thinking about going to the Roadmap.

[kermalou]

The Roadmap is coming to Los Angeles and I am thinking of going.

I am new to this GTD stuff this week actually and my book is coming from Amazon. Do you guys think that the Roadmap is helpful without completely reading the book? I dont want to miss an opportunity of going to this event as well.

thanks.

[Mark Jantzen]

I would highly recommend going. I went to the Boston RoadMap back in September. It was a great mix of fresh GTD ideas and old standby fundamentals.

They handed out a paperback version of David's book along with a dense seminar workbook. Not the only reason to go, but could influence your Amazon purchase.

I've seen DA twice live. Well worth it!

Mark

[kermalou]

but I haven't done any of his stuff yet, is it too much too soon?

[CosmoGTD]

It looks like the one day seminar is $600.
So it ain't cheap.
Weren't the last seminars a couple hundred bucks?

I wouldn't go for that price.

[sonia_simone]

I would say it depends a lot on your finances. If the $600 is not a huge deal to you, I could easily see getting a lot more out of it than the money and time you put in. (But I would definitely get the book in advance and go through the initial processing completely--you'll get more out of any seminar on any subject if the basic ideas aren't new to you.)

If the money is a stretch, you can find a lot of fantastic resources for free or virtually free. There are many GTD discussions on the Web. You could even get a few friends and/or co-workers together to do a study group.

You learn GTD by *doing* GTD. But if you have the resources, seminars can be a fun way to get energized. And $600 is not a lot of money to pick up even one really solid lifetime habit, which I think is very possible.

[kermalou]

i do accounting and am at wits end, I am willing to try this if it will help, the money is important to me, but so is going forward.

thanks for the tips, I think I will try it.

[sonia_simone]

When is the seminar scheduled? If you can possibly devote some serious time this weekend (or this week if you have flexibility at work for such things) to doing the initial GTD implementation, it will definitely pay off.

I hope you report back and let us know your thoughts!

[kermalou]

the seminar is on Fri., i am flipping some work and other stuff so i can go to this, now that I have committed myself.

[Brent]

Please come back afterwards and let us know what you think!

[TesTeq]

I don't know, I'll be honest here. I think $600 is a lot for a one-day GTD seminar. Again, being honest, in my opinion there is no way that a short one-day seminar is going to facilitate implementing the entire GTD process.
Have you ever attended any GTD seminar?

Attending such event may give an inspiration, motivation and some basic knowledge to implement GTD.

[CosmoGTD]

Have you ever attended any GTD seminar?

Attending such event may give an inspiration, motivation and some basic knowledge to implement GTD.

Have you? If you would like to go then knock yourself out!

I have attended many general seminars in the past. Most seminars are vastly overpriced to maximize income for the speaker.
I am giving my viewpoint that its not worth $600 to me, plus travel and hotel. I don't need to spend over $1,000 and lose work for that.

Motivation and inspiration are ephemeral and very short-term, and the generalized seminar industry is greatly overpriced, except for highly specialized or technical areas, or related to specialized professional interpersonal networking.

[TesTeq]

Motivation and inspiration are ephemeral and very short-term, and the generalized seminar industry is greatly overpriced, except for highly specialized or technical areas, or related to specialized professional interpersonal networking.
I would not neglect the inspirational and motivational impact of personal contact with GTD guru. It can change your life (but of course nothing is guaranteed).

I attended several business seminars that were not very useful. But - rather expensive - "Influence Exerting Theory" seminar by Piotr Tymochowicz was a real eye-opener which significantly influenced my life.

So, kermalou, be an active participant of the seminar and do enjoy it. Do not allow the negative thinking to waste your money ($600).

[kermalou]

the seminar is next to my place, so no travel expenses.

just want to hear from people that have gone.

[TesTeq]

Here are some useful links for you:

http://ideamatt.blogspot.com/2005/09/getting-most-from-david-allens-roadmap.html

http://buzzmodo.typepad.com/buzznovation/2005/08/gtdthe_road_map.html

http://pointreyes.net/notes/gtd/

I hope you'll enjoy reading.

[sonia_simone]

I've found some seminars a complete waste of oxygen and cells, and others to be life-changing. I've heard good things about DA in person.

Really looking forward to your report!

[mramm]

One key difference between the “Road Map” and the prior seminar that I went to is that this one assumes a certain familiarity with David’s ideas, and that you will complete the various exercies on your own.

this is from one of the links posted above.

take it as you see fit.

Michael

[kermalou]

i am going to wait and read up a little more, this might be a little more than I bargained for in the first place.


but, it really interests me.

[Ashok Atluri]

I have attended the Roadmap seminar in London last year. I found the seminar to be of average value and would not recommend it to anyone, esp. if you are new the GTD methodology. There may be some value to a GTD veteran but a newbie would be completely lost. Most of the time in the seminar was taken by practitioners of GTD who still had kinks to work out - after these discussions there was hardly anytime for David to talk about basic GTD (it is a one day seminar, remember).

As CosmoGTD says, correctly, the GTD Fast CDs offer much more value than this seminar. I would recommend reading the book first and then going to GTD Fast CDs (doing the workbook).

Since I am as much a David fan as one can be, seeing him in person was the biggest payoff.

If the seminar has evolved since London then that is a different story...

[TesTeq]

As CosmoGTD says, correctly, the GTD Fast CDs offer much more value than this seminar. I would recommend reading the book first and then going to GTD Fast CDs (doing the workbook).
GTD Fast CDs are not available for purchase from DavidCo.

They contain the recording of the previous, basic-level GTD seminar so they may be very interesting for you (more than Roadmap seminar).

[kermalou]

well, took the seminar yesterday.

for a newbie, paying out of my pocket, it was different. mostly everybody there was there because their company paid their way.

it was very very imformative and I learn a lot better by seeing and doing something, I learned alot. some of the terminlogy used was new, but nothing bad. it might be alittle too much for a newbie.

now to use everything that was taught.

[TesTeq]

Was the seminar inspirational / motivational?

Is David Allen a guru of the GTD cult or a professional presenter of the GTD productivity methodology?

[Brent]

Congrats, kermalou! Thanks for the report.

[kermalou]

you know he just puts it all out there.

very concise and to the point.

i am really thinking about getting that notetaker wallet of his.

[mochant]

I have attended the Roadmap seminar in London last year. I found the seminar to be of average value and would not recommend it to anyone, esp. if you are new the GTD methodology. There may be some value to a GTD veteran but a newbie would be completely lost. Most of the time in the seminar was taken by practitioners of GTD who still had kinks to work out - after these discussions there was hardly anytime for David to talk about basic GTD (it is a one day seminar, remember).

-snip-

If the seminar has evolved since London then that is a different story...
I just attended the Santa Monica seminar on Friday. I saw none of what you describe happening a year ago. I think David must have gotten a lot of feedback to that effect because he set expectations early that he would not allow that sort of derailment to happen and he didn't. At every juncture where questions were entertained, he time-boxed nicely and then got back to the agenda.

I first attended the two-day seminar back in 2002. This new one day format is a nicely compacted version of what he used to do in two days. Of course, something had to go to allow a 50% reduction in time. From my perspective, having been to both and having listened to GTD Fast countless times, what David has done is focus the agenda on the "why" questions and trimmed most of the "how" content out. In fact, he did not even show the classic workflow diagram onscreen, nor is it in the course manual. He made a single passing reference to it being in the book (attendees get a paperback copy along with some other swag) and that was it.

I was very impressed with how much David has embraced mind maps. He referenced the technique a number of times and had a number of slides that were generated from MindManager in the deck he was using.

TesTeq - to answer your question, I think he is a professional presenter, teacher, and coach. He neither asked for nor seems particularly comfortable with the guru mantle. In fact, I made a note to myself that he did an excellent job of objectifying the content and distancing himself from it. He called himself a "fellow student" a number of times during the day which is completely consistent with comments he has made in the past about the true nature of attaining black belt mastery. It's not a simple matter of always executing at a perfect level. It's more about knowing when you've fallen out of shape, recognizing that fact, and understanding the discipline well enough to quickly get yourself back into shape and operating "in the zone".

FWIW, I sat with three newbies who all agreed the seminar was very engaging, motivational, and helped them understand the potential costs and rewards of adopting GTD.

[gtderik]

Mochant,
I signed up for the Roadmap in Minneapolis coming in a month. I feel like the seminar might help me in seeing and perhaps doing some of the techniques in the book. I did get a little nervous when you said that the HOW portion was cut out of the seminar. I was hoping that seeing the process "fleshed out" would give me key insights to my own system. Do you think that I will be disappointed?

[mochant]

Mochant,
I signed up for the Roadmap in Minneapolis coming in a month. I feel like the seminar might help me in seeing and perhaps doing some of the techniques in the book. I did get a little nervous when you said that the HOW portion was cut out of the seminar. I was hoping that seeing the process "fleshed out" would give me key insights to my own system. Do you think that I will be disappointed?
I hope not and no, I don't think so. I sat with three newbies who had not yet really begun implementing GTD seriously and they all walked away very satisfied that they had a much better handle on how to ramp up properly.

Sorry if I gave the wrong impression - I was in the zone of comparing the old two-day event to the Roadmap and that's where that comment came from. For example, in the two-day, we spent a good 20-30 minutes conducting a mind sweep (brain dump, whatever you prefer to call it) and did a bit of Q&A between ourselves and some of the coaches who were in attendance. But that seminar had less than half as many people in attendance and I can appreciate how unwieldy that sort of process could be with 150 people.

David is very careful about pointing out exactly where in the text you can find reference for each of the procedural, "how" pieces of the process and also reiterates a few times the value you can find in the free articles and tips on this site.

Combine that with the incredible body of knowledge this community offers right here in the forums and I think you'll do just fine. The Roadmap has me totally juiced up and rethinking the idiosyncrasies I've introduced into my process over the years. Not that I'm throwing them out wholesale, mind you. Many of the adaptations I've put into place work really well for me and I plan to hold onto them - the way I use MindManager to manage my projects for example.

It's a day well spent if you are looking for a clear, high-level presentation about why this method works for so many people in so many different circumstances.

[kermalou]

read the book and re-read te book then go to the Roadmap.

[sonia_simone]

mochant, at some point I'd love it if you posted what you ended up throwing out or rethinking after having attended the seminar.

[mochant]

mochant, at some point I'd love it if you posted what you ended up throwing out or rethinking after having attended the seminar.
Sonia:

It's not much what I threw out (very little except for some dead-end reference stuff I had been sitting on for too long) as what I have added or put back in. The RoadMap made me very aware of the fact that I had been getting very horizontal at the expense of spending enough time at the higher altitudes. I sat down a did a fresh mind map for each altitude and it made me realize that a lot of the things I had been storing at 30K or 40K have become realities, to one degree or another, in the past year.

Moving some of those longer term, bigger picture items down to the 20K - runway levels had the effect of forcing me to redefine what my vision was for the 3-5 years and what wild success looks like to me today.

I also cleaned a ton of cruft from my Someday/Maybe list and parked some of the stuff that's just not moving right now there to tidy up my Project maps and NA list.

Oh... and I'm going to set up a tickler file again. I abandoned that quite some time back but I think I have a good perspective on what was missing from my implementation in the past (short story - I was being way too literal in my approach to what I would put in there).

This is just what I had hoped for when I made plans to go to the seminar. A serious jump start to reinvigorate my approach and a healthy shaking up to clear the cobwebs out.

I am planning an extended weekly review this week (3 hours rather than my usual 1-1/2) to finish up this process and really get my system humming.

[sonia_simone]

Very cool, thanks for the expansion.