The method: getting rid of, defining, and organizing “stuff”

Most reader of self-development books are in search of control and perspective. David Allen’s concept is to allow you to focus on what’s important by removing all the “stuff” you need to do / plan out of you head. Here is how D. Allen defines “stuff”:

Anything you have allowed into your psychological or physical world that doesn’t belong where it is, but for which you haven’t yet determined the desired outcome and the next action step.

The best way to do that is to set in place a system which will ensure you identify and keep track of all the stuff that isn’t in the right place. You should then either(1) get rid of the stuff by either simply tossing the unimportant ones or delegating the ones you can, (2) define each one by its next actionable item, (3) tackle it straight away if it requires less than two minutes to complete, or (4) create a folder or places you trust where you be able to access it and come back to it easily.

If you follow this method, you should end up with a manageable list of actionable items and project, which reflect your priorities, and which yo can tackle following your time, your energy, and/or the context of any given moment.

Of course, you also need to update and review the stuff you accumulated, and the actionable you did not yet tackle on a regular basis to ensure you stay on top of your game.

What do I think?

I think GTD is a very good book with a strong system. The writing is engaging and D. Allen knows how to motivate. I worked the system for a few days and came out with the following conclusions:

1. I felt empowered after listing down all my “stuff”.
2. The best moment were getting rid of all the non-necessary ones
3. I found many useful tips on how to get my “stuff” actionable
4. I improved my organizing method
5. The full system needs to be updated very often.

Unfortunately the last point I raised is problematic with me. I always end up losing focus at some point in time, and end up with a non-updated system. I ended up frustrated, and re-initialized the process of getting my “stuff” actionable and organized two times already. Each time I reviewed my system and got rid of a few things D. Allen recommend. I now have a system which I adapted to my processes, and I just realized it is very close to the one JD discovered when he read Zen to Done: The SIMPLE Productivity Syste. I guess it will be my next read !

Should you read it?

Yes.  I highly recommend you read Getting Things Done. Even if you don’t use the system once you finished it, you will come out with many nuggets of wisdom and actionable you can incorporate in your own personal system.

You can start by borrowing it from friends to discover it. If you like it and want to have it on your bookshelves to refer to it later on you can always buy it from Amazon down the road.

What is important here is that we now are back on tarck. We know how much we spent last month, and can better prepare ourselves. Tracking ones expenses can be difficult; especially when you start doing it. What you need is a few easy tricks and some dedication. You’ll find hereunder a few I found useful:

• Keep all your receipts
• Take a piece of paper and write the figure down when you forget or lost the receipt
• Update your tracking file every 2 days – it only take 5 minutes
• Keep your excel file with you all the time – a USB key is the idea companion
• Print your budget and stick it somewhere visible (fridge, mirror, TV…)
• Do it with your spouse / fiancée / GF / BF – doing it together will help you stay on track

Got any other? Please share

The Vanguard 500 index fund (code:VFINX) is, as its name indicates, an Index Funds tracking the Standard & Poor’s 500 index. It was launched in 1976 and has since been a portfolio’s favorite of many investors. Its success boils down to its investment philosophies – and some say its very good customer services.

Vanguard 500 Philosophy

John Bogle, Vanguard founder, built his company and index fund based on his Princeton undergraduate thesis findings. Mr. Bogle used the Standard & Poor’s 500 index to compare the performance of mutual funds in the past. He soon realized that three out of four of the managers were not performing better than a passive investor holding a basket of the 500 largest public companies in America. Their performance were eventually below par as investors still needed to pay their expenses, and active trading incurred taxes.

Mr. Bogle then decided to create a fund following the S&P’s 500 index with extremely low expenses. They achieved those low expenses thanks to a no-load strategy – the buyer do not pays sales commission (also called “load”) when buying or selling fund shares. All this no-load explanation may sound a little complicated. It simply translates into an incredibly low 0.18% expense ratio. Thanks to this sane and sound strategy, the Vanguard 500 Index Fund has grown to become one of the largest mutual funds of any kind. It now has more than $100 billion in assets – and growing!

What does this means to you?

It simply means that the Vanguard 500 is to be present in your portfolio. It is a very safe, cheap, and rewarding fund to hold – for Americans and non-Americans alike. Some may be afraid to invest in American funds right now. They may be right should you consider a lump sum investment. But for those considering cost-averaging, then now is the time to start building your position. What are you waiting for?

Vanguard 500 Market Data
Yahoo Finance
MSN Money
Google Finance

After a painful period, investors face a stark choice

OWNERS of risky assets suffered agonies in the first three months of the year. Almost without exception, stockmarkets lost ground while the price of corporate debt fell sharply (or to put it another way, spreads widened). Only those who bought the unlikely combination of government bonds and commodities will be looking fondly at their portfolios.

For dollar-based investors, it did not matter much what kind of equities they owned. The MSCI World index was down 9.5%, the American market 9.9%, Europe 9.2% and emerging markets 11.3%. The supposedly uncorrelated Tokyo market (it has tended to go down when others went up) decided to become correlated again at the least helpful moment, dropping 7.7% in dollar terms. And even those numbers are flattered by the decline of the greenback; in local currency, Japan was down 17.8% and Europe 16.2%.

“Be greedy when others are fearful” is one of Warren Buffett’s aphorisms and it is possible that this is one of those times. After all, most people are convinced that the American economy is in recession, and sentiment is depressed. The demise of Bear Stearns could mark the bottom of the crisis, and the cavalry are finally on their way: the Federal Reserve and the American Treasury are supplying both a monetary and a fiscal stimulus.

Read more by following this link.

Trent wrote a very interesting article on what he calls the Superman Syndrome. Some people want to be financial heros – they want to save the day by paying for the group. Should you recognize yourself in this category, I highly recommend Trent’s prose. He makes many good points.

While the superman syndrom is not cool for your finance, the avare (miserly) syndrome is not great either. Britt Bravo got a great point across in her article on how giving may cheer one up. We should never forget that we are social creatures & that sharing is one of the most enjoyable thing we could do with our money.

Last quick one for the road; I just came across some reading on Benjamin Graham in the local newspaper. Mr Graham was an influential economist and professional investor. Graham influenced many investment gurus as Warren Buffett or Michael Price. He wrote two “bibles” in the Security Analysis and The Intelligent Investor. I’ll try to find them in here & do as well as Mr Buffett…