Team

March 25, 2024
With the help of executive coach Lamont, business consultant Allen (Making It All Work) expounds in this fanciful program on how the framework he outlined in 2001’s Getting Things Done can improve the productivity of corporate teams. Updating the original’s “five steps for achieving control,” the authors recommend clarifying team objectives by asking “what’s the desired outcome?” and staying on schedule by keeping a communally accessible list of tasks and who’s responsible for each. Unfortunately, the guidance leans heavily on abstract navel-gazing. For instance, the authors devote several chapters to describing how teams can get on the same page about their “purpose and principles,” “vision,” and “goals” (terms they treat discretely but are largely interchangeable in practice) by discussing such questions as “why do we exist as a team?” (Confusingly, the authors bat away the obvious answer by insisting that making money is merely “a pleasant side effect” of a company’s “actual purpose,” contradicting their earlier admission that “for many, the primary reason their organization exists is to enrich the owners.”) Other suggestions are outright impractical, as when the authors extol the benefits of declining some tasks to focus on more important ones without addressing the fact that many employees aren’t given the luxury of being able to refuse work. This comes across more like a recipe for longer meetings than increased productivity.Agent: Doe Coover, Doe Coover Agency.

April 19, 2024
Allen, creator of the ""Getting Things Done"" (GTD) approach to productivity (and author of Getting Things Done, 2001), partners with executive coach Lamont to apply the GTD framework to teams. Their guidance is meant to be applicable in both professional and personal settings. The focus is on team mechanics, i.e., how to establish processes and standards that will most effectively and efficiently serve a team's ultimate goals. Much of the book reads like a traditional organizational management text; however, the text is particularly heavy on theory and relatively light on detailed case studies. Additional subjects include leadership, delegation, time management, productivity, and collaboration. Three appendices contain the most concrete information, reiterating the basic principles of the GTD approach and discussing both the optimal use of team-based software programs and the challenges of virtual work environments. Although this book is not a standout among the plethora of organizational management titles, it is well-written and will appeal to readers of Allen's previous works; recommended for collections that offer one or more of Allen's other books.

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