Getting Things Done: A Beginner's Guide

Buddha said the world is full of suffering, and I have scrolled enough social media to realize that is indeed the case. Heck, it feels like doomsday is around the corner. There is just misery all around. Everyone has got something which needs to be done!

 

There are problems spanning decades and unresolved issues plaguing generations, and this is without counting the Indian men's cricket team's propensity to lose in knockout matches. Therefore, to no one's surprise, the modern world is looking for problem solvers, people who can deconstruct these multi-layered, nuanced points of contention and arrive at an acceptable solution.

 

With 29 years of experience at being alive, a few months at an MNC and now 2 odd months in government, I have some ideas that should help a newcomer become the go-to man for any crisis. Like any other success guru, these are not at all well-researched and are purely anecdotal in nature. 

 

Let's start with the primary answer to problems - money. Money moves things around. If you find a problem, the most straightforward answer is to throw money at it. Look at how Mark Zuckerberg dealt with competition to Facebook. If that's not convincing enough, consider the proposed solutions to India's problems. 

 

Several committees and bodies have suggested that funding must be raised if you want to tackle a problem. If you want better educational outcomes, increase the funding to 6% of GDP. If you want better health outcomes, raise the funding to 5%. R&D also deserves 4% of India's GDP. Infrastructure needs 10%, defense needs another 15%, and so on. These are such intuitive suggestions that no one can debate. You could always adopt this path. 

 

However, this solution only works when you see things in isolation. I added the amount that India must spend to solve all its problems. It comes to around 420% of the GDP. Thus, it is as practical to accept all these recommendations as it is to expect more than 5 chips in a packet of lays. But no one actually bothers with the implementation, it's the words that matter.

 

Now that you have spent money, you should ask the responsible person to get things done. Say you are the manager of a small IT team of 5 people. A new project gets assigned to you. As a good manager, you should ask your team to get it done. They might say that they are already handling 4 projects, but hey, you have done your job of managing. You give them a deadline, usually a few days early, so that it doesn't affect the project even if they get late by a few days. 

 

How they will manage to do all this work in days with 24-hour long lunar cycle is something you shouldn't bother yourself with! Legend says that had an Indian IT Manager taken up the construction of the Taj Mahal, it would have been completed in 2 weeks, followed by continuous minor repairs for 30 years and then a complete overhaul. 

 

One must also utilize the available human resources efficiently to lessen the pressure. As I have learnt, the mantras are simple - coordination, supervision, and meetings. All the stakeholders must coordinate with each other. Superiors must supervise. Meeters must meet. Those who have to actually work must be ready to meet, get supervised and coordinated. After all this is done, they should get the work done. 

 

This strategy is foolproof. The supervisors, coordinators and conveners feel a sense of involvement and ownership of the project while shifting the accountability to the doers once they have passed down the instructions. If this reminds you of your boss, it also reminds your junior of his/her boss. I call it the Hamam me sab nange hain theory.

 

I have also noticed that buzzwords help. You throw heavyweights from English vocabulary around like it is no one's business and assume shit will get done. Here's a sample - "To seamlessly actualize the successful completion of this project, one must enthusiastically embark upon a multifaceted journey of incessant ideation and relentless conceptualization, ensuring an unwavering commitment to convoluted strategies, resulting into tangible actions and completion of measurable milestones." And no, I haven't taken this from a McKinsey report.

 

Technology is another enabler. If you have to do something, you have to use technology. The best thing is to use AI. If you could use AI in any shape or form, you have already impressed anyone you wanted to impress. The next grade belongs to the use of dashboards, shapes and figures. I have observed that a good concoction of APIs, back-end, and portals makes people go crazy. If you can't use these either, at least have a Zoom meeting, make some presentations, and show some numbers in Excel. Things seem to get done after this!

 

All of this could be overwhelming. There is just too much information I have provided. But the helplessness will soon give way to results if you follow this. These are time-tested, sector-agnostic, and culturally appropriate tricks of the trade that generations have resorted to. Join the queue and be a differentiator!