the Dogs Out?” All of these...
I’ve been thinking lately a lot about what defines success, and the messages that we receive in the marketplace of ideas about being “more successful.” Usually, those messages are based on the belief that success is externally defined, that there are objective...
I was ten minutes into a meeting when my colleague at the other end of the conference line said, “Something’s going on. I need to switch off my computer”. Two minutes later, I received the same message from our IT team – we were the target of a...
In the second blog in this series, we looked at how you might get a sense of what the current reality around working standards is in your team or organisation. If that exercise – of uncovering current standards – highlighted the need for change, what to do...
Alex Lee manages the strategic communications, planning and policy development for Library & Student Support Services at Sheffield Hallam University, leading a team of seven. Her role as Head of Management Services covers a broad range of service delivery for a...
I have a confession to make. I have been routinely engaging in conflict-resolution sessions with a group of creative, talented mid-career professionals. We have been collaborating on solutions to complicated, high-stakes problems by drawing on the unique strengths and...
In the lull between the Christmas and New Year celebrations, one of the pleasures I usually find myself drawn to, other than leftover mince pies, is looking ahead at next year’s holiday possibilities in my calendar. It seems I’m not alone, either, since it’s a peak...
We’re deep into the season of office parties, mulled wine and mince pies here in London, and as the nights continue to draw in I find myself in a reflective mood. Around this time of year, I like to remind myself of the core ideas behind GTD®, by way of reaffirming my...
