I learned even before reading GTD that the best thing I can do is schedule "work time" for myself. I generally give people until Monday to schedule meeting. The first thing I when I walk in Monday is find a four hour window for 'my projects'.

The second thing in your list I discovered listening to DA's podcast -- you have to do the weekly review. I had skipped a couple (ok maybe more) or had done only a quick glance at the list. I was feeling myself spiralling out of control and obsessing over small things. Once I sat down and did a thorough weekly review I was able to let go and go do something. Always good advice - To accomplish things you have to do something.

Thanks Joe Cool! That Weekly Review (GTD-style or whatever represents a thorough look at your stuff) tends to be one of the harder habits for people to adopt and keep. I'm no exception to that. I will find 100 things I could be doing instead of looking at my stuff and making decisions. But once I do it it does tend to smooth out the edges and let me do other things with more freedom.

Wow -was this ever a timely post. I had a busy week of friends calling with major crisis during my work day plus an unplanned change in leadership for one of my volunteer groups that resulted in 4 hours of additional work that forced me to push deadlines back on a couple of client projects. I am wondering, had I blocked out appointments for the client projects, perhaps I could have funneled the extra work into another slot or pleaded "Mercy" and delegated the work to someone else. Being self-employed, I don't have co-workers, but I can see the value of blocking off time for MY projects, even if no one sees them but me. Thanks for the post.

Ending the meeting a quarter before the hour is of course a fallacy. The meeting should end when the meeting is done.

As an IT consultant in the Netherlands I've had meetings in many companies over the years, including some major American ones.

Though the dutch are regarded as 'meeting-happy' I've noticed that while the dutch companies have many meetings, these don't tend to last longer than necessary, while the meetings in the American companies tended to use up the alloted time, even when all points had been discussed halfway through.

Interesting point Robbert. It's kind of like the mentality of the bigger the house, the more that fills it. The longer the allotted meeting time, the longer people are there, whether the time is needed or not.

Meeting efficiency could be an entire blog topic--and it has been on many occasions!

Thanks for posting.

Kaboom...great post, Kelly. Say it like it is.

Megadittos on blocking time to work on your own projects, particularly if in a shared calendar environment. I've saved myself a ton of time by this simply thing...I just have a "recurring" meeting set up for certain mornings, every week, infinelty to the future from 9-noon. It really helps.

Thanks for your good blog!!

There are some disturbing trends to some of the practices on the calendar:

1. People pay no attention to whether or not your calendar is booked; they just book the meeting.
2. Your manager overrides all of the calendar time.
3. My favorite: all the meeting materials are sent in e-mail two minutes before the meeting while you're just getting out of the previous meeting.

No good answers past what you've said, Kelly -- be selfish with your time.

I would add that one effective method of at least getting the meeting better organized is stating that the meeting notice needs to have the agenda in the calendar invite. No agenda, no attendance.

But it's tough.

I'd love to do this -- but as a university professor - I am expected to have a completely 'open door' policy - students can and do drop by at any time. If I block out time and they see I am there - they run to the dept head (who hates the policy as much as I do). So between classes, open door hours, and committee meetings -- just how do I schedule time AT WORK - to get things done?

Its an interesting point that you make about checking emails before meetings. I think its important in case you miss something that you might need to know before the meeting. On the other hand, there are lots of GTD blogs telling people not to check their email first thing in the morning, that they should complete some tasks first because reading email will send their brain down other paths. I guess they are usually talking about getting a particular task done, not having meetings.

Hi Kate,

I appreciate what a tough spot you are in. I know what has worked for others in your position is to make their office somewhere other than your office, temporarily, to get things done. For example, some people will find another spot on campus or in their building (a conference room, coffee shop etc.) just to get some uninterrupted time. If you've got a laptop this is ideal. One our clients goes so far as to give participants in the GTD classes yellow police tape to put around their cubicle that says, "Do not disturb...Work in progress." It's a bit over the top, but I've heard it works and others respect that the person needs some uninterrupted time. Good luck.

Kelly

Kate
My university also has an open door policy and have got around this by timetabling student time and also 'by appointment only' time and pinning these timetables to office doors. At the start of each semester the students are provided with these access times with their unit outlines. This way if a student calls or drops in you can direct them to either open student time or ask them to schedule an appointment if it is private rather than academic matter. Hope this helps

I would be close to lost if I didn't do a weekly review. I have a very large number of clients that are being taken care of by a smaller core team. All of us are using strict GTD and various own methods that allow us to work very effectively - we have built a solid reputation in Toronto life insurance.