GTD promises a foolproof system for never forgetting anything: capture, clarify, organize, review, engage. On paper, it works. In practice, most GTD systems hold up for a few weeks, then run out of steam, almost always at the same point. Here's why that one step does so much damage, and what a tool can do to lighten it.
The real weak point of GTD: keeping the system running
The method itself has no hidden flaw. Five clear steps, capture, clarify, organize, review, engage, that can structure just about any busy working life. What actually breaks it is the upkeep. A GTD system is only useful if its lists still reflect reality. The moment they fall behind, trust erodes, and you stop checking them.
The weekly review: where most GTD systems grind to a halt
In his own writing on the weekly review, David Allen calls it "the one factor upon which your success... hinges": "Do it, it lives and grows. Don't do it, it dies." In practice, lists that fall behind quickly lose their owner's trust: undated tasks pile up out of sight, and the whole system starts to feel like one more chore instead of a help.
The catch is that the review needs a blocked-off slot every week, uninterrupted, to reopen every project and every list one by one. It's the most demanding step in GTD, the one where the method leaves almost the entire load on your own discipline.
Emptying your head shouldn't be a project in itself
Capture, the first step of GTD, means jotting down whatever's on your mind before it slips away. In Flots, a task is created with a title, in two clicks, no category to pick and no project to assign on the spot. The Flots task guide walks through how a task later grows with categories, subtasks, or a description, only when that's actually useful.
The upkeep shifts sides from there. GTD normally asks you to sort each capture into the right list at the right time. With capture this quick, that sorting can wait without ever losing sight of the action itself.
Undated tasks, kept in view instead of stuck in a separate ritual
A good chunk of the GTD weekly review is spent tracking down undated tasks and deciding what to do with them. That's useful, but it means setting aside a dedicated session just to keep them from disappearing for the rest of the week.
Flots' Planning view changes where that work happens. Undated tasks stay visible at all times next to your day, ready to be dragged into a slot the moment you have room. No need to wait for a Sunday-evening ritual to find them again: they're right there, every day, in plain sight.
The Planning view brings tasks and calendar together
Undated tasks stay visible next to your day at all times, ready to drag into a slot.
Discover the Planning viewRituals that come back on their own
GTD files routine tasks, monthly invoicing, the weekly team check-in, into reference lists or projects to review regularly. That's one more thing to keep an eye on, week after week.
In Flots, a recurring task is set up once: it then comes back on its own, every week or on whatever rhythm you choose. Invoicing, the team check-in, or any other ritual no longer needs to be recreated, or even spotted during a review. It just reappears at the right time, without you having to remember it.
And what about projects, in the GTD sense
In GTD terminology, a project is anything that takes more than one action to complete, a deliberately broad definition that covers both "redo the website" and "organize the office move." Flots projects follow the same logic: a dedicated space per subject, with steps and milestones to track progress, instead of a flat list of tasks with no connection between them.
GTD by hand, GTD with a tool that shares the load
| GTD step | By hand | With Flots |
|---|---|---|
| Capture | Decide where to write it, in which list | A title, in 2 clicks |
| Undated tasks | Mostly resurface at review time | Visible at all times in the Planning view |
| Recurring tasks | Spot and recreate them yourself | Set up once, come back on their own |
| Weekly review | Mandatory session for the system to hold up | Lighter: less to recreate or track down |
GTD is still a good method. It asks you to build a system, then keep it running, and it's the upkeep that makes most people give up. A tool doesn't replace the discipline that clarifying requires, or the judgment call on what actually matters this week. But it can carry part of the upkeep for you: capture that doesn't ask for any thought, undated tasks you never lose sight of, rituals that come back without you having to remember them.
Empty your head in two clicks, no Sunday-evening ritual required.
Create your tasks in an instant, let your rituals come back on their own, and keep undated tasks in view in the Planning view.
