Tag Archives: making it all work

Productivity, Motivation, and Personal Development Links – 29th March 2009

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I am sat writing this on the train from Leeds to London. Free Wifi on the train is powering my Internet so no need for the 3G card.

Here are my collection of links for this week.

  • My first link for this week is a link to an interview with David Allen from the Washington Post. The interview is about how to Get Things Done and Organize Your Life.
  • My second link is a link to the Shoeboxed Blog that announces integration with Evernote. Shoeboxed is a service that allows you to mail in your receipts as and when you need to and now with the Evernote integration they will scan them into your Evernote account. If only they had this in the UK I would be a customer for sure!
  • My third link is a link to a review of Making it All Work, the latest book from GTD creator David Allen. I am quite shocked to admit that I have not yet read this book, but it is the next on my reading list after I have finished with Twyla Tharp and the Creative Habit.
  • My fourth link is a link to a great article comparing Getting Things Done and Autofocus. Both are great productivity methodologies and it is good to see the writers viewpoint of the differences between these two systems.
  • My fifth and last link is a link to some information about the latest version of reQall. reQall is an iPhone application that I reviewed back in November 2008 when it first came to my attention. One of the main new features of reQall is the ability to do location based reminders. All in all reQall should be looked at if you have an iPhone and want to improve your productivity.

Well, the WiFi is still holding up so I will publish this whilst I still can. I am down in London for a couple of days on a training course, should be fun.

Wishing you all a great week!

Productivity, Motivation, and Personal Development Links – 15th February 2009

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This week say my RSS Subscriber count hit 3000 for the first time. It is a bit lower right now but that is normal for Feedburner on a weekend. Hopefully it will bounce back and always be above the 3000 mark.

Yet another Sunday hitting @home. I have been fitting taps today in the bath and seem to have pulled my back, great with a busy week ahead!

Here are my collection of links for this week.

  • My first link for this week is a Mind Mapping website that I found out about from a blog comment here on my blog. The website is IQMatrix and they provide a really cool collection of Mind Maps. Check them out.
  • My second link is a link to a post about Overcoming Public Speaking Anxiety from Sid Savara. We all know the anxiety posed by public speaking and this post does a good job in breaking the fear down in order to manage it.
  • My third link is a link to a new time management system called AutoFocus. I always like to read these new time management systems and compare them to the GTD Methodology. Worth a read.
  • My fourth link is a link to a review of Ready For Anything. This was David Allen’s second book after Getting Things Done and before Making it all Work. I must admit that I started Ready for Anything and never finished it. I will, just not high priority for me and it is in my system!
  • My fifth and last link for this week is a review of that previously mentioned third book from David Allen, Making it all Work. The review is from Genuine Curiosity and the review is a pretty good synopsis of the book.

I have got some interesting ideas for this week and I have to get some review posts edited and posted on the site.

Wishing you all a productive week, as always!

Andrew..

Productivity, Motivation, and Personal Development Links – 18th January 2009

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Another very productive week for me. I have been working on a very long customer report all week and also my latest eBook writing project for Cisco Press.

Deadlines really help you to focus and I am happy to say that I hit another one. Good planning and time allocation are key to working on a writing project with a deadline. I avoid procrastination and start early. There is nothing worse than leaving everything to the last minute, by which time you put yourself under undue pressure!

Here are my collection of links for this week.

I am just getting ready to set off to Havant near Portsmouth for three nights. This time my hotel advertises Free WiFi Internet so let’s see how good the connection is.

Hope you all have a great week.

Productivity, Motivation, and Personal Development Links – 11th January 2009

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I have been away from home for most of this week in Basingstoke but I am glad to be back and back to a good Internet connection. I have a deadline for the 15th this week for my next Cisco Press eBook so the next few days will be busy but I am ahead of schedule so will be more than fine for time.

Here are my collection of links for this week.

  • My first link for this week is a link to a great review of the new David Allen Book, Making it All Work from the Simple Dollar. I am reading this book at the minute. I must admit I am not as far in as I would have liked but I have a writing deadline for the 15th Jan so that has been taking a lot of my time. This is a great review of the whole book, the best review I have seen yet.
  • My second link is a link to the 15-Minute Solution for Getting Organized. This is a new blog that I have discovered and this is a great post on how to use 15 minutes to get organized. It is amazing what you can do with 5, never mind 15 minutes!
  • My third link is a link to the 25-50-25 rule to Getting Things Done. This is from the Abundance Blog and it correlates the 25-50-25 rule to the GTD methodology. Well worth the time investment.
  • My fourth link is a link a video interview with Leo Babuta from Zen Habits. I will probably post these videos as a separate post to my blog.
  • My fifth and last link for this week is a link to an article titled You Can Do Anything but Not Everything from the Indian Dinosaur blog. This is a great, and lengthy post about a persons view on productivity and GTD at general. Great read.

Going to hit the gym now and then settle down. Hopefully get some more Making it All Work read as my reading has suffered over the past few weeks due to my eBook deadline.

Merry Christmas to All

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Just a quick note to wish all my readers a very Merry Christmas!

I am looking forward to relaxing over the next few days and being as merry as I can. My copy of Making it All Work by David Allen arrived today, so I will start to read it over Christmas and report all about it here on this blog.

Enjoy the festive season and get ready for the New Year!

Thanks,

Andrew..

Books to Read at Christmas – Well, books that a productivity blogger would read

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I have just ordered myself two books to read over the holiday season. Now, these are not your traditional festive tales of snowmen and Santa Claus, but what would you expect from a productivity blogger?

The Creative HabitMaking it all work
The first book I ordered is The Creative Habit by Twyla Tharp. I first heard about this book via 43Folders and as I normally like the book recommendations from Merlin Mann I thought I would order it on Amazon and read it for myself.

What makes someone creative? How does someone face the empty page, the empty stage and making something where nothing existed before? Not just a dilemma for the artist, it is something everyone faces everyday.

What will I cook that isn’t boring? How can I make that memo persuasive? What sales pitch will increase the order, get me the job, lock in that bonus? These too, are creative acts, and they all share a common need: proper preparation.

For Twyla Tharp, creativity is no mystery; it’s the product of hard work and preparation, of knowing one’s aims and one’s subject, of learning from approaches taken in the past. It’s a process undertaken every day. It’s a habit.

The Creative Habit is not merely a look inside the mind of a remarkable woman with remarkable skills, but a programmatic, inspiring, encouraging guide to help each of us achieve our fullest creative potential.

The second book is Making it all Work by David Allen. This is a book I am really looking forward to reading and it is supposed to start where Getting Things Done left. This is a productivity book that we are all looking forward to it and I must admit that this will be my first read as I want to get the book digested and provide the review as fast as I can.

David Allen’s Getting Things Done hit a nerve and ignited a movement with businesses, students, soccer moms, and techies all the way from Silicon Valley to Europe and Asia.

Now, David Allen leads the world on a new path to achieve focus, control, and perspective. Throw out everything you know about productivity- Making It All Work will make life and work a game you can win.

For those who have already experienced the clarity of mind from reading Getting Things Done, Making It All Work will take the process to the next level. David Allen shows us how to excel in dealing with our daily commitments, the unexpected, and the information overload that threatens to drown us.

Making It All Work provides an instantly usable, success-building tool kit for staying ahead of the game. Making It All Work addresses: how to figure out where you are in life and what you need; how to be your own consultant and a CEO of your life; moving from hope to trust in decision-making; when not to set goals; harnessing intuition, spontaneity, and serendipity; and why life is like business and business is like life.

I am looking forward to my Christmas reading. Do you have anything planned to read over the festive period? If so, I would love to hear about it.

David Allen – Making it all Work

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The new book from David Allen is now available for pre-order at the Amazon bookstore.

The book is being hailed as the sequel to the fantastic “Getting Things Done” and aims to start with the GTD book left off. Concentrating on winning at the game of work and the business of life.

I have already pre-ordered this via Amazon and I am sure lots of other people will also be doing who have been involved with the GTD Methodology.

Here is some blurb from the David Allen’s website.

From the author of the bestseller “Getting Things Done,” comes a new book that will change your life. “Getting Things Done” hit a nerve and spawned a movement with businesses, students, and techies all the way from Silicon Valley to Europe and Asia. Now, David Allen leads the world on a new path to achieve focus, control, and perspective. Throw out everything you know about productivity—”Making It All Work” will make life and work a game you can win.