The IBM Lotus Technical Information and Education (LTIE) community holds a web meeting every month. Their upcoming August session will feature eProductivity's president, Eric Mack.
Eric will be sharing how eProductivity has turned the Lotus application distribution model upside down. Instead of new technology being solely introduced by the IT department, end users are now able to find, try, purchase, and use new apps for Lotus Software. Using apps like eProductivity has in turn allowed end users to achieve higher performance.
Eric will then share 7 general considerations for creating self-serve Lotus Notes apps.
We invite you to join us for this event. Details below.
Reference items are non-actionable pieces of information that you want to hang on to. Everyone has plenty of reference items!
In my experience, digital reference items tend to come in three different forms: emails, webpage URLs, and documents (e.g. PDFs, Word documents).
For storing emails, email folders are a logical choice. For webpage URLs, many people favor web-based tools like Delicious. For documents, the My Documents folder or a network drive are common destinations, with Dropbox being a popular web-based alternative.
But I find that consolidating my reference items into a single tool works best for most of my items. (The exceptions are things like my music and picture files, which are fine in their current My Music and My Pictures folders). Too many storage locations leads to items becoming "out of sight, out of mind" and the reference items lose their value.
Instead, I prefer a single "digital filing cabinet" that I can put everything in and see it all in one place. Here's some of my criteria for picking a digital filing cabinet:
Stores any kind of file or media
New entries are easily created
Entries can be assigned to multiple categories
Allows an unlimited number of categories
Provides full-text search for finding items quickly
Accessible across different computers and mobile devices
Integrates with email
For these reasons, I'm not bashful in saying I favor the eProductivity Reference Database (available as a free download). It fits my criteria well and most importantly, it integrates well with my Lotus Notes email system. This is critical because I find most of my reference information comes via email, and I can simply drag-and-drop the email into my Reference Database to create a new entry - very slick!
The bottom-line is, I have a place that I store everything in, so stuff isn't scattered across my computer.
Another popular reference system I hear mentioned is Evernote, although I've never personally used it.
Do you have other reference tools that you use? Any tips on choosing a reference tool? Please share them in the comments!
IBMer Amanda Bauman recently reduced her inbox from 5000 emails to zero after learning GTD techniques. She attended the April 8 "Getting Things Done with Lotus Notes" web event and learned the best practices of GTD straight from the experts, David Allen and Eric Mack. Inspired by what she learned, Amanda made some dramatic improvements to her productivity system. I had linked to her story previously.
Today - a little over 1 month later - Amanda posted an update. She writes:
It's been over a month since I started my quest to clean out my in-box and adopt the GTD methodology. I've purposefully restricted this quest to just my work life, because quite frankly, my personal life works just fine as is :-), and I'm a big fan of only tackling one major change at a time, otherwise I start to feel out of control. And be assured, GTD is a big change.
But over a month later, my in box remains empty, my to do list remains full, and things that may have been on the edge of my radar and in danger of falling off... well, they are still on the edge, but now there is a nice, tidy wall around everything to prevent things from slipping off the edge.
She goes on to describe some of the challenges and successes she's experienced on her journey with GTD & eProductivity. Read the full post
Her story is well-worth the few minutes it takes to read. It echoes some of the other stories that we've heard from eProductivity users. Implementing a new productivity system can be a challenge - we all know how hard it is to change habits! But when you have great tools that attract you to use them, frequently the pain of change can be tempered and the adoption of new habits can be accelerated.
What are challenges you've faced on your way to working smarter, not harder?
As a result of last month's "Getting Things Done with Lotus Notes" public and IBM Employee Only webinars with David Allen, thousands of Notes users around the world are now exploring and choosing eProductivity as an alternative to the standard Lotus Notes Mail/Calendar/tasks experience to increase their personal productivity. Today I want to discuss a little-known feature hidden inside of Lotus Notes that allows you to categorize the messages in your inbox.
This 'categorized' functionality has been provided by IBM in all Mail template releases since Notes 7. Apparently some organizations - like IBM - have modified their standard mail template to make categorization of messages in the inbox become the default.
How the 'categorized' inbox works in Lotus Notes:
In the standard Lotus Notes Mail inbox, emails are presented in chronological order with the oldest message at the top and the newest at the bottom. No preference is give to messages flagged 'High priority' or calendar invites and meeting notices:
In the 'Categorized' Notes Mail Inbox, emails are presented in a categorized fashion so that:
Calendar Invites/Updates will appear at the top of the inbox
Next, all high priority emails will be displayed
Finally, all normal priority emails will be displayed
Here's how the above mail box looks with the 'categorized' inbox:
I'm not sure whether I prefer the categorized inbox or not yet, but if you are a current eProductivity beta user and want to experience this, we've posted version 2.0.1.5 in the beta forum so you can try it out for yourself. Meanwhile, read on for my reactions...
My thoughts on the categorized inbox so far...
On the surface, this categorized view would appear to be a boon to anyone that gets lots of emails and wants to be sure that they won't miss an urgent email. At least that was my initial reaction. I like that all calendar items appear at the top of the inbox -- it makes it easier to process all of my calendar related invites, notices, and changes at once. At first glance, having the high priority emails at the top of the inbox means that I won't miss a high priority item -- as long as I remember to check that part of the view.
But is this really the most productive way to go, or does it encourage less productive email habits? That's what I wanted to know, so I made the change to my inbox and worked with it for a while.
What I like about the categorized inbox As I stated earlier, I like having all of the calendar information in once place. That makes it easy for me to handle all calendar information at once. What I lose, however, is the context as I can longer see the email messages that came in before and after the calendar request or update. I haven't reached a conclusion about whether that is a big deal or not.
In the same way, I like that I can see and get to all urgent (flagged as High importance, but let's call it how people use it) email in one place. Here again, context is lost because these messages are now at the top instead of in the message flow.
What concerns me about the categorized inbox For me, the biggest concern about a categorized inbox + lots of emails is that I'd FORGET to check the top of the stack. David Allen and I teach that the best practice around email is to process it once into a trusted system and then work from an empty inbox. We teach that your inbox should only be a temporary collection point for incoming stuff.
If you work this way and your process your inbox to zero at least once every 24 hours, then a categorized inbox might be helpful and may even be more productive. If you are buried in email and have a considerable backlog, then my concern is that a categorized inbox can become a hindrance to your overall productivity by encouraging you to deal with what's latest and loudest -- your urgent items -- and not the rest of the messages.
Also, if you have more than one screen full of email, you will have to scroll to the top to see these urgent emails. As a result, you risk losing focus on the rest of your inbox because you are either at the top or the bottom of the stack. For me, in the sort while that I have been evaluating the categorized inbox I found myself subject to the tyranny of the urgent. And, there was no incentive for be to process everything - I could simply wait until things were urgent enough to flag them as such. I try to process my email when it shows up instead of when it blows up.
What do YOU think? Do you think the 'categorized' inbox would be a help or a hindrance? Do you currently use the categorized inbox? If so, what do you like or dislike about it ? If you don't, what are your thoughts? I'd like to know.
We ran some fun giveaways during today's highly successful Getting Things Done with Lotus Notes webinar. Thanks again to everyone for their participation!
Our winners are:
Julie Manning
Jonathan Pop
Tom Scanlan
YC Tan
We also awarded prizes to our 800th and 900th registrants for the event. Those folks are:
It's been a little while since I've blogged. This is due to spending much of my time preparing for tomorrow's Getting Things Done with Lotus Notes web event with featured guest David Allen and eProductivity's Eric Mack. The time seems well spent because we have 785 folks registered as of right now. Wow!
We're delighted to have David Allen join us for this special event. For Lotus Notes users, it's an extraordinary opportunity to hear from David himself about the techniques he uses to get things done in Lotus Notes. Based on the number of sign-ups, many folks agree that this is an interesting topic.
Speaking of having 785 folks registered, we're giving away a 1-year eProductivity Professional license to our 800th registrant. So if you haven't signed up yet, that person could be you! Register here: www.eproductivity.com/gtdwebinar
If you'd like to participate in the conversation on Twitter before, during, and after the event, I invite you to use the #GTDLN hashtag that we created for the event. Happy tweeting!
Update:
I think this is worth sharing. Following the GTD & Lotus Notes webinar on April 8th, one IBMer was able to reduce her inbox from 5000 emails to Zero, and she's been maintaining inbox zero since then. You can read her story here.
Last Thursday, we held an IBM employee-only "Getting Things Done in Lotus Notes" webinar with eProductivity's Eric Mack and featured guest, GTD® creator David Allen. Judging by the 725 IBMer registrants, the 200 questions asked during the session, and the multitudes of follow-up emails that attendees sent us, the webinar was a resounding success.
The webinar even generated the Tweet of the Month! (trademark pending, of course...)
David and Eric were on fire and shared many things they've learned about being more productive with Lotus Notes.
David delivered a passionate explanation of the Essentials of GTD. He spoke on the vital importance of a trusted system and reminded us that you can only feel good about what you're not doing if you know what you're not doing.
For those who had never heard of GTD, it was a eye-opening experience (based on their comments afterwards) and for those of us familiar with GTD, it was a welcome refresher.
Eric then showed how to set up Lotus Notes for GTD. First, he demonstrated how regular Lotus Notes can be an effective GTD list manager, and then he showed how using eProductivity takes Lotus Notes to the next level. The best part? It was all stuff people could put to use right away.
Plus, all attendees received a free resource kit which included an eProductivity Reference database full of great GTD articles from David's library.
First, let me say a big thanks to everyone who attended the webinar. Your participation was appreciated and it's been great to hear from so many of you about how the webinar benefited you.
Let me also say thanks to everyone who helped spread the word about the webinar.
Another opportunity to hear David and Eric live:
On April 28th, you have another opportunity to experience David and Eric's extensive knowledge of productivity.
This time, the free event is open to the general public but spaces are filling up quickly. So before the event is booked out, make sure to tell all your friends who use Lotus Notes and could use more time & less stress in their lives! Register for the webinar
Now, in case you're still deciding if this is the webinar for you, here's the planned agenda:
Agenda
Your Personal Productivity Equation
Essentials of GTD
How to set up Lotus Notes with GTD
David's Productivity Toolkit
eProductivity™ for IBM Lotus Notes
Getting Started with GTD and Lotus Notes
Q&A
As you can see, this is a must-attend event! Register today.
To get automatic updates on eProductivity's webinar events, you can sign up for the free eProductivity newsletter.
When setting up the upcoming "Getting Things Done with Lotus Notes" webinars with special guest presenter David Allen, I ran into an interesting issue with GoToMeeting. They include an "Add to Outlook calendar" link on the webpage that appears after registering for a webinar, and we can't remove the link or change it to say Lotus Notes. Kinda embarrassing for Notes events like these.
Eric Mack then bloggedtwice about this on the Notes on Productivity blog.
I sent in a help request to GoToMeeting to see if anything could be done to about this Outlook-gate issue. Their help team recently responded with this:
There is no way to remove that option. Outlook is the default option because of its widespread use.
Ok, not surprising and even understandable. I'd bet other virtual meeting software companies do the same thing.
It's unfortunate, though, because it's confusing for our webinar attendees and it looks pretty bad when running Lotus Notes events.
So for everyone asking about the Add to Outlook link on our webinar registration forms, we know. :-) We can't change it. But maybe you can write to GoToMeeting and show that there are a lot of Notes users out there who would appreciate some consideration.
P.S. Oh, and you should know that if you actually click the "Add to Outlook" link, it's really just an .ics file that can be imported into your Notes 8 calendar. So no harm in clicking that link...
As you probably know, David Allen's book "Getting Things Done - The Art of Stress-Free Productivity" is the inspiration behind eProductivity.
David's GTD methodology has revolutionized the way millions of working men and women tackle their work. His system turns achieving control and perspective over your commitments into a daily reality.
Many people know this about GTD. What you may not know is that for the past 17 years, David has used Lotus Notes as his personal organization system. (For several years, he's used eProductivity as well.)
This month, David and Eric Mack will be co-presenting two webinars on GTD & Lotus Notes. The webinars will be full of great information for non-eProductivity users and eProductivity users alike.
Some of the things they'll show:
How to go home at the end of the day with an empty inbox
How to tackle your work week with the confidence of knowing you’re being as productive as you can possibly be
What's in David's productivity toolkit and how he uses Lotus Notes to get things done
Webinar exclusively for IBM employees
On April 8th from 10am – 11:30am PST, we’ll be doing a webinar exclusively for IBM employees on applying GTD to Lotus Notes. Many IBMers are fans of GTD already, and this will give more insight into David’s master tips, tricks & strategies. We’ll also look at eProductivity – the only software tool for Lotus Notes that’s earned the distinctive “GTD Enabled” certification.
If you’re an IBM employee, sign up now. Space is limited.
Webinar open to the public
On April 28th from 10:00am - 11:30am PST, David and Eric will be doing another "Getting Things Done in Lotus Notes" webinar for the general public.
Go here to get more details and sign up now. Space is limited.
To keep current on eProductivity webinar news, you can subscribe to the eProductivity newsletter to receive updates on this and other events and specials.
David Allen, GTD Coach Kelly Forrister, and eProductivity's Eric Mack collaborated on a recent TechGTD podcast.
Topics in the far-ranging podcast included cloud computing, mobile devices, favorite apps, Lotus Notes, and much more. It's well-worth listening to the approximately 48 minutes of run-time.
Note: Listening to this podcast requires a GTD Connect membership. You can sign up for a free trial here.
Click the image below to go to the podcast on GTD Connect (login required).
At this year's Lotusphere, IBM Lotus VP of messaging and collaboration, Kevin Cavanaugh presented the Technology Keynote. Kevin talked about the Lotus product strategy, roadmap, and of course, Project Vulcan.
Kevin discussed how Lotus applications bring a flood of information to the user, and he pointed out a key problem that this can cause: information overload.
"... we don't need more calendars... we need a way to consolidate and adjudicate between competing events. ... we don't need more ways to capture text; we need ways to reduce the stress of unfulfilled commitments and organize tasks for action... As an industry, we're kind of guilty of multiplying lists, with no real method for how those lists of tasks might be managed. However, there are some great counter-examples..."
Kevin proceeded to talk about David Allen's Getting Things Done® (GTD®) Methodology and how eProductivity is a solution developed by Lotus Business Partner Eric Mack and David Allen to 'GTD Enable' Lotus Notes. (See the video for more).
On a related note, one theme that came out of Lotusphere was how CIOs feel that they've extracted all the cost cutting value they can from IT budgets. There's not much left to pare down. CIOs are instead focusing on making workers more productive. (Read the conversation transcript at Escape Velocity, a blog by Nathan T. Freeman)
Lotus has introduced many new improvements and enhancements to their products that can help, but at the end of the day, value creation ultimately happens at the individual level. It's at this level - increasing personal productivity - that the next great opportunity exists.
With that in mind, it's exciting to see Lotus exploring ways to increase worker productivity. One way they're doing that is by looking beyond Lotus software to the best practices of GTD and software tools like eProductivity that complement Lotus offerings and help users get things done.
Jens Bruntt has created a really cool and useful app for Android devices called BrainDump to Notes. The app allows you to quickly capture actionable items on your Android and then sync them with your Lotus Notes To-Dos in a single click.
I've only watched the video, but Jen's app looks very easy to use. The idea is sort of a cross between GyroQ and the eProductivity Mindsweep Coach. Jens himself is a long-time eProductivity user and he says the app works great with eProductivity. Excellent!
The app is available for free from the Android app market.
Maybe it's time to go nag my boss about getting me a 'Droid?...
GTD Times recently announced an upcoming GTD and Lotus Notes webinar class.
The class time is February 4th at 12pm PST, and it will be held in the GTD Connect virtual learning center. For more details, read Kelly Forrister's post on the GTD Times blog.
February 4th is just around the corner, so you only have a couple of days left to sign up...
Slow software is such a drag on productivity, not to mention downright annoying to work with. When you work with the same software, such as Lotus Notes, every single day, even the smallest performance slowdowns can result in huge productivity losses over time.
The good news is, speedier performance is possible if you're armed with the right information.
To give you the inside scoop, Eric Mack wrote an article on the Notes on Productivity blog about improving the performance of your Lotus Notes software.
An excerpt:
As I work with and coach clients around the world that use Lotus Notes, I'm often asked why Notes and their systems in general seem to get slower and slower. While there are many parts to the answer, the good news is that there is much you can do to improve the user experience in terms of performance.
Before we can talk about the things that can be done to speed up Lotus Notes, we must first understand what aspects of your system and Notes affect performance. I have broken these down into three areas: System, Lotus Notes, and User Data. Elements in each of these areas will affect end-user performance. Some are things you can change easily; some are not. Let's take a look.
I've got a special treat for you, courtesy of David Allen himself.
Last weekend, Eric Mack sat down with David and talked about eProductivity, Lotus Notes, IBM, cloud computing, and much more. Graciously, David allowed Eric to record portions of their conversation so that we can share it with you.
I'll be posting new clips every few hours. Here are two clips to kick it off.
I am being upgraded by my company from Notes version 7 to Notes version 8.5. How will this affect my eProductivity software?
The main thing you need to know is that eProductivity is not likely not to work immediately following the upgrade. To restore it to working order, you'll need to re-apply the eProductivity template, which is thankfully a fast and painless process.
When your Notes administrators upgrades you to Notes 8.5, they will usually do two things:
1. Upgrade your Lotus Notes software 2. Replace your mail template design with the new Notes 8.5 template.
This second step will break the functionality of eProductivity. Your eProductivity navigator and contexts will not appear after the upgrade and the action buttons in your folders may not work.
The good news is that you won't lose your projects or actions or linking. You just won't see them until you re-apply the eProductivity template to your mail file. The re-application process is quick and easy - it's the same process you went through when you installed eProductivity for the first time.
So, following the upgrade to Notes 8.5, you'll likely need to follow these steps to get back your eProductivity functionality.
Over on the Notes on eProductivity blog, Eric Mack riffs on some of the fundamental problems with Lotus Notes archiving options. Basically, between the (poor) options that Notes gives for archiving and the typical way that system admins configure those archiving options, the chances of users getting burned by unfortunate archiving practices are very high. In other words, archiving may cause them to lose their data and hate Notes for forever. It's pretty hard to trust a system that steals your data when you're not looking.
As a sidenote, we're working hard to give our eProductivity users an archiving method that they can trust and just simply works. Here's a screenshot of the eProductivity archive view:
The latest version of eProductivity (1.81) contains manynew features. Among them are two experimental views that you can use to create sidebar widgets or floating windows based on the popular eProductivity 'Today' and 'All by context' views.
Here's a preview of just two of several new Sidebar widgets for eProductivity that you will soon be able to use: the Today view and the All by Context views.
These widgets are now available in eProductivity 1.81. These sidebar views are persistent - it does not matter what Notes application you have open - you can always review your Today list and your actions by contexts.
If you would like to try this on your own system, here are the steps I am currently using to accomplish this in Notes 8.5.1
If you're using Notes 8.x or 8.5x, you can use Sidebars to display information from a Notes application (e.g. eProductivity) even when that application is not open.
Here's a preview of just two of several new Sidebar widgets for eProductivity that you will soon be able to use: the Today view and the All by Context views.
These widgets are being made to our Notes 8 Design Partners and will soon appear in the next release of eProductivity. These sidebar views are persistent - it does not matter what Notes application you have open - you can always review your Today list and your actions by contexts.
As part of our unified task management strategy, we are working on ways to allow you to drag and drop anything onto a context and manage it in Notes, GTD-Style, with eProductivity. (This includes web and mobile resources as well - a true unified view.)
Lotus Knows has been running since 8am this morning. Already 400+ ideas, 5500+ votes cast, and 825+ comments posted as I write this.
A better email system in Notes has been a hot topic. People are clearly fed up with having cluttered inboxes that nag at them all day long. Here at eProductivity, we get excited about helping people gain control over a rowdy inbox and it's always great to hear stories of people going from inbox chaos to inbox zero by using eProductivity. It'll be interesting to see the solutions the Lotus community suggests for relieving the email burden.
Last week, Bilal Jeffrey of IBM announced an upcoming IdeaJam session called Lotus Knows. I'm excited about this Jam because it's squarely focused on Lotus Notes end-users.
IBM has had the reputation of focusing their marketing on large companies and IT departments. But IBM seems to be working hard on changing up their game plan and focusing on the end user. This IdeaJam is another step in that direction.
As has been well-publicized in many other places, companies are finding out that end users now drive the adoption of new technology. Ending quickly are the old days of the IT department dictating completely what technology tools their employees can use. The top-down approach is leaky.
Employees, especially younger ones, have expectations that they can use whatever technology tools appeal the most to them. They tend to figure out ways to get their hands on these tools, and perhaps more importantly, they tend to tell their friends about their tools.
Tapping into the viral power of "my buddy says 'xyz tool rocks!'" is crucial. Lotus Notes could use a few more end users talking about how cool Notes is. As a company that makes an individual productivity tool for Notes, eProductivity could use a few more end users talking up the hipness of Notes.
So yes, I'm excited about Lotus Knows I plan on dropping by frequently over the 3-day Jam span.
We receive many requests from people who have learned about Lotus Notes for the first time, either as a result of David Allen's mention of Notes at the Office 2.0 Conference, a public GTD seminar, or podcast or as a result of learning about eProductivity. They usually contact us to ask if individuals can purchase Lotus Notes (yes) and if it is possible to evaluate Lotus Notes for free (yes).
Unfortunately, as many people have learned, the IBM web site can be an overwhelming experience for an individual user that simply wants to download and try or buy Lotus Notes. Here's some information which you may find helpful:
How to experience Lotus Notes for free: You can evaluate Lotus Notes for free, with the Lotus Notes 90-day Test Drive.
Lotus Notes Product Manager, Dwight Morse, recently posted a detailed tutorial that explains how to use Lotus Notes to retrieve your personal email (e.g. from a hosted account.) Dwight provides detailed screen shots for each step. If you are a first-time user of Lotus Notes and you want to use Notes as your personal information management system, I think you will find this tutorial helpful.
When you are ready to purchase Lotus Notes: When you are ready to purchase Lotus Notes, choose the license for "IBM Lotus Notes with Collaboration Authorized User License + SW Subscription & Support 12 Months (D5CS2LL)."
Visit the Lotus Notes Product Page and look in the right colum under the green button that says "View US prices & buy". If you are outside of the United States, use the "Choose your country" link below the green button.
Lotus Notes Product Manager, Dwight Morse, has just posted a detailed tutorial that explains how to use Lotus Notes to retrieve your personal email (e.g. from a hosted account.) Dwight provides detailed screen shots for each step. If you are a first-time user of Lotus Notes and you want to use Notes as your personal information management system, I think you will find this tutorial helpful.
I'm pleased to see this tutorial. Many first-time users are installing Notes for themselves, either to get eProductivity or because they have learned that GTD Author, David Allen, uses Notes. Either way, these people need simple steps to find, download, install, and configure Notes. This is an area in which IBM has historically been light on information for the end-user.
Dwight's tutorial is a step in the right direction to making it easy for people to install and use what David Allen and I believe is an outstanding information management and self-organization tool.
I look forward to Dwight's future tips and I will blog about them as I see them.
Here's what's on my wish list for the future:
An equivalent tutorial for a first-time installation of Notes 8.x for Mac and PC. (Including how to locate, navigate to and download the software.)
Videos for each tutorial posted on YouTube to make it easy for people to find and get started
What first-time Notes user topics would YOU like to see IBM blog about?
Over on the GTD Times blog, Patrick asks how to manage GTD system across multiple machines. Peter Simoons says that eProductivity is the answer.
That's not quite true.
While Peter is a big fan of eProductivity and I appreciate the unsolicited promotion, the real credit goes to Lotus Notes and its ability to replicate information across Windows/Mac/Linux computers seamlessly.
I've just posted a comment that explains how David Allen uses Lotus Notes to create a single trusted system across all of his computers and mobile devices.
Update: Apparently my comments on GTD Times have not been approved yet, so here's what I posted:
Patrick,
As David Allen’s technologist for 15 years, I can share that David uses Lotus Notes, from IBM, to solve this challenge and it works very well. with Lotus Notes, he can maintain his projects and actions in a single trusted system that replicates across ALL of his computers, including his Mac, PC, and mobile devices (e.g. Treo).
If David wants to work on his PC, he can pick up his ThinkPad and everything will be there. If he wants to play with his shiny new Mac Air, he can pick that up and all of his information will be there. And, if he’s on the run, he takes his Treo with him and his stuff is there.
In short, he simply picks up whichever tool he prefers and gets things done.
Lotus Notes makes it seamless.
In addition to Lotus Notes, David also uses and recommends eProductivity (http://www.eProductivity.com), an optional tool that makes GTD in Lotus Notes easy. You can start with basic Lotus Notes and follow the GTD Implementation guide to create a very nice system.
It's exciting to read emails and blogs from people around the world that are finding ways to increase their personal productivity and effectiveness using IBM Lotus Notes.
Industry analyst, Michael Sampson, recently interviewed David Allen about his use of Lotus Notes, and today has published the almost one-hour long discussion. During the podcast, Michael and David talk about: how David uses Lotus Notes in his company, what he thinks of Notes and the tools he uses, and David's upcoming presentation at Lotusphere.
At the end of the podcast, Michael puts his IT analyst hat on and shares his thoughts about why he thinks Lotus Notes works so well for David Allen and his company.
Here's an opportunity to listen to two very smart (and productive) people talk about Lotus Notes!
I have a long-standing interest in devices and applications that increase mobile knowledge worker productivity, particularly those that support the GTD methodology and can sync with Lotus Notes. The problem is that most of the devices that I have used to date fail in one or both categories. For this reason, I have continued use and recommend the Treo 755p for power GTD users that want a powerful mobile list manager that seamelessly integrates with Lotus Notes. It's not that the Treo is the best mobile platform out there. It isn't. It simply has the best native list manager for managing projects and actions using the GTD methodology.
Since I know that someone will object to my statement, let me explain what I want in a mobile list manager: I want to click one button and see my list of projects and actions, sorted by context. I do not want to have to click Start, Run, and then click a bunch of options to find my tasks. I also want these views and the way I set them up to be persistent, which rules out two of the most popular device families on the market today. I don't mind using third party solutions to accomplish this, but for some devices, like the Nokia Series, they simply do not exist. I find it amazing that devices marketed to the business professional and equipped with so many productivity features would be so lacking in this vital component of productivity: list management.
For years, David Allen and I have discussed this: why do manufacturers make great hardware and then drop the ball when it comes to the suitability of their list management and task integration? (David uses a 755p, also.) I think it must be that manufacturers are expecting people to purchase based on the shiny features and not on what they can accomplish with the device. Earlier this year, a client generously gave me a shiny new Nokia E90 Communicator as a thank you gift. The E90 is a truly amazing mobile productivity device. Except, it has two problems: No task management. Zip. Zilch. Nada. (Unless you count their lame recording of a task as a note in a calendar event) and no reliable over-the-air sync of tasks to Lotus Notes. David and I played with this device this summer and agreed that while it sported an impressive list of hardware features it was essentially useless for us as a mobile GTD support tool. So, into pile of "really cool devices that I cannot use" it went. I hoped that someday, I might find a solution that would allow me to test this device as a list manager with Notes.
I have a very special opportunity that involves my client, The David Allen Company. In short, I have been asked to nominate a few people to participate in a special program. There's no cost and the benefits are huge. You'll be asked to share and blog about your experience. I can nominate 3 people. If you are an established Notes blogger with a serious interest in personal productivity, I'd like to hear from you and see some of your personal productivity blog posts that you have written. You know where to find me.
David Allen's up in San Francisco at the Office 2.0 conference today. This morning, David delivered the opening keynote with Office 2.0 conference organizer Ismael Ghalimi.
I understand that Ismael asks David, "Why Lotus Notes?" David shares his thoughts on Getting Things Done with Lotus and eProductivity. Cool!
I've not yet had an opportunity to watch the video but I see that Ed Brill's already blogged about it.
An expert on user interface design, Chris Blatnick, recently reviewed eProductivity and shares his thoughts on his experience from a design and usability perspective:
eProductivity is THE GTD solution for Lotus Notes. It has a very simple and intuitive user interface, one that stays out of the way until you need it. Since the GTD features are so finely integrated into the context of the work you do everyday, you immediately become more productive when using it. eProductivity avoids flashy functionality and complicated routines and instead quietly empowers you to perform your daily tasks faster and more efficiently. This is the hallmark of good software design, something the eProductivity team obviously knows a lot about. For those that want to greatly improve their performance, I can highly recommend eProductivity for Lotus Notes.
A few days ago, I posted an eProductivity Preview Invitation for folks to see what we have done to create the ultimate GTD implementation tool for Lotus Notes. As part of the sign-up, I asked folks a number of questions, including which version of Lotus Notes. Here are the results so far.
As you can see, there are concentrations at each end of the spectrum with pockets for each version. This is to be expected. This is not a comprehensive survey, but it is interesting to see what the folks most interested in getting things done with Notes are using. Fortunately, we have coded eProductivity to support versions 6.02 - 8.5x of Lotus Notes across all platforms (yes, even Mac and Linux).
I plan to update this over time to see what more we can learn.
We're off to Ireland for the ILUG 2008 Conference.
Ian and I look forward to hanging out with Bruce, Ben, Ed, Alan, and many others. If you plan to attend, send me an email or find me. Ian and I will be there wearing our way cool white eProductivity logo shirts.
This year's conference promises to be a great one with many speakers and the opportunity to network with key folks in the Lotus Notes community. I'm also excited to have been invited to be one of the speed geek presenters; I plan to show off some productivity tools for Lotus Notes. 12 presentations in 1 hour. Should be fun.
Each year the ILUG organizers outdo the previous year's conference. This year is no exception; as part of their marketing & promotion campaign Paul Mooney arranged for Aer Lingus to temporarily paint their entire fleet of aircraft with the ILUG Shamrock so that we would get into the ILUG spirit as soon as we took off...
It will be a fast trip but I plan to make it a productive one. If you plan to attend let me know. Time permitting, I'll also try to blog a little.
Last week, an executive at a large global consulting firm with over 100K Lotus Notes users called me to ask for help getting up to speed with GTD and Notes. He told me that he was feeling overwhelmed at work with a growing number of projects and responsibilities and in his pursuit of a solution he had found and read David Allen's book, Getting Things Done. He was also aware that while Lotus Notes is an excellent tool for messaging, collaboration, and information management, it wasn't supporting him in the way that he needed. He was calling to get eProductivity for Lotus Notes and some coaching to help him set up Notes to be more productive. After a fruitful conversation, and my promise to help him, he asked me, "How can I ramp up quickly with GTD & Lotus Notes?" Continue Reading ""How can I ramp up quickly with GTD & Notes?"" »
I've received some interesting requests for eProductivity but none as original as the one I received this morning:
Re: eProductivity for Lotus Notes and GTD
Hello from Denmark :-)
I have told Santa that I would really really like to have a copy of eProductivity for Lotus Notes.
He said that I have been a good boy so I should contact you directly to request a preview....
I've had people contact me directly or via a friend to get into the eProductivity preview program, but this is the first request that I know of that solicited Santa's help. A novel approach to be sure.
The title of this post is in response to a comment on Michael Dolan's recent blog post sharing his experience coaching team of people that are using Lotus Notes as a trusted system for GTD. Michael's post is worth reading, because he talks about the importance of being the master of your domain: knowing and controlling what crosses over the transom. Specifically, Michael addresses the issue of delegated tasks, not just in Lotus Notes but in general, and how difficult it can be to use well as a team. (You should read Michael's original post and my response.)
What caught my eye, however, and the topic I wish to address today is whether or not it is possible to build a trusted system out of Lotus Notes. You see, a reader of Michael's blog, Doug Ransom, had this to say in a comment he posted:
... I think it is near impossible to build a trusted system out of Lotus Notes, which is why my assistants print everything out. We just cant trust Lotus Notes as a bring-forward system. I often find myself writing down the important stuff to do today on a piece of paper because there is no way in Lotus Notes to capture "this must be done today if possible". It is just too cumbersome to effectively review the lists.
Doug continues...
Everyone I know who switched to Lotus Notes from Outlook dropped off the GTD bandwagon. I am moving towards simply using Lotus to-dos for a "-waiting" category; anything I assign to my assistant or anyone else goes into this list. I'll go to some other system (paper, excel, or perhaps daylight (from marketcircle) for my GTD system. ...
Where do I begin? You already know, from the title of my blog, that I'm going to defend Lotus Notes as a productivity tool. But what else do I have to say? Lots.
First of all, I think it's important to separate the methodology from the technology (the tool). In my eProductivity seminars and coaching, I begin by teaching my eProductivity equation: productivity = knowledge * methodology * technology
Should we really use the delegated task feature to delegate actions to others?
While many people are usually excited to learn that their action management system will allow them to delegate actions to someone else, I find that many who have actually worked with such a system do not often share the same enthusiasm.
I usually recommend that my clients avoid using the task delegation feature of their action management system-- at least until I can confirm that everyone is on the same page in terms of how they will use it.
In order for delegated tasks to work, a high level of trust and an "action delegation protocol" must exist between all parties.
The person doing the delegating needs to trust that when he delegates something to another, it will be seen and actually treated as an action by the assignee. Likewise, the person who receives the delegated action must have a way to become aware of, internalize, and "accept" the action as their own. Successful delegation requires trust and commitment. If either is not present (as is often the case) then delegated tasks won't work.
This is not a new problem, it's as old as paper, at least. Technology has just made it easier to quickly dispatch a barrage of computer-delegated actions to unsuspecting (and possibly unwilling) people.
Delegated tasks create a situation in which the technology of productivity is likely to clash with the methodology of productivity.
The technology allows for tasks to be created and assigned to other individuals; however, without a sound methodology and clear agreement on how these will be processed, (the action delegation protocol), it can quickly become a recipe for lost or missed actions, frustration, and incompletion.
I recommend that my clients use David Allen's GTD methodology. In of my years of consulting on technology, I've not found a better system for thinking about your work than GTD. In his book, Getting Things Done, David emphasizes the importance of accountability in all aspects of delegating and accepting actions; he also makes it clear that the system used to track actions - be it paper or digital - must be absolutely leak-proof. These are two areas where delegated actions, if not used properly, can fall apart as a tool for organizational action management.
Microsoft Outlook, Lotus Notes, and even my eProductivity software all allow for tasks to be delegated to others simply by selecting the assignee from a directory. The beauty of this - at least from the perspective of the one doing the delegating - is that it is easy to create a project and then delegate actions to others.
One of my first action management systems, which I designed for the US Navy, did just this. The manager could initiate a project and then define and delegate specific actions to others in succession. Next actions could be queued so that as one action was completed the next would be delegated out in sequence. The system was a success, but I suspect that a large measure of this success was because the actions were effectively "orders" on the part of the manager and it was clearly understood that they were to be followed as assigned. The trust and protocol that I mentioned earlier were part of the environment. In a closed-system, with a clear chain of command, action management can, and indeed in some cases must work this way. That was almost 20 years ago. Today, a person is as likely to collaborate with someone in their own office as they are with someone around the world. The relationship is less likely to be superior/subordinate, as with my Navy client, and more likely to be peer to peer. In this situation trust and protocol are essential.
The benefits of a delegated-tasks system can be significant. For the one doing the delegating, as tasks are entered into the system, they can delegate an action to someone else simply by indicating their name in the "assigned to" field. They can also can provide optional information such as a due date, status and alert notification request.
Outlook task delegation fields:
Lotus Notes task delegation fields:
For the assignee, they do not have to enter anything into their action tracking system - it's all done for them. Depending upon how their system is configured, they may have the ability to accept or reject assigned tasks first or the new tasks may simply appear on their to do list. Both Microsoft Outlook and Lotus Notes will display a list of delegated tasks, the responsible party, due date, and status. For these reasons it is often quite tempting to use delegated tasks in the hopes of having a system of "total control and accountability."
Key things to consider when using delegated tasks:
1. Discuss delegated actions with your collaboration partners: Will you use computer-delegated tasks at all? Will you allow others to add actions directly to your action support lists (risky) or will you use the propose/accept model (better) for delegated actions? What kind of feedback will be exchanged about the actions? What should be done when changes are required on either side?
2. Make sure that you understand how delegated tasks work: Who "owns" the task? Will your system automatically place an action item on the assignee's to do list? How will they become aware of the new action? Do they have to accept it to make it their own? What is the process for delegating a task to someone and what happens when you (or they) cancel or change a task? Can a delegated task be delegated to someone else? How will you track these delegated items?
3. Make sure that everyone else understands this as well: Simply having good technology in place will not necessarily make a team more productive. Sometimes it even leads to just the opposite. It is important, therefore, to have procedures and protocols in place for putting technology to work. My clients have found that training and coaching can make a big difference in the productive benefits they receive from their technology investment.
4. Have everyone practice delegating/accepting/declining actions: Practice, practice, practice. As I've said before, in order for delegated actions to work at all, there must be a high level of trust - not only among the people but in their support systems as well.
Are delegated tasks simply a bad idea?
I don't think so, but I do think they can be very dangerous if not used properly. When used correctly, by a group of people, who have agreed upon a specific task delegation protocol, delegated tasks can be a powerful productivity tool. Unfortunately, more often than not, this agreement is not in place, and for this group of people, computer delegated-tasks can quickly lead to a lack of trust in systems and turn into a digital nightmare.
As I show clients how to use technology in support of the GTD methodology I find that few are really ready or need to use delegated actions. I usually coach these people to avoid using computer delegated actions and to use traditional means, such as e-mail, phone or even paper as a way of exchanging information about tasks without entering actions directly into someone else' system. This way, each party can internalize the next action and their commitment to it, placing it on their own list as appropriate.
Is your organization using computer-delegated tasks? If so, how has it worked (or not worked) out?
I would like to hear about your experience.
Please post a comment (or send me an email) and let me know what you think!
This blog post is a transcript from last week's podcast on delegated tasks management.
Note: For purposes of this discussion, when I refer to delegated tasks, I am specifically referring to the ability to create a task (an action) in a digital system such as Outlook or Lotus Notes, and to assign it to another individual, so that it will automatically end up on their action list.
Buzz Bruggeman, president and chief evangelist at ActiveWords, called me this morning to show me how he is integrating ActiveWords with Palm desktop. I mentioned my eProductivity Template for Lotus Notes, and how I planned to add hot key control to all of the unique features of my template for an enterprise customer. Buzz quickly showed me just what I needed to know to use ActiveWords to create powerful shortcuts that integrate with Lotus Notes and my eProductivity template.
I can now quickly create a new action item from anywhere -- even outside of Notes. A simple hot key will automatically launch Notes and open a new action form. I've even set it up to automatically populate the date & time for me so that all I have to do is enter my next action, select my context, and save. (See screen shot)
To take things to the next level, I created a hot key that will allow me to select an email and convert it into an action in one step. Cool.
I've blogged about ActiveWords before, and I remain enthusiastic about the product. Not since Actioneer came out with Actioneer Pro for Lotus Notes 4.0, have I seen such a powerful shortcut tool that I can use to quickly capture my actions. I've recently enhanced my eProductivity template to support Notes R6 for an enterprise customer. ActiveWords will help add further value to the template.
For those of you who are interested, I plan to share my ActiveWords wordbases so that anyone who uses Lotus Notes can enjoy them and enhance them to suit their own needs.
"It's Empty, It's Empty, It's Empty! I never thought that would ever happen. Thanks!"
These excited words are from a client, who recently learned how to quickly and effectively process his overflowing e-mail Lotus Notes in-box to zero as a result of attending one of my presentations. Reading his email made my day -- and it reminded me of why I enjoy doing what I do at ICA.
The most valued thanks that I receive in my work is learning how something that I was able to do for a client has positively impacted their life and their business.
Today, Jason Womack inspired me to share summaries of a few comments that I have recently received:
Eric, I have changed my Notes Welcome Page to look like yours and turned off my "chime" when incoming mail arrives. I am literally amazed at how much of what I NEEDED to get done was accomplished yesterday. I handled every one of my new emails and have even cleaned up all the way back to Monday (which if you saw my in-box is pretty good).
The question that you asked that struck a chord with me was whether or not we really knew what projects we were working on, and what tasks we had to complete to move them along.
I have started to use the Notes To-dos to manage my projects. Now, everything I need is at my fingertips.
I have processed my in-box to empty, and I am now working from my To-do list. As I adapt to your methods (and customize them to my needs), I hope to reduce the stress in my life, and become more effective.
I was energized to think differently about how I use Lotus Notes.
It is so gratifying to hear from my clients, current and past, about how I have been able to help them increase their productivity and find the time to do the things that really matter to them.
A blog by and for productive people who get things done with IBM Lotus Notes
David delivered a passionate explanation of the Essentials of GTD. He spoke on the vital importance of a trusted system and reminded us that you can only feel good about what you're not doing if you know what you're not doing.
Now, in case you're still deciding if this is the webinar for you, here's the planned agenda:
