Thanks to Brad Abare, I heard that Rob Bell has a new book out called, Jesus Wants to Save Christians: A Manifesto for the Church in Exile. I just got it last week and started diving into it this weekend. Given my publishing background, the format, and I mean the layout and design, is very non-traditional. It makes for interesting reading.

Once I get done, I’ll post a review of it here.

The hunt for an easy-to-use Mac-based “Getting Things Done” (GTD) system.

If you’ve ever been interested in improving your personal productivity, there’s no doubt you are likely to be familiar with such books as Getting Things Done (GTD) and 4-Hour Work Week. Both books are inspiring, but when it comes down to practical solutions, GTD has become the gold-standard. I highly recommend it if you’ve recently been caught drifting in a conversation because you forgot to do this, or forgot to email her that.

The Perfect GTD System

One of the cornerstones of the GTD personal productivity methodology is having a system that you completely trust. This eliminates the endless questioning of when and where did I put ____________. (For more on what makes a great system, check out this recent blog post on author David Allen’s website.) Unfortunately, the hunt for the perfect GTD-based system isn’t an easy one. There are a lot of options available and there seems to be more coming on the market regularly.

My Specific Needs

Before I jump into the heart of this post, I should give you context for my particular needs. I’m using a Mac, Entourage for email, address book and calendaring and a Palm 755p for my mobile needs. Ideally, I would find a solution that would allow me to sync Entourage and my Palm seamlessly.

After searching for the perfect mac-entourage-palm solution for quite some time, let me save you the hassle; as of 5/13/08, that solution does not exist. While you could hack your way to some form of synchronization, it will not happen easily and without trial and error. This, at the core of GTD, is grounds for distrust. Thus, I needed something simple and trustworthy.

GTD Software Solutions

After narrowing down my options, I chose to test and review: iGTD/iGTD2, OmniFocus, Inbox and Things. The winner is … Things.

Here’s six reason’s why:

• Simple to Use: The learning curve on this software is about 15-20 minutes. If it’s that easy to learn, imagine how easy it is to use on a regular basis
• In Development: The current version of Things is 0.9.1.1 but the new 1.0 version is due out any day. With most anything, I like to be part of something that’s moving forward. Like many of the other apps mentioned, this software is living and breathing. Expect new changes and feature add-ons regularly. For you iPhone users, expect your own version in late-June.
• Gorgeous Interface (see below): Let’s face it, we all like to look at pretty things. The Things interface is not only easy to use, but it’s fun to look at; which makes it more fun to interact with

• Does NOT Synchronize: While this may be a drawback for some, it’s not for me. At this point, unless it can natively sync with Entourage, I’m not interested in trying to make it work. I’ve spent the past six-months trying to get things to sync through SyncServices and it’s a nightmare. Things inability to sync actually puts my mind at rest on the idea. Otherwise, I’d be tempted to keep that loop wide open in an effort to achieve the sync.
• Brilliant Delegation: If you manage people and are regularly assigning tasks for future follow-up, Things has made delegation (@Waiting for) simple and easy to use by adding a “People” reference. This makes adding people to your project or task easy to do and easy to follow up on.
• The Magic Tag Bar: They decided to leave context lists out and use a familiar tagging system instead. At first I didn’t know if I’d like this, but now, it’s brilliant. There are many levels and features to this system; too many to be described in this post, but is here. Overall, it’s much more intuitive.

My Full GTD System

In order to keep my system functional both at the office and while being mobile, the rest of my system is defined by the following:

• Entourage - will track email, address book and calendaring
• Things - will track projects, tasks and due dates
• Palm - will track @Calls, @Errands, @Agenda’s, and @Lists (like books to read, movies to see…all things I generally discover outside of the office).
• Missing Sync: will be used to backup my phone and synchronize it with Entourage

Which do you prefer?

Have you discovered the benefits and joy of utilizing your own GTD system? I’d love to hear about yours. Post your comments below.

Helpful Links

• Buy Getting Things Done (Amazon.com)
• Download Things (Mac only)
• Getting Things Done Defined (Wikipedia)
• David Allen - Author of the book Getting Things Done
• 43Folders - Well-known personal productivity blog
• OSX Task Manager Showdown – iGTD2 vs Inbox vs OmniFocus vs Things - A much more in depth review and analysis of the software mentioned above

Recently, a friend of mine turned me onto a book that sounded appealing. He introduced it by explaining the power that happens when a pen and a piece of paper come together; ah, the hand written note. He reminded me of that feeling you get when a piece of mail is delivered, hand addressed and personalized just for me. Yeah, I love that feeling too. The art of letter writing is fleeting, but it doesn’t have to be.

The book, The Little Red Book of Wisdom, by Mark DeMoss, is full of great reminders, helpful insights and of course, wisdom. Here are just a few tidbits for you to chew on:

• “Focus is the discipline to say no to anything off-mission…” p.14
• “Find a job that you like so much that you’d do it without compensation; then do it so well that people will pay you to continue.” —Walt Disney
• “The stupidity of people comes from having an answer to everything. The wisdom of the novel comes from having a question for everything.” —Milan Kundera (p.80) << I found this especially convicting
• “Wise people, knowing they are fallible, hew to integrity as the compass that guides, the wall that protects, the glue that blinds.” —p.107

But I end with the most inspiring of all:

“Let the wise listen adn add to their learning.” —Proverbs 1:5