GIGO: words unreadable aloud

Getting 7 Frog Habits Done

Two or more years ago, I listened to an (abridged, I read later) audio version of Covey's first "7 Habits" book. Lots of good stuff in there, most of which I didn't apply. A few months later, I read Brian Tracy's "Eat That Frog" book (which has the advantage of being a very quick read). Finally, Robert Allen's "Getting Things Done" methodology is showing up in several places on the Web, especially at Merlin Mann's 43 Folders weblog.

Coincidentally, "Eat That Frog" is today on the books-sidebar of the 43 Folders site.

In Mann's year-end review, one commenter suggested "One of my "attractive nuisances" is thinking about how I'd design a mash-up of GTD and the 7 Habits", which was what I've been doing a little thinking about also.

Tracy's Frog method seems a bit oversimplified. And GTD's 43 folders is way too many, requiring way too much specificity (as far as I can tell, not having read the book). GTD and 7H are somewhat complementary; I see the "F" (3rd) of the main 7H as in some sense "containing" the scheduling aspects which can be GTD-like, or can use the "Mishrogo" method from 7H.

To be a little less cryptic than I was last time I mentioned it:

PEF WUSS is my mnemonic for the 7 Habits.

P - be Proactive
E - begin with the End in mind
F - put First things first
W - think "Win-win"
U - seek first to Understand, then to be understood
S - Synergize
S - Sharpen the saw

Much of this is pretty high-level, and the F is where you do detailed scheduling.

That's where the Mishrogo Weedapeval comes in. This is Covey's six steps of scheduling:

Mish - write a MISSion statement
Ro - list your various ROles
Go - for each role, what are your GOals?
Wee - plan only a WEEk at a time
Dap - if situations change, aDAPt (with integrity)
Eval - EVALuate how you did

I found a nice GTD summary here at the Minezone Wiki. Had some comments on it which I'll put somewhere else.

One other place where I made up a similar silly mnemonic: a little poem that I call WashAdJeff MadMonAdJack.
12:14:38 PM comment/