Conrey is for Closers

Everyone has their own method to their GTD madness, here’s a brief rundown on what I use to make my day productive and painless:

Software:

• Things (both iPhone and desktop app) – By far the best to-do list manager I’ve ever used (and I’ve used them all).   The syncing between the iPhone and desktop app is getting better by the day, and this app is worth every penny.  If you get the iPhone app and love it, shell out for the desktop app, the ease to add to-dos makes it my daily hero.
• Tweetdeck/Nambu – if Twitter is a part of your daily work then you need a better way to manage the incoming streams of data.   I’m currently switching from Tweetdeck to Nambu due to some of the ways it handles unread items, but either one of these is a powerful tool to manange your Twitter data
• Google Calendar – I use the week view and multiple colored calendars to plan my weekly agenda and appointments.   Adding guest invites so that I can collaborate with other people and get on their schedule is important in any busy organization.
• GMail – Mail.app doesn’t work for me – Gmail’s interface is the gold standard for how web applications should work.
• OSX – too much flexibility here to not vote for this over windows or linux
• iPhone – voice recording app, Things app, camera, and access to my email wherever I go – how did I live without an iPhone?

Low Tech:

• Moleskine – my notebook carries meeting notes, business cards, and phone numbers for nearly everyone I talk to and nearly every meeting I’ve been in for the last 6 months.   Any notebook COULD work, but the sturdy covers and solid binding hold up to someone who is hard on their stuff like I am.
• Cheap Pens – I lose pens constantly, so I can’t justify spending a ton of money on a nice pen.  I buy these by the bucketload and lose them all the time without feeling bad.
• Post It Notes – great for quick visible reminders or self-motivational notes.  No good salesman exists without notes to himself in post-its somewhere
• SwissGear Backpack – great organizer backpack designed to carry a laptop and all my other gear.   Easily big enough to carry enough stuff for a 3 day trip if you can travel light, padded enough and with enough smaller pockets to keep your stuff organized and easy to get at.
• Wallet Pen – Just in case you find yourself without a normal pen, carry a small pen in your wallet and you’ll never be caught breaking one of my rules.

What do you use to Get Things Done?

Today will be the 11th Productivity Wednesday since I started this whole thing – so enough data to give some perspective on it. What have I learned?

• Some people still don’t get that I’m not just being productive on Wednesdays, just focusing on it.   Its like Mother’s Day – I love my mom every day, but I get to celebrate it once a year.
• Having one dedicated day that I know I can crank away on stuff and people are going to respect that I’m heads down more than usual is nice.
• Turning off tweetdeck every once in a while is a good thing.
• People are starting to join up – search #productivitywednesday on twitter and you’ll start to see about a dozen regulars posting with the hashtag (usually at the beginning of the day then not much until the evening).
• It isn’t easy to focus every wednesday on keeping it up – but not everything is easy every time you do it
• Having Hacknight at the end of Productivity Wednesday is a nice way to know that I’ll be able to let off some steam at the end of a hard day.
• I find other people helping to keep me motivated and on task to support my productivity – often in obscure ways like public humiliations and mockery – but it works.

This is not the end of Productivity Wednesday, but hopefully a way for more of you to jump on board and start to use it to be more productive in your own workspace.

At the beginning of February we at Integrum ran into a busy couple of weeks, and I felt a little out of gear when it came to getting stuff done. We returned to AZ from client meetings in California late on a Tuesday night and had less than 5 hours to sleep before returning on Wednesday. Both Jade and I came in ready to rock on Wednesday and energized by our client meetings so I declared the day “Productivity Wednesday” and started tracking how many to-do’s came off my list.

12 to-do’s later I called it a successful day. The next week I crossed off 16 things.

Now of course I’m aiming for this kind of production everyday, but having a stated target and tweeting about it gives me some level of accountability. It gives me one day a week where I know that I’m turning off tweetdeck, putting my shoulder to the wheel, and cranking out to-dos. Not only that but the concept is spreading – I’m starting to see some twitter traffic with the tag.

So how do you get play? Tweet on wednesday with a goal, and #productivitywednesday as your hash tag. As you get things done, tweet again – get some encouragement – give some to others – and watch the To-Do List check boxes get filled up.

Productivity Wednesday starts in less than 9 hours – are you ready?