Eric Mack On-Line

This is an invitation to encourage our homeschool robotics team in the 2006 FIRST Robotics competition. My daughter, Amy, contributed to this post:

I'm excited! We have just started our first official day of LEGO Robotics 2006.

Our robotics team, the The LEGO Mountaineers is an all-girls home school robotics team. We have been competing in the FIRST Robotics competitions for the past 4 years. FIRST stands for For Inspiration And Recognition of Science and Technology. Its a great way to learn to apply skills in critical thinking, problem solving, math, science, computers, and robotics. It's fun, too.

Today, we finished making our first mind map for the 2006 FIRST Competition.

We use mind maps in all of our planning and we make maps often help us keep track of our goals, projects, ideas, and questions. This will also make it easier for us to keep track of what we have accomplished. Below, is a link to the mind map we made. I believe that it is because of our mind mapping and GTD planning skills that we were able to successfully plan, prepare, and win the Director's Award at two different competitions.

Continue Reading "2006 FIRST Robotics season begins - you can help" »

One way is to tease him publicly, like this.



Michael knows that I'll have my Tablet PC back from repair tomorrow, but he's not going to miss any opportunity to leave a hint.

I guess Michael's not yet seen these Mac & Tablet PC commercials?

Seriously, a Mac is on my computing horizon. What I'd really like is a high resolution Apple tablet. I wonder if we'll see one this year?

Last week, I got to enjoy a fun afternoon in the studio with David Allen, Robert Peake, and Merlin Mann (43 Folders). David invited us to Ojai to record an upcoming GeekTD podcast. David though it would be interesting to bring together a few geeks with varying approaches to productivity. Merlin talked about how he uses his Mac, Robert talked about the power of Mac and Open Source solutions, and I talked about Lotus Notes as a productivity tool for Getting Things Done. The discussion went all over the place and I have no idea what will end up in the finished version. David asked great questions and tried to keep order, which must have felt like herding cats.



David opened the session by stating how cool he thinks Lotus Notes is; he asked why, after 20 years, it seems that  many people who use Notes still don't get the power of Lotus Notes. David shared that he frequently goes into organizations that use Notes only to find that people (and their managers) have no idea what their system can do for them (e.g. that they can create their own databases, participate in discussions, use newsletter summary, agents, collaborate, etc.)

Continue Reading "GeekTD: Why don't people get Notes?" »

This week, my pastor shared a funny story about the danger of sending email to the wrong person and the potential consequences of reading email not intended for you.

Continue Reading "The danger of reading email not intended for you" »

Last week, I posted a quick preview of a powerful capture tool for MindManager, however, I did not reveal the tool at the time. Well, the tool is GyroQ, it's from the team at Gyronix, and I've been working with this product for the past 6 weeks.



In this post, I'll share my thoughts on GyroQ and a simple screen movie to show how I use GyroQ and why I consider it a valuable addition to my productivity toolbox.

What GyroQ Does
First, GyroQ allows me to quickly capture ideas and actions via a small pop-up window, regardless of the program I'm currently using.
Second, GyroQ automatically populates a MindManager Map with all of the the thoughts and actions I've captured.

Continue Reading "GyroQ - a powerful MindManager capture tool" »

My post on GTD Connect touched off a storm of discussion about GTD Connect. Even David Allen jumped into the discussion! I think the implied question is "Is GTD Connect worth it?" This discussion continues here, on my blog and over in the GTD Yahoo group. I think that the contributors have clearly shared their point of view.  Rather than comment further, I encourage you to read my original post, along with all of the comments, including a David's response.

Early adopter, Michael Sampson, was among the first to sign up for GTD Connect. He had this to say...


Continue Reading "Is GTD Connect worth the monthly investment?" »

Remember my recipe for homemade productivity juice?



Details here.

Remember Actioneer? That was a great digital capture tool. It captured information in a pop-up box, parsed it, and pasted it into your PIM. Unfortunately, Actioneer is no longer in the digital capture tools market.

This tool, [name withheld to build suspense and milk this blog post for all I can] does something similar, only it captures directly into MindManager maps!



Now that's cool!

Full video screenshow preview coming soon.

There are several excellent mind mapping blogs on my must-read list. Among them is Chuck Frey's The Mind Mapping Software Weblog and Nick Duffill's Beyond Crayons blog. (My regular readers may know that I've started a project to explore MindManager and ResultsManager with Nick and blog the process. More on that in another post.)

Chuck's blog chronicles the mind mapping revolution in business and I refer to it often to stay on top of news about mind-mapping and visualization tools. [Thank you, Chuck!]

Now, Chuck's asked for our help. He's trying to quantify the mind mapping revolution and uncover what people are doing with mind maps.

Continue Reading "Mind Mapping Revolution in Progress" »

By now you've probably read that David has formally launched GTD Connect. The popular GTD forums, blogs, and even the David Allen Company web site are already buzzing with the news. I think that Bob Walsh has probably done the best job summarizing some of the key features of GTD Connect so far. Rather than repeat what he's written so well, I'll encourage you to go and read Bob's post. If you've already taken the bold step to sign up for GTD Connect, then be sure to watch the Introductory video tour by David. It's a great way to learn more about what GTD Connect has to offer!  



Since Bob's already blogged with an overview of GTD Connect, I'd like to talk about it from a different perspective - that of someone who's been behind the curtain, met the man, and watched this information evolve over the years into GTD Connect - the first step in David's vision of being able to share information and connect with others who have a passion for getting things done. I want to share why I'm excited about GTD Connect.

[Disclaimer: I'm writing this on my own and not as a representative of The David Allen Company. The opinions I share are my own. Hopefully you will find them valuable. If so, let me know. If not, I'd like to hear that, too.]

I'm an independent eProductivity Specialist, and for 14 years, I've worked for David Allen, as his personal technologist. In that time, he's become a great mentor and friend. He's also been amazingly transparent about his work and life. I've had the opportunity to see what goes on behind the scenes at David's office, his home, and in his in-box. The guy practices what he preaches. He falls off the GTD system easily gets back on with the same ease. That's what I like about GTD. Even I can do it. David simply has a little more - OK a LOT more - experience than I do at getting things done. I've learned a lot from David. the education has been invaluable.

Continue Reading "Plugged in (Connected) to David Allen and GTD" »

Have you ever returned from vacation to find  1500 new emails waiting for you to process? Kelly Forrister's mentions this new e-mail vacation tax, in her post on obsessive-compulsive productivity.

I recently returned from an extended absence to several thousand emails. I'm now below the one hundred mark, but I'm fighting to get down to zero.
Here's one way to avoid the post-vacation E-Mail vacation tax:
Continue Reading "One way to avoid the post-vacation E-Mail tax" »

I've just surfaced from 6 weeks of intense work, presentations, and client travel. Two weeks in Ojai with the David Allen Company, two weeks to complete and work on my eProductivity business plan, and two weeks of client travel to meet with clients who waited patiently during my absence. This, punctuated by a memorial service for my grandpa, my business plan presentation (miracle did occur),  a dinner meeting with Marc Orchant and a delightful visit from my good friend, Michael Sampson and his Mac. (We enjoyed a very quick Thanksgiving dinner and church the next day, followed by a brief visit aboard a special aircraft.) Blog posts on all of these, coming soon.

I am going somewhere with this. I'm setting the stage for typically serious post-travel overwhelm. Whenever this happens, I apply the GTD work flow model to processing my stuff.  I'm now wresting with last 100 emails (out of thousands) and a small stack of papers, 33 draft blog topic ideas, and a business plan to revise.

So, what does all of this have to do with using a 24" LCD Panel as a tool for visual project mapping?

Continue Reading "24" LCD Panel as a tool for visual project mapping" »

Can you tell who's who? Listen to how Marc Orchant introduces my friend, Michael Sampson, now global VP of Word of Mouth Marketing for Foldera, on a recent  On the Run with Tablet PC podcast:

Sorry Michael, I couldn't resist. :-)

Source: On the Run with Tablet PC Podcast #24 (listen at 5 min 15 seconds in) Better yet, click on the podcast link below for a 60 second sound byte.