The Five Step Process - the art of productivity

Before we look at the concept, we should review the model of the general five step process for stress free productivity that David Allen explains in his book and his webcast "Knowledge Work Athletics" (link). The model makes sense if we look at it from the bottom up (logic arrow).

• Do - first, we have important things to do in the Do step, but how do we make sure we get to do them?
• Review - we have to prioritize and plan on daily, weekly, monthly and annual basis to ensure we align our short term priorities with our goals, responsibilities and dreams. To plan and prioritize, we need to know all tasks and appointments so we can evaluate them against each other, but how do we ensure that we have them all and ready for comparison?
• Organize - we have to organize all items in a trusted system that will allow us to hold all items and remind us of deadlines. To organize all items, we need to sort them in an meaningful way that will allow us to act on tasks and appointments as well as find reference material, but how do we ensure that?
• Process - we have to process all items to understand them and to sort them. This requires we first understand them, evaluate what is required and what the real next action is. To be able to process all stuff, we need to have them all, but how do we do that?
• Collect - we collect all items from predefined approved collection points or inboxes on regular intervals.

The first point to notice is that we must empty our head for all commitments as the mind is a bad system for storage since nothing can be indexed, easily retrieved and no reminders exists. Also, there is only so much we can hold in our mind.

Another point to notice is that we must empty our inboxes and process all stuff often on a regular basis to be able to plan from a holistic point of view and to avoid crisis. This means that especially the email inbox should be emptied daily if possible and not used as an archive. Only if we have all items collected can we compare and prioritize between them.

A third point to notice is that when we process our stuff, we need to determine which items requires actions so we can plan on them and we need to identify what the real next action for a task is to be able to "do" anything.

Sources/Links:

David Allen Webcast: Knowledge Worker Athletics
David Allen on YouTube