Getting Things Done

Brainstorming
Once you know what you want to have happen, and
why, the "how" mechanism is brought into play.
When you identify with some picture in your mind
that is different from your current reality, you auto-
matically start filling in the gaps, or brainstorming.
Ideas begin to pop into your head in somewhat ran-
dom order—little ones, big ones, not-so-good ones,
good ones. This process usually goes on internally for
most people about most things, and that's often suf-
ficient. For example, you think about what you want
to say to your boss as you're walking down the hall to
speak to her. But there are many other instances
when writing things down, or capturing them in
some external way, can give a tremendous boost to
productive output and thinking.
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Capturing Your Ideas
Over the last few decades, a number of graphics-oriented brain-
storming techniques have been introduced to help develop cre-
ative thinking about projects and topics. They've been called
things like mind-mapping, clustering, patterning, webbing, and
fish-boning. Although the authors of these various processes may
portray them as being different from one another, for most of us
end-users the basic premise remains the same: give yourself per-
mission to capture and express any idea, and then later on figure
out how it fits in and what to do with it. If nothing else (and there
is plenty of "else"), this practice adds to your efficiency—when
you have the idea, you grab it, which means you won't have to go
"have the idea" again.

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CHAPTER 3 | GETTING PROJECTS CREATIVELY UNDER WAY: THE FIVE PHASES OF PLANNING
The most popular of these techniques is called mind-
mapping, a name coined by Tony Buzan, a British researcher in
brain functioning, to label this process of brainstorming ideas onto a
graphic format. In mind-mapping, the core idea is presented in the
center, with associated ideas growing out in a somewhat free-form
fashion around it. For instance, if I found out that I had to move my
office, I might think about computers, changing my business cards,
all the connections I'd have to change, new furniture, moving the
phones, purging and packing, and so on. If I captured these thoughts
graphically it might start to look something like this:

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THE ART OF GETTING THINGS DONE | PART ONE
You could do this kind of mind-mapping on Post-its that
could be stuck on a whiteboard, or you could input ideas into a
word processor or outlining program on the computer.
Distributed Cognition
The great thing about external brainstorming is that in addition to
capturing your original ideas, it can help generate many new ones
that might not have occurred to you if you didn't have
a mechanism to hold your thoughts and continually
reflect them back to you. It's as if your mind were to
say, "Look, I'm only going to give you as many ideas
as you feel you can effectively use. If you're not col-
lecting them in some trusted way, I won't give you
that many. But if you're actually doing something
with the ideas—even if it's just recording them for
later evaluation—then here, have a bunch! And, oh wow! That
reminds me of another one, and another," etc.
Psychologists are beginning to label this and similar
processes "distributed cognition." It's getting things out of your
head and into objective, reviewable formats. But my English
teacher in high school didn't have to know about the theory to
give me the key: "David," he said, "you're going to college, and
you're going to be writing papers. Write all your notes and quotes
on separate three-by-five cards. Then, when you get ready to
organize your thinking, just spread them all out on the floor, see
the structure, and figure out what you're missing." Mr. Edmund-
son was teaching me a major piece of the natural
planning model!
Few people can hold their focus on a topic for
more than a couple of minutes, without some objec-
tive structure and tool or trigger to help them. Pick a
big project you have going right now and just try to
think of nothing else for more than sixty seconds.
This is pretty hard to do unless you have a pen and
paper in hand and use those "cognitive artifacts"
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Nothing is more
dangerous than an
idea when it is the
only one you have.
—Emile Chartier
Only he who
handles his ideas
lightly is master of
his ideas, and only
he who is master of
his ideas is not
enslaved by them.
—Lin Yutang

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