Make things happen with GTD Method Weekly Review

If the idea of doing a weekly review makes you feel like you just want to walk away, because it sounds full on, I got good news for you. 

It isn’t and it doesn’t have to be that way. 

I know that when we talk about review, it sounds like it’s too serious, tedious and takes a lot of time. 

While it’s partly true, I want you to know that you make it simple and complete it without dedicating hours upon hours.

It can be wrapped up in as little as 15 minutes. Of course, you can take longer if you have more time. 

So, stick with me for a bit and you’ll learn how to do a weekly review even if you don’t have much time. 

Table of Content

Why do you need a weekly review? 

If you’re wondering why you need a weekly review.  I’ll give your three reasons:

1. Less mental load
2. Less stress
3. Improved decision-making skill

Whether you’re pursuing professional or personal goals one of the common challenges here is not knowing if you’re still on the right track. 

And if you don’t know if you’re on track or not – it’ll be hard to tell if you’re moving closer or away from your goals. 

Fortunately, by having a dedicated time to review your week, you’ll know exactly where you are in your journey. 

And if you make it a priority in your weekly to-do list, you’re going to achieve more than what you’ve imagine. 

Weekly review is a part of a weekly planning process. I created a special guide that will help you create an intentional and productive week. You can grab it from here at a very special price.

DISCLOSURE: As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. This post contains affiliate links which means I receive a commission at no additional cost to you if you click through and make a purchase using those links. See my full Disclaimer here.

GTD in a nutshell 

Before I introduce the GTD Weekly Review Process, I’ll quickly explain David Allen’s Getting Things Done, or GTD  in a nutshell. 

Getting Things Done, art of stress-free productivity, is a book written by David Allen. He created the GTD method to help individuals effectively manage tasks, projects, and commitments

The GTD method has 5 steps:

1. CAPTURE – write, record or gather anything and everything that has your attention into a collection tool. You can use a pen and paper or a note-taking app.  
2. CLARIFY – process or clarify what you’ve collected. If its actionable, decide the next action. This can be a task or a project. A task can be completed with one action step while a project requires more than one action step. If it’s not actionable, decide if it is a rubbish (trash), a reference or something to put on hold. 
3. ORGANISE – Once clarified, put it where it belongs. I do this by having a Task Space and a Project Space in Notion. All others go to Reference Space. 
4. REFLECT – Update and review to regain control and maintain focus
5. ENGAGE – Use a trusted system to make confident and clear decisions to get things done.

What is GTD method of Weekly Review?

In this post, we’re going to focus on the 4th step of the Getting Things Done (GTD) method: Reflection. 

Reflection is an important part of living an intentional life. It’s when you hit the pause button and think about things.

You take a breather and assess where you were the last time, where you are right now and where you’re heading. It’s an opportunity to appreciate your hard work and what you’ve done so far. Then figure out what’s important and make a game plan to level up.

Getting Things Done Weekly Review has 3 main sections. 

• first, is getting clear 
• next, is getting current 
• and then getting creative

I’ll explain more about each section here, and then I’ll share with you my version of it later on. 

1: Get Clear

Collect all lose paper, notes and paper-based materials that you want to include in your weekly review. Then, process them completely. Process means to take action or at least decide what you’re going to do about what you collected.

For example, getting your “inbox” ( physical or digital) to zero, and dealing with your notes and calendars.Then empty your head by capturing new tasks, projects, “waiting for” and “someday-maybe” items. 

2: Get Current

To get current, mark completed tasks, review reminders, further action steps, and follow-ups. You also need to look at your calendar – and review events, projects, and goals both short-term and long-term. Then evaluate projects, goals and outcomes. Make sure there’s at least one current action item on each. If you’re maintaining any check- list, this is the section where you review your check list too. 

3: Get Creative

Review someday/maybe list – review projects that may now have become active – then put it in the Project List. Any item that lost spark can be deleted. 

This part is also where you think of new and meaningful ideas to add to your system -including hare-brained, creative, thought provoking and risk-taking ideas. 

A short note

Just a quick note: 

I published this blog post, in October 2020 and since then, a lot have changed – with the way I live intentionally and how I approach intentional productivity. 

Getting Things Done method remains the main influence on how I do things. But my implementation is a slightly different now. 

I took the knowledge on board, tested them, and then I tweaked and refined the process based on my personal preference and style. 

Now, I can say with pride and gratitude (thanks Mr Allen), that doing a weekly review is one of those habits that has made a massive impact to my productivity and ability to make things happen. It’s a practice that holds my Weekly Planning Routine and make it purposeful and meaningful.

Originally, I only had 3 intentions on doing Weekly Review. 

I started doing the weekly review because I wanted to: 

• chronicle my weekly snap shots or parts of my week as a mum and a blogger which I intend to share with my two kids later on in life.
• deliberately manage and distribute my capacity or my limited time and energy so I could be a good daughter, mum, wife, friend, employee and human being. I don’t always get things right but I like recording the lessons and using them to do better.
• get things done (for real)

Why do you need to do Weekly Review? 

Now that I’m into 3 years (September 2023) of doing weekly review, I can tell you with confidence that this has been a game changer. This has now become a part of my productivity system that helps me manage the many hats I’m wearing. I have a small family with 2 young children, I have a day job, (I work 4 days a week) and I have a blog and online shops. (the ieSHOP and Etsy GratefulheartshopbyE)

Telling you this perhaps gives you the impression that I’m a busy bee. Yes I am, but not all the time. 

Because I’m living an intentional life, I can manage all these roles with ease. 

Weekly Review isn’t just about being productive, it’s also a part of being intentional. 

Weekly review serves as a steady system to make sure I do what I said I would do, reflect on what’s working and what’s not working. And most importantly, it helps me enjoy each day while I work on achieving my goals. 

I’m an imperfect human being which means with all these organisational and productivity methods, I’m bound to make a mess here and there. 

This is why I find the value of doing a Weekly Review which I do every Friday afternoon. It closes the previous week neatly, and prepares the following week with intention. Giving me a chance to do better, take what I learned from the past week and move forward. 

Benefits of doing Weekly Review

Before we dive in with my version of GTD Weekly Review, I want to share a few benefits I’ve gotten from regular Weekly Review.

GTD Weekly Review is critical component of making things happen especially for those projects that will take time to be completed. 

Aside from increasing productivity (more sense of fulfilment) and confidence, (knowing you’re capable of making things happen). there are a few more benefits when you do Weekly Review.  

Reduced Mental Load  

The Notion that our attention is distracted by incomplete task is known as Zeigarnik Effect. This article explains more about Zeigarnik Effect whereby interruption of a task can lead to it being remembered in more detail.

In David Allen’s Getting Things Done, he calls these tasks “open loops”. The author, David Allen defines open loops as anything pulling at our attention that doesn’t belong where it is, the way it is.

These “open loops’ constantly pop in our head and while a couple of them are harmless, more than 3 can cause overwhelm. A great way to deal with this is doing a brain dump. 

Doing a brain dump helps you free up some mental space and clears your mind. Having a clear mind makes you think clearly and you’ll feel less overwhelmed. By externalising what’s in your mind, you’re making them tangible and therefore more manageable.

Grab your free Brain dump sheet here.

Less Stress

Weekly review reduces stress because it serves as your trusted system to manage tasks, projects, goals and commitments.

At the moment, I have 2 young kids, and I have a day job. I want to be a good mum but also a good and reliable employee. Weekly review is the best way for me to find my balance. It’s never going to be a perfect balance, I know that. But the important thing is, I know that every week, I can decide how much time I need to spend on any task or project I’m working on.

Improved decision making

Personally, I find it’s hard to decide when I’m not clear with what I’m doing (like what exactly I am trying to achieve and why).

Being in this state also makes it hard to prioritise. Because I might know what needs to be done, but how I do I know which one comes first? This is specially difficult when trying to work out long-term goals. By doing weekly reviews, I’m able to get clear with the tasks I need to complete at the end of the upcoming week.

What are the steps in GTD Review? 

As I mentioned earlier, David’ Allen’s weekly review method has 3 Sections. Getting clear, current and creative. 

I’ve been using the most parts of the GTD system since 2015 and as my own system changes, I also tweaked the GTD Review process for my own use.  

So the process I’m going to share is my own interpretation of the framework and how I implement what I learned from David Allen.

You can either do this separately or do it while your planning your week.

I have a dedicated time every Friday afternoon to do my Weekly Review where I do both review and planning.  

And that’s the beauty of the Getting Things Done Method. The best thing about it is being flexible. It allows you to customise the framework based on what you need, what you prefer and your working style. 

How to do weekly review (quick version) 

If you’re pressed with time, a weekly review can be wrapped up in as little as 15 minutes. You can do this by answering the following questions. It’s a great idea to have your answers written down so that you can refer to them when you do the next weekly review. 

1. How do I feel about last week? 
2. What did I accomplish last week? Were they aligned with the bigger picture I’m aiming for? 
3. How can I bring my effort to the next level to make next week better than the past week?

That’s it. Your weekly review can be as simple and as quick as answering those 3 questions. But of course, depending on how long your answers are, sometimes it might take more than 15 minutes.

How to do weekly review (my 3-step version) 

The goal of the weekly review is to have a clear sense of where you were last week, where you are in the current week and where you want to be in the coming week.

I’ve been doing Regular Review for almost 3 years and the best time for me to do it is on a Friday afternoon. I used to do it on Sunday afternoon or Sunday evening, but because my week starts on a Monday morning, it didn’t work for me. Not much wiggle room so Friday is the perfect time for me.

Before we get into the 3 steps of weekly review,  let me share one habit that I do on a daily basis.

Do a mind sweep

I do a mind sweep every single day.

Every time something pops in my head I write it down or note it on my apple notes. Doing this on a regular basis helps me reduce mental clutter because I don’t have to try to remember those thoughts or ideas. Once they’re written down or noted, my brain stops reminding me about them. I’m sure you can relate to that nagging feelings that you’re forgetting something or missing important due dates because you forgot to write them down. The cure is doing a mind sweep.

Process those thoughts and ideas at the end of each day or wait until the end of the week when you do your weekly review. Any time is a great time as long as it works for you. 

And now, here’s the 3 simple steps to do a weekly review

1. Collect 

The first step is collecting what you need to process (or clarify) during the review.

Email, notes, reminders of events and appointments from Calendar. I deal with emails on a daily basis so, emails during weekly review is more about unsubscribing from marketing emails that I don’t need anymore. I also do a big brain dump to clear my mind and process what’s in my head for that week. 

2. Review  

The next step is Review.

Once I finish with the collection,  I start the reflection part by asking myself the 3 questions I shared above. Then I review my Task and Project List, current goals and someday maybe/list. 

During quarterly reviews, I look at my big goals, but sometimes I include them during weekly review too. It’s always a good idea to have a visible reminder of the big goals.

During review, I check my Mother List of Task in Notion (it’s my manual task manager). Then I pick tasks that I can schedule in the next 7 days. When new projects come up, I park them in my Project List in Notion.

The current top 3 important projects are written in my Bullet Journal together with the next actions list. Part of my daily routine is looking at my task list, particularly the next action list for each project and do them according to importance. 

3. Mindset / Attitude Check

After the reflection process, I create new notes for mindset and attitude check. Am I still happy with what I’m doing? Are my actions still aligned with what I’m trying to achieve?

I also make sure I practise an attitude of gratitude by appreciating the people, things and moments that made my last week meaningful. 

The next step

Incorporating a weekly review into your routine is like giving your productivity a compass—it ensures you’re headed in the right direction.

By taking this intentional time to reflect, reset, and realign, you’re setting the stage for a more focused and successful week ahead.

You can also treat your weekly review as your personal roadmap to taking control of your tasks, goals and over all well being

So your next step to make time and start doing a weekly review. Use my suggested quick version or the 3 steps process, it’s up to you.

Download your Free Brain Dump Sheets.