David Allen

Getting Things Done rests on a claim about memory rather than about discipline: the mind is for having ideas, not holding them, and an unrecorded commitment consumes attention until it is written somewhere trusted.

The method is a sequence, capture everything, clarify what each item actually requires, organise by context, review weekly, and the next action question that forces vague projects into concrete first steps.

Allen worked as a management consultant and had, by his own account, an erratic career including a spell as a magician's assistant. The weekly review is the part everyone skips and the part the system depends on.