Organize IT

The first month of the new year was very eventful. I will spare you the details of what stats went up, what changed, etc. However, if you haven’t subscribed to Organize IT yet please do. I’ve set a target to beat this month, so I’m sure you will forgive me for the in-your-face promotion! Below are the best posts from January in case you’ve missed them. Give them a read and leave a comment or two.

• The GTD Habits: Part 1
• An Introduction To The Circle Of Life
• The Art Of Conversation
• The Art Of Conversation: Open Questions
• Ask The Readers: What Weird Things Have Influenced You?
• Seinfeld And The Habit Tracker

I’m proud of this blog. I’m proud of myself for sticking with it and working on it nearly every day for over a year now. In some ways you could describe it as a second job. However, I don’t cover the topic of blogging here on Organize IT, so why am I writing about it? Over the last year a number of benefits have come to the surface from working on this blog that I never anticipated when I originally started it. These benefits are so profound in my life that I actually feel everybody should have a blog. Here’s why:

I don’t normally cover social/political issues here at Organize IT because obviously that’s not what the blog is about. However, with my video posts I sometimes broaden my scope and in this case I’m glad I did because this video on the big brother state is excellent. What’s your thoughts? Is it alarmist or does it make a very real point about our current culture?

Organize IT recap for 1st February 2008

• The increasing number of people who subscribe to Organize IT every week is always encouraging to see. It took a year to get my first 1000 subscribers, yet I’ve managed to break the 2000 subscribers mark in a third of the time… well, almost. To hit my target I need to get the figure consistently over 2000 within the next seven days, so if you enjoy this blog please subscribe to the RSS feed and make my week complete!
• If you haven’t checked out my latest template, the habit tracker, please do! I’ve been inspired by David Seah’s Printable CEO series and over the next few weeks I’m going to be radically updating my productivity templates to be more professional. So watch this space.
• Has anyone tried FolderShare for backing up and syncing their files? It was recently bought out by Microsoft and looks an intriguing prospect. As you may be aware I’ve been a fan of Mozy for the last few months, so I’m looking for feedback on whether to change tools.
• Lifehack.org discusses twelve ways to upgrade your weekly review. There are some very good points worthy of attention here. However, from my personal experience I’ve found that the GTD concept of a weekly review is flawed (at least for me). What I’m currently doing is reviewing as and when I need to. Of course the trick is to recognize the signs saying you need to review :) Anyone tried a similar approach?

Last week I published a guest post from Chrissy of Executive Assistant’s Toolbox about the art of conversation. One point that stood out for me was asking “questions about what people think and what they’ve experienced” This is typically achieved with open ended questions, which encourage the person you are talking with to say and reveal more, rather than giving “yes” or “no” answers. Ironically, last week I also had a training session at work that discussed the importance of using such questions. The problem is, in the heat of conversation – especially with a new person or a customer – it’s hardly realistic to stop and pause while you analyze what open question to ask.