43 Folders

Back to Work

Merlin’s weekly podcast with Dan Benjamin. We talk about creativity, independence, and making things you love.

Join us via RSS, iTunes, or at 5by5.tv.

”What’s 43 Folders?”
43Folders.com is Merlin Mann’s website about finding the time and attention to do your best creative work.

GTD: Project Verbs vs. Next-Action Verbs

In implementing Getting Things Done, you're wise to understand that words are powerful things. And the king of words in GTD, as in life, is the verb.

How you articulate an activity or how you choose to frame a project within the context of your larger life and work will say a lot about how successful you can be in turning all your "stuff" into atomic actions that will work in support of valuable outcomes. This starts with simple things like beginning next actions with a physical verb, but there's actually a lot more subtlety (and potential confusion) to it.

In fact, one of the hang-ups that many people encounter in planning their work in GTD is that, no matter how hard they try, they can never seem to get the distinction between single-action verbs and the larger "look-into" style projects that may require sub-actions. This comes up a lot, and it can lead to frustration and untold friction.

Well, if you've ever shared this affliction of not knowing your verbs from a hole in the ground, I have some rare and unexpected GTD gold.

Buried in the companion booklet for the Getting Things Done FAST! CD set (currently out of print) is one of the more useful bits of GTD instruction I've seen outside the book. It's a list of "Project Verbs" versus "Next-Action Verbs" and, man, is it ever useful.

These materials (which I'd never seen anywhere else before) provide a powerful codebook for translating your own language and thinking into planning that is do-able and valuable. Put simply, there are verbs that suggest a single physical next action, and there are verbs that suggest a desired outcome with more than one step. And these tables can help you see and understand that distinction immediately.

(reproduced from the OOP GTD Fast booklet, ©1998-2001 David Allen & Co.)

Project verbs

Finalize Resolve Handle
Look into Submit Maximize
Organize Design Complete
Ensure Roll out Update
Install Implement Set-up

Next-action verbs

Call Organize Review
Buy Fill out Find
Purge Look into (Web) Gather
Print Take Waiting for
Load Draft Email

Get the distinction? Most all of those big verbs can and should be uncorked to reveal that they contain nothing but dozens of smaller verbs. And those little fellas are your physical next actions. That's your work.


I really wish I'd had these tables taped over my desk three years ago when I started doing GTD, because -- geeky as it sounds -- they're a kind of rosetta stone for ensuring that you correctly translate your stuff into either tasks or containers for tasks. So useful.

Getting that taxonomy and structure correct during the planning stage will do much to improve your life when it comes time for doing.

Darla's picture

Organize should appear on both...

Organize should appear on both lists because you can "organize" a project, which may require several sub-steps. For instance, "organize a charity event". In the sense of a Next Action, it could be "organize desk drawer." It is one of those words that could go either way.

 
EXPLORE 43Folders THE GOOD STUFF

Popular
Today

Popular
Classics

An Oblique Strategy:
Honor thy error as a hidden intention


STAY IN THE LOOP:

Subscribe with Google Reader

Subscribe on Netvibes

Add to Technorati Favorites

Subscribe on Pageflakes

Add RSS feed

The Podcast Feed

Cranking

Merlin used to crank. He’s not cranking any more.

This is an essay about family, priorities, and Shakey’s Pizza, and it’s probably the best thing he’s written. »

Scared Shitless

Merlin’s scared. You’re scared. Everybody is scared.

This is the video of Merlin’s keynote at Webstock 2011. The one where he cried. You should watch it. »