We strive everyday to be more productive. And productivity is all about getting things done isn’t? Quad erat demonstrandum, the more stuff I get done, the more productive I am being.
Well, not necessarily. Everyone knows the feeling when you haven’t stopped from getting up until going to bed but can’t work out what kept you so busy. You will have got plenty done, but was it really quality work, done once?
What do I mean by this? Lets look at the two aspects separately:
Quality Work
Here we are not talking about the output – I’m sure Messers Hemingway, Shakespeare and Bacon are very impressed – but we are instead talking about what you actually decided to do in the first place.
In everyday life this is checking your RSS feeds, revising your fantasy sports team and spending 2 hours on Twitter, but not getting around to renewing your car insurance which expired last week.
In GTD-speak we can think of this as pushing too many things into the Next Action bucket, when they should be in the Delegate, Someday/Maybe, or Trash bucket.
When you sit down and decide what you are about to do, ask yourself “am I really adding any value with this?”. Does this improve your businesses, your role, your relationship with your boss etc. If so, you are focusing your time on Quality Work.
Done Once
Why would anyone do something more than once? Surely that is a waste of their time and resources. But we all do it on a daily basis from the simplest tasks to the most complex projects.
For example, last week my car ran out of washer fluid – rather than fill it up, I just quickly put a glass or two of water in to ‘keep it going’. I have done this 3 times now whereas a the extra 5 minutes originally filling it to the top would have saved me 3 times that – along with a fair bit of inconvenience!
When we start a task we need to think through what the most effective way of completing it is, and not just dive headlong in. What achieves the overall aims of the task in the most efficient and complete manner?
Quality Work, Done Once
Putting this together, we should assess any activity in the following ways before we jump in:
- Does this activity really add-value? Is it Quality Work?
- How do I meet the goals of this activity in the most effective and complete manner? How do I ensure it is Done Once?
What are you planning on doing today? Is it Quality Work, Done Once?
