The Zen of Time Management

April 27, 2007

We love to joke about how organized or disorganized we are. I am perhaps the most disorganized person on earth. My pain is only getting worse as the number of e-mails I get climbs above 4,000 a month.

David Allen takes this subject seriously and he's trying to ease our pain. He has become a guru among self-help consultants for busy people who want to become more productive. His insight: If you can organize yourself so that you're not bothered by minor distractions, you'll be able to concentrate more on things that matter.

That's the message of "Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity," a book he wrote in 2001 that still ranks high on any given day on Amazon.com's bestseller list. It has sold more than 500,000 copies.

Here's one of his most appealing ideas: If you find a task that requires only two minutes to address, take care of it immediately. Otherwise, it becomes a distraction that will nag you. The process of tracking such tasks will take far more energy than if you just deal with them immediately.

Time magazine recently called the 61-year-old Allen the "oracle of organization."

"I love David's concise summary approach," said Sean Wise, a venture capitalist and management adviser at Wise Mentor Capital in Toronto. "So much so, that I've made it required reading for my portfolio CEOs."

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