Dave Allen's best selling book, Getting Things Done, has revolutionized personal productivity for many people overburdened by the complexity and hectic pace of modern day life. However, his system presumes that you live in a first world society in which everything happens to schedule, basic services always work and overnight delivery is readily available as an extra cost option.
In places like Nicaragua a completely different set of rules apply. Things happens slowly here, unexpected delays are the norm and the layers of bureaucracy exist to create badly needed employment rather than to supply efficient services. This reality was brought home to me the first time I went into the city of Rivas to register my motorcycle at the main police station and discovered that their personnel had just gone home for lunch. All of them.
Fortunately, the more sclerotic the system, the more likely it is that shortcuts have evolved. Ask a few locals and you will quickly discover the name of the fixer who will, for a reasonable fee, bypass all of the paper shuffling and queuing normally required to do just about anything. For example, it is necessary for expatriate residents here to leave the country for 48 hours every three months in order to renew their visa upon re-entry. However, call a certain phone number and it is possible to send your passport for a weekend vacation to Costa Rica without you, returning stamped with your new visa.
Personal productivity in the third world has less to do with maintaining an empty IN box than with accepting the intrinsic difficulties with good humour and ingenuity, as well as having the right phone numbers on speed dial.
1 comment:
For implementing GTD you might try out this web-based application:
http://www.gtdagenda.com
You can use it to manage your goals, projects and tasks, set next actions and contexts, use checklists, schedules and a calendar.
A mobile version is available too.
With the new added iCal feed, now you can subscribe to Gtdagenda with third party services like Google Calendar or Apple iCal, and stay up-to-date with your Gtdagenda tasks.
Hope you like it.
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