This book, Natural Productivity explains Dragos Roua's ADD productivity method. In case you don't know, Dragos has a blog on self-improvement, productivity and the like, and I've been following his posts since one year ago. He writes very compelling content, and this is a review of his last ebook. ADD is the acronym of Assess-Decide-Do, the three main frames of mind of this system. Or realms, as is the usual name in the book. More on how the method works later (or buy the book!).
The book is divided in 3 sections: What is ADD?, Applied ADD and iADD: the iPhone and iPad app. In the first two sections, the framework for ADD is established and the last section is the down to earth application of it.
Personally, I found the first two sections a little fluffy, and the third section brilliantly clear. I asked Dragos about that, and he said that some people were completely in reverse, saying the first two chapters were eye opening and the third, boring. We guess it has something to do with analytical/emotional type of thinkers. I am pretty analytical, in case you wonder.
- Assess: You collect data for your task/project, split into sub-tasks, observe it from afar. When you run out of data, move on.
- Decide: You line your tasks with a context, start date and due date. When everything is set, move on.
- Do: Do this, and mark it as done. (*)
- Focus: What you need to do assess your tasks, decide on your tasks and do your tasks
- Flow: The state in which all this is done.
In the section where Do is considered, a few hints on task management and prioritising is given. But, as Dragos writes: Do is where you are going to create miracles.
(*) One interesting thing is that when a project comes to Do, you can apply your usual time management techniques (timeboxing, continuous improvement) or use GTD on it without problems.
In part two, ADD is applied to some real life settings (relationships, dealing with interruptions, personal crisis management and how it applies to the inbox zero paradigm). Then comes a chapter redefining deadline which you can read it in Dragos' blog if you like, and to end this section, what factors make ADD the natural productivity method. I won't delve into these factors, you can buy the book if you like.
The final chapter is the one which enlightened me the most. How the method really worked, applied. It was so enlightening, in fact, that I promptly bought the app (you can buy it from here, if you like) and even gave Dragos a testimonial to put in his blog. It is definitely the application. It integrates into my natural workflow perfectly. I am ashamed I am not the author of this application. Okay, I'll stop the lavishing now. It is worth its price, from my point of view.
As an overall view, I found the book very worthwhile, tied together with the application if you have an iPhone (or iPod Touch, or iPad) and you use it every day for task keeping, or intend to do so. You can also use the system without an iPod, of course
- Natural Productivity: A very good book about the ADD system, with a perfect manual for the following iPhone application
- iADD: The best productivity app I have tried (and I have tried quite a few)
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