A popular methodology for task management is based on a book by David Allen called “Getting Things Done”. The main concept of the methodology is that for your mind to work effectively, it has to stop spending all of its time just remembering what has to be done next and instead working on the actual actions of doing it.

According to the methodology, your mind should be emptied of these “open loop” distractions of “to dos” by storing them all in some kind of “trusted system” that you can then organize anduse to refer back to all your tasks.

The “trusted system” can be a notebook or a PDA or something on your computer.

GTD-Free is a application that runs on Windows, Mac and Linux and is a straight forward implementation of the GTD methodology and can be used as the trusted system and for organizing your tasks.

The workflow for GTD consists of 5 steps, each represented by a process in GTD-Free.  The Organize and Review steps are combined – and Do is called Execute (which sounds a little like the task is given a blindfold, a last cigarette and put up against a wall).

The basic idea is to do a “Collect(ion)” of all the tasks you’re carrying around in your head and “untrusted” systems (like stickies).

The next step is to Process the tasks by going from the top to bottom of your list, one at a time, determining  if an item requires action and then filing it, throwing it away or incubating it for later action.

Then the Organizing step determines the next action the item requires to complete it and organizing it so that it can be done when ready.  Reviewing the categories should be an on-going process done daily with a major review done weekly.

Do is pretty simply, when you finally start working on the items to get them finished.

GTD Workflow:

1. Collect
2. Process
3. Organize
4. Review
5. Do

GTD-Free is a great free way to begin to explore GTD and to find out whether it makes sense for you.  If you like it, there are scores of other systems to help you collect, process and organize your tasks.  We’ll be reporting on others of them here at Enquiring Mimes from time to time.

Download GTD-Free [via lifehacker]

Getting Things Done Resources

Wikipedia

GTD Dictionary

A Primer on Getting Things Done

Related articles:

• Advanced Guide to Getting Things Done in Remember the Milk [GTD]
• In search of a GTD solution