Genuine Curiosity

Author Dwayne Melancon is always on the lookout for new things to learn. An ecclectic collection of postings on personal productivity, travel, good books, gadgets, leadership & management, and many other things.

 

Category sprawl and GTD

I’m in the process of doing a “reset” on my GTD system.  Basically, I ripped out all of my categories, printed out all my list and deleted them, and am starting from scratch.

Why? I found that I let my lists turn into “junk drawers” which meant that I was a) afraid to open some of them, and b) couldn’t find anything useful when I did force myself to open them.

One of the culprits was what I call “category sprawl,” which meant that I created so many granular categories for my tasks, and so many goofy ‘contexts’ that my lists really weren’t all that useful any more.

Basically, I acted like I was “special” and made a bunch of changes to the recommended GTD method.  It was fun for a while but turned out to be not such a great idea.  And now I’m paying the price.

Preventing the sprawl – my strategy

outlookcategories I’ve taken a number of steps to try to get back into a clean place with GTD:

  1. I have reverted to the recommended, default contexts as recommended by David Allen (those shown in the screen grab at right). [Note:  I am about to add one additional category called @ONLINE but will try not to add any more].
  2. I turned of automatic categorization in ClearContext so that I have to manually assign categories to tasks.  (This wasn’t an issue for the GTD Outlook Add-In)
  3. I am “forcing” all of my next actions to fit into one of these categories.

There are (obviously) a lot of other tweaks I’m doing to my process, like getting back into the discipline of truly identifying physical next actions, moving all projects I’m not actively working on to SOMEDAY/MAYBE, and more.

If you’re a GTD person and you find yourself with category sprawl, this kind of a clean-slate approach might help.  Let me know if this resonates with you, or if you’ve got any best practices for a GTD reset.

Guiding principles and teamwork

agree In my “day job” our team is working to up-level our effectiveness.  One of the aspects of this is re-forging our agreements with each other and clarifying expectations for how we engage.  We have a set of guiding principles that I thought I’d share here, since I think they are very empowering.

  • The team trusts one another
  • The team engages in unfiltered conflict around ideas
  • The team commits to decision and plans
  • The team holds one another accountable for delivery on plans
  • The team focuses on achievement of collective results

If you’ve ever read Patrick Lencioni’s “Five Dysfunctions of a Team,” these should look familiar – they are modeled after the advice in that book.  As a team (the whole company is being exposed to this as part of our process), we’re all reading this (excellent) book and using it to help us through the process.

We are nowhere as messed up as the team in Lencioni’s fable, but we are also not perfect in our practice of these principles.  What I find empowering about this list is that it establishes a benchmark for us and a way to do some gap analysis by asking questions like:

  • In the situation we just completed (project, discussion, etc.) how did we do as a team in honoring these principles?
  • How well did I do individually?
  • In the next [week, month, quarter, year] what can I do to meaningfully improve my contribution to these principles.

Obviously, there a bunch of things that work alongside these, such as how we learn from our inevitable missteps, how we bring new people into our teams in a way that prepares them for success, how (and how often) we evaluate ourselves against these.  But the nice thing is we now have a structure in which to analyze how we’re working together.

What about you – does your organization have such principles?  Are they implicit or explicit?  Are they working or not? 

What can you share about how to improve an organization’s ability to work together?

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That’s a great question…

If you’ve ever read my profile on the blog, you will know that the very essence of “genuine curiosity” as a concept is that you change your interactions with the world by asking open-ended, evocative questions.

Yes/No is a no-no

The main thing to remember with the genuine curiosity concept is that the questions should not be answerable with a yes/no response (unlike my daughter’s unusual questionnaire, at right). 

The idea is to get people to talk and see where the conversation goes.

I’ve heard some great questions since I’ve started listening for them.  Back in 2005, I wrote about a few general purpose “discovery questions,” best used on others – especially people you don’t know very well.

Going deeper

I have started a list of the really great questions I hear, and my favorites are those that cause really deep thinking.  These can be used on others as coaching exercises or, in many cases, on yourself to get to a deeper level of introspection.

One guy that has Great questions is Michael Bungay Stanier from Box of Crayons.  I’ve heard a number of his questions from interviews he’s done with David Allen (the “GTD Guy”) and have enjoyed them immensely.

I finally got around to watching an awesome, 5 minute film that Michael has created called “The 5.75 Questions You’ve Been Avoiding.”  This is an entertaining way to get to some really insightful questions – ones that can really help you improve yourself if you’re willing to put in the time to think about them.

After watching the video, if you like how he thinks be sure & check out the “Great Work Blog.” 

Trust and the test of relationships

A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of attending a talk by Stephen M. R. Covey, author of “The Speed of Trust.”  Covey is an excellent speaker, because he has a way of crystallizing his points with stories and personalized exercises.

An Exercise in Trust

test_tubeOne such exercise was the following.  I encourage you to actually go through it right now – it won’t take long, and I think it will be enlightening.

Part 1: High Trust

Identify a person you work with whom you feel you have a “high trust relationship.”  Got them in mind?  Now, ask yourself each of the following question and take about 10-15 seconds to write down the first responses that come to mind for each question:

  1. What is it like to work with this person?
  2. What is it like to communicate with this person?
  3. How fast can you get things done?
  4. What are the results when you work together?

Part 2: Low Trust

Identify a person you work with whom you feel you have a “low trust relationship.”  Got them in mind?  Once again, ask yourself each of the following question and take about 10-15 seconds to write down the first responses that come to mind for each question:

  1. What is it like to work with this person?
  2. What is it like to communicate with this person?
  3. How fast can you get things done?
  4. What are the results when you work together?

Comparing the Results

If you’re like me, the results you see will mirror Covey’s description of the characteristics of each type of relationship:

High Trust: Open, energetic, and authentic.  Things get done quickly when working together, usually with great results.

Low Trust:  Guarded, calculating, with information hiding and “CYA” behaviors.  Working together is an energy-draining experience, and the results usually aren’t very impressive.

The Litmus Test

Covey’s point in all of this was how much trust impacts the speed and cost of getting things done, and how much more efficient & effective high trust relationships are.

But what really drove this home for me was the “litmus test” Covey offered, by which you can quickly tell the difference between high- and low-trust relationships:

  • “In a high-trust relationship, even if you say the wrong thing, the other person will still ‘get’ your intent or motive.”
  • “In a low-trust relationship, you can be very precise & measured and the other person will still misinterpret you.”

Powerful stuff, that.  I think I may go back and read his book again.

Always something there to remind me...

This week, I've been an adult leader at a Boy Scout summer camp and it has been a great experience. Not only has it been relaxing, it has been a refreshing week of interactions with others - adults and young men, alike.


One of the things I noticed was how well the camp we attended has created "embedded" reminders of the core values of Scouting throughout the camp. These core values are represented in the Scout Law:

A Scout is: Trustworthy, Loyal, Helpful, Friendly, Courteous, Kind, Obedient, Cheerful, Thrifty, Brave, Clean, and Reverent.

The goal of these points is to remind Scouts of the character attributes they should aspire to exemplify in life. At the camp this week, there were signs reminding everyone of these values and many of them were just-in-time triggers, like the "Clean" sign above (placed just outside the dining hall), and the "Thrifty" sign at the front of the Trading Post.

Of course, the challenge is always to make a good, values-aligned choice even when there aren't reminders right in front of you. With this in mind, I encourage you to think about the values that define your character from time to time.

Are there any areas around your guiding principles where you can improve? If so, what can you do to become more aligned with your desired values? Are there any ways you can embed reminders in your life to better anchor you to where you'd like to be?

-- Post From My iPhone