13 min
Why Everything Must Start From Your Areas of Focus. The Working With... Podcast
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We’ve reached a rather special milestone this week. This is the 150th episode of the Working With… Podcast so I thought this week I would explain something important about how great productivity systems are built.
You can subscribe to this podcast on:
Podbean | Apple Podcasts | Stitcher | Spotify | TUNEIN
Links:
Email Me | Twitter | Facebook | Website | Linkedin
Why Your System Must Start At An Area of Focus Level
Steve Jobs’s Crazy Ones recording
Your Digital Life 3.0 Online
Carl’s Time Sector System Blog Post
The FREE Beginners Guide To Building Your Own COD System
Carl Pullein Learning Centre
Carl’s YouTube Channel
Carl Pullein Coaching Programmes
The Working With… Podcast Previous episodes page
Script
Episode 150
Hello and welcome to episode 150 of the Working With Podcast. A podcast to answer all your questions about productivity, time management, self-development and goal planning. My name is Carl Pullein and I am your host for this show.
So, in a little change from the usual format, today I want to explain how to build your very own productivity system from the basic foundations.
As with all building, it starts with solid foundations and most people’s productivity systems fall apart not because of a lack of discipline but because the foundations on which the system is built are not strong.
There are three essential parts to any productivity system. There is the daily level—the tasks you complete. There is the project level, the group of connected tasks that when completed results is a finished project and then there is the areas of focus—the foundations of the system.
Now, It does not matter about the app you are using, it does not matter what industry you are working in. What matters are the foundations on which your whole system is built. I actually think this is a weakness in the Getting Things Done methodology. In the GTD book, there is a lot of stuff about collecting, managing your stuff and creating file folders for the different projects you create as a result of what you collected, but there is very little on why you are collecting that stuff. GTD focuses too much on the daily and project level and not enough on the foundational level.
You see, everything begins with your areas of focus or areas of responsibility. (There are many different ways of describing these). Essentially what this means are the very things you consider to be important in your life.
For most people, these will be things like:
Family and relationships
Your career
Your health
Your spirituality
Personal development
Life experiences — the places you want to visit, the things you want to experience.
Your finances
And your purpose in life.
There are more, but essentially most people would consider these areas of life as being important.
Now the funny thing is each of these areas will have a different level of importance depending on where you are in your life. If you are in your twenties, your relationships, career and life experiences are likely to be your top priorities. In your thirties, your family, life experiences and career. In your forties, it’s likely to be your personal development, finances and purpose in life. Fifties; finances will be near the top, your health and your family and so on. It changes with us and we are all different so the mix will be different for each of us.
But wherever you are in life, if you have not got these down, your system will be built on a foundation of sand. You will have no direction, no levels of importance that match where you are in life and so you will be operating from the level of your projects. Essentially your daily to-do list will be just that. A daily to-do list of tasks that are not connected in any way to what is really important to you.
And if you don’t know what your areas of focus are, where will your projects generally come from? Your work projects are likely to come from your company and boss. Your family projects will be a compromise with
We’ve reached a rather special milestone this week. This is the 150th episode of the Working With… Podcast so I thought this week I would explain something important about how great productivity systems are built.
You can subscribe to this podcast on:
Podbean | Apple Podcasts | Stitcher | Spotify | TUNEIN
Links:
Email Me | Twitter | Facebook | Website | Linkedin
Why Your System Must Start At An Area of Focus Level
Steve Jobs’s Crazy Ones recording
Your Digital Life 3.0 Online
Carl’s Time Sector System Blog Post
The FREE Beginners Guide To Building Your Own COD System
Carl Pullein Learning Centre
Carl’s YouTube Channel
Carl Pullein Coaching Programmes
The Working With… Podcast Previous episodes page
Script
Episode 150
Hello and welcome to episode 150 of the Working With Podcast. A podcast to answer all your questions about productivity, time management, self-development and goal planning. My name is Carl Pullein and I am your host for this show.
So, in a little change from the usual format, today I want to explain how to build your very own productivity system from the basic foundations.
As with all building, it starts with solid foundations and most people’s productivity systems fall apart not because of a lack of discipline but because the foundations on which the system is built are not strong.
There are three essential parts to any productivity system. There is the daily level—the tasks you complete. There is the project level, the group of connected tasks that when completed results is a finished project and then there is the areas of focus—the foundations of the system.
Now, It does not matter about the app you are using, it does not matter what industry you are working in. What matters are the foundations on which your whole system is built. I actually think this is a weakness in the Getting Things Done methodology. In the GTD book, there is a lot of stuff about collecting, managing your stuff and creating file folders for the different projects you create as a result of what you collected, but there is very little on why you are collecting that stuff. GTD focuses too much on the daily and project level and not enough on the foundational level.
You see, everything begins with your areas of focus or areas of responsibility. (There are many different ways of describing these). Essentially what this means are the very things you consider to be important in your life.
For most people, these will be things like:
Family and relationships
Your career
Your health
Your spirituality
Personal development
Life experiences — the places you want to visit, the things you want to experience.
Your finances
And your purpose in life.
There are more, but essentially most people would consider these areas of life as being important.
Now the funny thing is each of these areas will have a different level of importance depending on where you are in your life. If you are in your twenties, your relationships, career and life experiences are likely to be your top priorities. In your thirties, your family, life experiences and career. In your forties, it’s likely to be your personal development, finances and purpose in life. Fifties; finances will be near the top, your health and your family and so on. It changes with us and we are all different so the mix will be different for each of us.
But wherever you are in life, if you have not got these down, your system will be built on a foundation of sand. You will have no direction, no levels of importance that match where you are in life and so you will be operating from the level of your projects. Essentially your daily to-do list will be just that. A daily to-do list of tasks that are not connected in any way to what is really important to you.
And if you don’t know what your areas of focus are, where will your projects generally come from? Your work projects are likely to come from your company and boss. Your family projects will be a compromise with
13 min