Ready For Anything: 52 Productivity Principles For Getting Things Done By David Allen

Ready for Anything: 52 Productivity Principles for Getting Things Done By David Allen List Price: $15.00 Price: $10.20 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Ships from and sold by Amazon.com 117 new or used available from $3.11 Average customer review: (50 customer reviews)

Product Description

In his bestselling first book, Getting Things Done, veteran coach and management consultant David Allen presented his breakthrough methods to increase efficiency. Now "the personal productivity guru" (Fast Company) shows readers how to increase their ability to work better, not harder—every day. Based on Allen's highly popular e-newsletter, Ready for Anything offers readers 52 ways to immediately clear your head for creativity, focus your attention, create structures that work, and take action to get things moving.

With wit, inspiration, and know-how, Allen shows readers how to make things happen—with less effort and stress, and lots more energy, creativity, and effectiveness. Ready for Anything is the perfect book for anyone wanting to work and live at his or her very best.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9324 in Books
• Published on: 2004-12-28
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Dimensions: .52" h x 5.72" w x 7.90" l, .36 pounds
• Binding: Paperback
• 192 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780143034544
• Condition: New
• Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! BUY WITH CONFIDENCE, Over one million books sold! 98% Positive feedback. Compare our books, prices and service to the competition. 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed

Editorial Reviews

Review
No one makes the challenges of productivity more understandable and manageable. (Rob Johnston, President of Leader to Leader Institute) This fundamentally different look at productivity makes David's book not just a good read, but something [to] truly live by. (Keith Yamashita, author of Unstuck: A Tool For Yourself, Your Team, and Your World) These powerful and practical pointers for living a more productive life are as subtle and rich as they are simple. (Arianna Huffington)

About the Author
David Allen is president of The David Allen Company and has more than twenty years experience as a consultant and executive coach for such organizations as Microsoft, the Ford Foundation, L.L.Bean, and the World Bank. His work has been featured in Fast Company, Fortune, Atlantic Monthly, The Oprah Magazine, and many other publications.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Introduction:Making It Easy to Take It Easy

MAXIMUM PRODUCTIVITY is making something happenófurniture, freeways, or funówith as little effort as possible. The fact that we have ìeffortî at all, though, implies that we confront resistance and impediments when we want to get anything done. Improving productivity has a lot to do with dealing more effectively with the hindrances, barriers, and distractions that show up in our wayóanything that opposes or weakens our forward motion. In a totally frictionless world, everything would just appear as soon as it was imaginedóthere would be little need to train for greater flexibility and focus or to install better systems and approaches. In the world you and I inhabit, however, to really get what we want most effectively, we have to be ready for anything. And there are things we can all do, anytime, that make it easier to take things in stride and stay the course.

Iíve spent more than two decades exploring the best methods to achieve a more relaxed, positive, and sustainable way to live and work. And as a management consultant and productivity coach, Iíve helped thousands of professionals implement what Iíve discovered to be the best ways to work more productively and get more enjoyment from what theyíre doing. When people gain a method of achieving that kind of balance in their day-to-day endeavors, no matter whatís going on, they have easier access to more of their intuition and creativity. They become better at processing information, managing their thoughts and feelings, focusing on results, and trusting their judgments about what to do next. They have a systematic approach in place for dealing with themselves and their work, which is far more useful than merely relying on ad hoc, reactive behaviors to bail them out of the pressures and crises of their world. When people know they have a process in place to handle any situation, they are more relaxed. When theyíre relaxed, everything improves. More gets done, with less effort, and a host of other wonderful side effects emerge that add to the outcomes of their efforts and the quality of their life.

The methods I teach came from the behaviors and the systems I discovered that worked the best to keep us at our best. Since the early 1980s, they have been tested and proven highly effective, from the ground upófor both individuals and organizations. The steps of this discovery and this process were described in my first book, Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity. Its success around the world indicated that people across a wide spectrum of cultures and careers seemed ready for this information and eager for change. They were tired of feeling overwhelmed by their jobs and the business of life. They wanted to regain lost opportunities for creative thinking and playing. They were looking for a new approach, a system that could be counted on, no matter what kind of job they had or what kind of day they were having. They wanted a structureóbut a natural one that matched their complex lifestyles and created more freedom, not more constraint.

While I was uncovering and implementing the details of the what, when, and how that made up the heart of my programs, I started doing something else: I began writing about the why behind these steps. Why did they work so well? Why did they consistently help people function at a higher capacity and feel better? Was something deeper at work here? What was the foundation behind this success? There seemed to be underlying principles that wove themselves in and through the methodologyófactors that held true no matter when, where, or with whom they were applied.

A person can be an excellent race-car driver without knowing anything about gravity, even though gravity is the underlying force affecting everything one does behind the wheel. To win races, the driver needs only to master the steering, the speed on the straightaways, and the technique of the turns, and to remember to keep the car under control at all times. You do your job, and gravity will do its job. Manage yourself, and the automobile will be fine. But what if driving fast isnít enough after a while? What if you want to know more about why your skills work so well and how they keep you from crashing and burning? What if you want to get closer to the secrets behind your own successes? And what if understanding those secrets leads to more tools for productivity and even greater achievements?

In 1997, I began exploring these questions by compiling a set of principles that seemed to lie at the foundation of productive behavior and writing informal essays about the implications and applications of those truths in everyday life. I started to enlarge on my core premise that oneís ability to be productive was directly proportional to oneís ability to relax. I dug further into four main areas of productive behavior:

1. Capturing and corralling all our internal and external ìopen loopsî to regain clarity and energy.
2. Consciously managing our focus within the multiple levels of outcomes and responsibilities to which we are committed.
3. Creating trusted structures and consistent usage of them to trigger the appropriate focus and reminders as necessary.
4. Grounding it all with flexible, forward motion at the physical-action level.

I discovered that people didnít need more discipline as suchóthey needed a disciplined approach. They didnít need to work harderóthey needed to define their work better at multiple levels of detail and stay focused on all of them simultaneously.

Behind all this lay the ìmind like waterî concept, an image Iíd come across years ago while studying karate. When you throw a pebble into a pond, what does the water do? It responds with total appropriateness to the force and mass of the rock. It does nothing more and nothing less. It doesnít overreact or underreact. It doesnít react at all. It simply interacts with whatever comes to it and then returns to its natural state. The water can do that only by design. A human being can act this way only if he or she has a conscious system in place and if that system is built on principles that can withstand chaos and stress. Those principles must be aligned with something deeper in our nature.

Two years after I began writing the essays, I decided to write and distribute a newsletter to those who were becoming familiar with my methods. My hope was to galvanize a network of practitioners and to build a community of people dedicated to doing good work, sharing their best practices, and celebrating life. Each newsletter was intended to reinforce and expand the ideas behind relaxed control and performance excellence. I wondered if people would respond.

My answer soon exceeded my expectations. Within two years, our readership had grown tenfold, from two thousand to twenty thousand subscribers. A year later it had reached thirty thousand and was still gathering momentum. People were sending out the newsletters through their own online networks. They were being e-mailed across the country and around the globe. Other folks were printing, stapling, and binding hard copies and distributing them to their friends and colleagues. Still others were posting them in elevators at work. They were showing up everywhere. Some of the essays leaned more toward practical advice, and others delved below the surface. All were developing and growing my understanding of the ìwhy,î and all were adding value to what had come before.

The feedback was overwhelmingly positiveópeople seemed hungry for reinforcement of the basics, exploration of the subtleties, and the adventure of the surprises produced by some of the simplest techniques, tools, and awarenesses. These were hardly people in the Remedial Living class eitheróthe most profound rewards from using this material have been reported by some of the best and brightest people on the planet, many already in the top percentiles of productivity, by anyoneís standards.

It was time to put this material together into a book of its own.

The following principles, commentaries, and essays form a body of thought that I believe offers more than just tips or tricks. Whether or not people implemented the complete method of best practices I delineated in Getting Things Done, there were still things everyone could do more and more consistently, anytime, that would improve their productivity and well-being. These are the elements you will find validated and reinforced in these principles and essays.

The writings have been sorted into the four major areas of productive behavior they support: completion, focus, structure, and action. The principles and essays grouped as such are meant not to be limited to these headings or to give an exhaustive exposition of those topics but rather to stimulate your own thinking and validations of better ways to handle things.

There are times when individuals (and groups) will get the most leverage out of completing old stuff and clearing the decks (Part I). Other times a focus on the right focus is the primary key (Part II). Still other situations will call for structures and systems as most important for growth (Part III). And others will require simply letting go of trying to get it perfect and just get going (Part IV). All these aspects are important, but often one specifically will be the trigger point for busting through into a next level of productivity. Part V offers checklists as reference and reminders of the core practices for staying on top of the flow.

You will notice that the essays are not precise expositions of the principles they follow but rather food-for-thought spins on the topics.* And the concluding ìBy the way...î questions are merely catalysts for your own reflection about possible applications ìback at the ranch.î Human behavior and awareness can be at the same time really simple, really complex, and infinitely explorable, and Iíve tried not to nail down anything too hard. But youíll find at least hints as to how work functions at higher levels, how we ...

Customer Reviews

Most helpful customer reviews

381 of 394 people found the following review helpful.
David Allen's new book hits the mark.
By Bruce C. Houghton
Let me start by admitting that while I'm a huge fan of David Allen and his wonderful productivity theories and practices, I found his first book "Getting Things Done" a rather tough read. A lot of great info was certainly there, but somehow the way it was written left my head spinning. Eventually I began to understand the systems and implement them, but I couldn't get over the nagging feeling that these theories and practices that were so basic and logical did not have to be so hard to grasp.

All of these shortcomings have been fixed in this great new book. Allen's theories, practices and strategies are delivered in 2-5 page bite sized pieces which much better suit his writing style. Each of the 52 short chapters can be devoured in a few minutes and can be understood and internalized individually or in well organized clusters as fits you best.

In a perfect world I'd suggest skimming Allen's first book so that you get an over view of his "systems"; then read this book for a bunch of "I get it!" moments; and then back to "Getting Things Done" for a more careful read. In fact, that's what I'm going to do.

But even if you never read Allen's first book; this new one is well worth the time because it will force you to look at work, time, and all of the stuff that clutters your mind and life in entirely new ways.

174 of 178 people found the following review helpful.
Unnecessary
By Winter Aura
I can not recommend David Allen's earlier book, Getting Things Done, highly enough. I read it six months ago and continue to follow his system, using the Outlook plug-in sold on his web site. I had made a reminder when I finished that book to re-read it in six months. When the time came, I decided to pick up this book instead. It was a mistake.

Ready For Anything is a series of short inspirational essays on productivity. It has a strong self-help feel to it. If you've read GTD and aren't convinced that the system is worth implementing, maybe this book will sell it to you. For those who are already practicing the system, it doesn't offer a whole lot. Many essays are about the importance of having a system, or the importance of the weekly review, a key element of the system. Others are simply meanderings with no concrete purpose. There are quotes peppered in the margins throughout. While some are thought-provoking, they distracted me from the main text. I'd prefer to see them at the beginning or end of the essay.

If you haven't read Getting Things Done, absolutely read that first. If you need a little motivation to keep you on track, maybe Ready For Anything will help.

211 of 220 people found the following review helpful.
Tune-up after Getting Things Done
By peederj
While this is an outstanding book, I highly recommend his first work, Getting Things Done. Since this doesn't have a consistent narrative but is instead broken up into numerous tiny essays, it will be harder to get the maximum benefit from his approach to personal productivity from this alone.

Readers who "got" Getting Things Done don't need my advice on this one...they've already bought it I'm sure.

David Allen is probably the smartest personal productivity coach in print. I would buy Getting Things Done for every employee in my organization, and I would have copies of this one lying around to remind people and elaborate on some of the finer points.

Oh and I would like to add one point. I believe there is one thing missing from Mr. Allen's algorithm. That is finishing. I think his plan is outstanding for getting unstuck: figure out the next action, and do it without hesitation. But I don't find any attention paid to how to decide how many actions are "enough" for a desired outcome of a project.

You can always find some next action, and founder in what software engineers like myself call "permanent beta" or "feature creep." Yet external constraints are best not relied on exclusively for these decisions. It's best to volunteer a ruthless focus on the essence of your project's deliverable, isn't it?

So I would like Mr. Allen to write his next book about finishing projects, if he is able to develop insights into that stage as strong as his insights into the process of the middle stages.