The Sociology of Productivity

Following up on what I was writing about Getting Things Done (GTD) and reflexivity last night – the further I get into David Allen’s second book, the more aware I am of the countless empirical claims he makes about how internal conversation and reflexivity operate. I agree with many of them and, given the foundations of the system in his own experience as a management consultant and feedback from GTD users over the years, it’s not surprising that many of them are accurate. However I’ve got good empirical grounds for saying that some of them aren’t. Furthermore he doesn’t acknowledge the variability of reflexivity, nor the potential reasons for this or its implications for the practice of GTD. This opens up an intriguing prospect: a sociology of productivity. He’s put the infrastructure in place but many of the specific claims on which GTD rests demand further empirical investigation and conceptual scrutiny, albeit in a way which is ultra sympathetic to the form and content of GTD as a whole. Convinced there’s an awesome book in this idea, sad I have to finish my bloody thesis first though.