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- Every project the brain plans well, it plans in the same five phases, whether or

- not anyone names them. David Allen's Getting Things Done (GTD) formalizes this

- intuitive sequence so it can be applied deliberately to projects that are stuck,

- vague, or simply new. The point of walking through it is not process for its own

- sake — it is to arrive at outcomes that are clear and next actions that are

- concrete enough to actually do.

-

- This skill is distilled from personal notes on David Allen's *Getting Things

- Done* (German edition *Wie ich die Dinge geregelt kriege*, trans. Helmut

- Reuter); apply it as a general reasoning tool, not as a prescription for how

- any one person must plan.

- | # | Phase | What it does | Key question / output |

- |---|-------|---------------|------------------------|

- | 1 | **Purpose & principles** | Answers "Why?" — defines success, sets decision criteria, focuses resources, motivates, clarifies what matters, and widens the option space. | "Why are we doing this at all?" |

- | 2 | **Envision the outcome** | Mentally anticipates successful completion. Visualize where you'd be, what would be true of finances, reputation, relationships, or whatever the project touches. | "What does success look and feel like?" |

- | 3 | **Brainstorm** | Generates ideas without evaluating them. Nothing is judged, questioned, rated, or criticized; quantity beats quality; analysis and structuring are deliberately deferred. Mind-mapping is a natural fit: put the central idea in the middle and let associations grow freely from it. | "What are all the possible moves?" |

- | 4 | **Organize** | Sorts the brainstormed material by importance, into sections, sequences, and priorities. Depending on the project this can be a hierarchical outline or a flowchart of steps over time. | "What structure does this need?" |

- | 5 | **Identify next actions** | Defines concrete physical next actions. A project is ready to execute once every next action, on every currently-movable front, is decided — without first having to finish other parts. | "What is the very next physical thing to do?" |

- The five phases run in this order because each depends on the one before it:

- without purpose, brainstorming has no criteria to aim at; without an envisioned

- outcome, organizing has nothing to structure toward.

- The governing principle: **plan only as much as it takes to get the project off

- your mind.** Not every project needs all five phases in full.

- | Light | ~80% | Just a clear outcome (phase 2) plus a next action (phase 5) — no separate brainstorm or organize step required. |

- | Medium | ~15% | The above, plus some brainstorming — a sketch, a few notes, informal idea capture. |

- | Full | ~5% | The complete five-phase model, applied deliberately and in writing. |

-

- Match the depth of planning to the project, not the other way around. Forcing a

- five-phase treatment onto a simple project wastes effort; skipping phases on a

- genuinely complex or stuck project is why it stays stuck.

- 1. **Assign the tier first.** Decide up front how much planning this project

- needs — Light (outcome + next action, ~80%), Medium (plus a sketch of

- brainstorm, ~15%), or Full (all five phases in writing, ~5%). Everything

- below follows from that choice.

- 2. **Ask for the purpose — don't invent it.** Ask the user "Why are we doing

- this at all?", then wait for the answer. Ask one question at a time and

- never fill in purpose or outcome on the user's behalf.

- 3. **Ask for the outcome picture.** Ask what successful completion looks like —

- concretely, not as a vague aspiration — and again wait for the answer.

- 4. **Brainstorm without editing.** Generate every possible step or angle. Defer

- all judgment, structuring, and prioritization to the next step. This is the

- only step the agent may generate on its own.

- 5. **Organize the ideas.** Group, sequence, and prioritize what came out of the

- brainstorm. Use whatever structure fits — an outline, a flowchart, a simple

- list.

- 6. **Decide the next action(s).** For every front the project can currently move

- on, name the concrete physical next action. When a front's next move belongs

- to someone else, record it as Waiting For — who owes what — instead of a

- next action. Stop only when nothing is left vague.

- For Light-tier projects, steps 4–5 collapse: go straight from outcome (step

- 3) to next action (step 6).

- A "next action" must describe a physical, visible behavior — something a body

- can actually go and do. This is the most common place planning silently stalls:

- people write down something that sounds like an action but isn't one.

-

- - **Not a next action:** "Schedule a meeting." This names an outcome, not a

- physical behavior — it doesn't say what to actually go and do next.

- - **A real next action:** "Email Jane to propose three possible dates for the

- meeting." This is something that can be done right now, with the body, at a

- keyboard or a phone.

- - [ ] Does it name a physical behavior (email, call, write, buy, walk to, open)

- rather than a result or an intention?

- - [ ] Could someone else do exactly this, right now, without asking a

- clarifying question first?

- - [ ] If not — the real next action is almost always to *gather more

- information* (in Allen's framing, most stalled decisions are stalled for

- lack of information, not lack of willpower). Make finding that

- information itself the next action.

- When planning stalls, Allen's rule asks which direction to move: a project

- that lacks clarity moves up the model, back toward purpose and outcome; a

- project that is clear but motionless moves down the model, toward

- brainstorming, organizing, and next actions.

- **Move up — the project needs clarity.** Signs:

- - Arguing about solution details without agreement on what the outcome even is.

- - Every idea on the table feels like a variation of the same thing (cognitive

- fixation).

- - Each proposed solution creates new problems (a sign the wrong problem was

- solved).

- If any of these show up, back up to phases 1–2 — restate the purpose and

- re-visualize the outcome — before resuming organizing or picking next actions.

- **Move down — the project is clear but motionless.** Signs:

- - The outcome is clear, yet no concrete physical next action exists.

- - Planning keeps circling back to purpose and vision instead of producing

- something doable right now.

- If these show up, move down to phases 3–5: brainstorm, organize, and name the

- next physical action.

- **Reactive planning is the failure pattern:** starting from the bottom —

- scheduling, listing actions, reacting to the latest pressure — before purpose

- and outcome are established. Planning run backwards like this produces motion

- without direction; stop and move back up to phase 1.

- 2. Where the project falls on the 80/15/5 tier, and therefore how much of

- phases 3–4 are actually warranted.

- 5. A list of concrete physical next actions — checked against the

- physical-next-action rule above, one per currently-movable front of the

- project.

- 6. A Waiting-For list for fronts whose next move belongs to someone else —

- who owes what — kept separate from your own next actions.

- If the process stalls at any point, run the stuck-session diagnostic above —

- move up for clarity, move down for motion — before pushing further on

- organizing or actions.