Books on Organisation, Goal Setting and Work

Organising and planning

The Now Habit
Neil Fiore

Fiore has been studying procrastination for many years and really sees that motivation is key. He suggests designing your day around what you really enjoy, leisure, hobbies, exercise  and then to build half hour slots around this - to work towards your goals. Instead of focusing on finishing, the focus is on starting in 30 minute increments then taking a reward, and back to start again. He reccommends taking a 2 minute pre-project focus to get the mind ready to start. Procrastinating uses up valuable energy. It's a protection of sorts, but it takes energy to procrastinate. The stories of clients in the book makes one feel he has missed the obvious, that many of them are ADD. So this is really a book for ADHD Adults just doesn't know it!

Do It Tomorrow
Mark Forster

Mark Forster offers advice on time management. The advice is amazingly tuned to the traits of ADHD, Forster does not apparently realise that many of the people with the disorganised issues he mentions are most likely ADHD struggling with weak executive functions of poor motivation, planning and procrastination. Anyway he aims to help the disorganised take control of their working day and learn to achieve what they set out to. Forster, a leading Life Coach, focuses on motivation to improve productivity, using experimentally validated techniques, such as: don't wait to put in new systems until you've dealt with the backlog, you never will. He shoots down the two cornerstones of traditional time management, the "to do" list and prioritising by importance and urgency. His belief is that we crave completion, to-do lists where we add new items all the time are "never completed". Forster's solution is to create a list of items to do tomorrow, and then draw a line under those items. If you complete everything above the line, you've succeeded. Things may arise during the day but they are added below the line and if possible take a lower priority than completing the items above the line, that you wrote yesterday. Perfect for ADHD time menegemnt, put it on your list to buy tomorrow!

The Disorganized Mind: Coaching Your ADHD Brain to Take Control of Your Time, Tasks, and Talents
Nancy A. Ratey and John Ratey

Author Nancy Ratey who has ADD and Dyslexia, is an adult ADD Coach. Her wisdom and experience show clearly in this book, illuminated with client histories who overcame their ADD challenges. Ratey offers a six step strategy that gives the reader a way to analyze what is working for them and what is not and provides forms and questionnaires to help the reader get through the steps. She also emphasises the need for commitment and patience for the process of growth while covering every aspect of ADD from time mismanagement, procrastination, distractibility, impulsivity to transitions.  In this book Ratey help people with ADHD take control of time, tasks, and talents at work and at home without losing sight of spiritual, physical and mental wellbeing. Coaching can help someone with ADD bring balance into their otherwise chaotic life and learn strategies to structure their life and goals aligned with their ADD. Nancy distills her coaching techniques into this excellent book. so that you can become your own ADD coach.

ADD-Friendly Ways to Organize Your Life: Strategies that Work from a Professional Organizer and a Renowned ADD Clinician
Judith Kolberg & Kathleen Nadeau

Great techniques to help with organisation but also one of the best books on understanding ADD available. Judith Kolberg is a professional organizer and Kathleen Nadeau is a psychologist and author of dozen titles on ADD/ADHD. A really helpful practical guide for home and work. Many ADD books on organizing strategies spend pages defining the problem and then offer only brief and obvious advice "ADD people need structure." This book gives simply practical advice on how to simplify and structure your life to not only maintain order but to reach your goals without becoming overwhelmed and giving up in frustration. It suggest implementing maintenance strategies first before gaining the strength to tackle the chaos to get out from under. There is a lot more to this book than organisation and it is a great insightful guide to ADD highlighting many traits that other books fail to mention.

10 Simple Solutions to Adult ADD: How to Overcome Chronic Distraction & Accomplish Your Goals
Stephanie Moulton Sarki

Stephanie Moulton Sari, Assistant Professor of Counselor Education, University of Florida, provides straightforward tips delivered in brief measures, ideal for someone with a shorted attention span. Her intent is to improve the efficiency of daily living and develop lifestyle patterns to offset the disadvantages for ADD in adults. Each chapter takes up an issue Get Immediate and Lasting Rewards, Better Concentration, Sharper Memory, Richer relationships, Improved Money and Time management, and Greater Self-Confidence.  Suggestions include the "Five Box" method for sorting one's possessions: 1. Fix it 2. Give it away 3. Keep it 4. Don't know, 5. Garbage; for using alarms to keep track of time;  for using a seven-day pill container to ensure one takes the correct dosage of one's medication over the course of a week. No shattering revalations but a concise, practical and valuable guide.

Finding a fit – Creativity and ADD Careers

The Career Guide for Creative and Unconventional People
Carol Eikleberry

Another guide for people with ADHD, written by an author unaware of the traits of  ADD and who perhaps who also share these traits herself? Dr Eikleberry's research for this book, written in the 1970s, was based on the Holland Codes, three-letter codes designed to describe work interests that map very closely to the the traits of creativity, unconventional, intuitive, out-of-the-box thinking we connect today with ADHD. She states "findings from psychological and vocational studies indicate interests in art, music and literature are associated with more neurotic problems", the "artistic person perceives a complex world in which certain elements are wrong or don't fit" , "creative people tend to be independent in their relation to authority figures" , "a sensitive, intuitive, expressive nature is no advantage when the task is to handle everyday maintenance chores by established rules".  Eikleberry realises that finding the right career involves not just pursuing your interests but working with people who share your values too.  People need to take salary into account too as many artistic occupations do not pay well, so there are suggestions on creative career choices to support you fully; or taking "normal" jobs as day jobs and working on your art in your own time; and in composing your own career. This is a wonderful, focused, goal-directed book that should be able to help nearly any confused creative (ADHD) person find a better direction in life, required reading for anyone who dreads the thought of conformity and working in a traditional office setting.

The Art of Happiness at Work
The Dalai Lama and Howard Cutler

The second book from Howard Cutler and the Dalai Lama about how to find happiness at work? Unsurprisingly the Dalai Lama feels that cultivating inner values contributes to the greatest possibility of being happy at work. Topics are brought up as conversations that took place between Cutler and the Dalai Lama with commentary from Cutler as the chapter ends. The topics include making money, work boredom, job career, right livelihood. Practical suggestions are to keep an optimistic outlook, calm mind and a realistic perspective.  Tying self-identity to money is not a realistic perspective, you are not your money and so what happens if you suddenly stop making money? Do you become a worthless person because you no longer have a high income? The Dalai Lama encourages us to even take jobs that pay less money but that leave for more time to spend with family, friends, and doing things we enjoy. It's hard to be happy when you are a slave to work. Have a self-understanding of your strengths and weaknesses so you won't be devastated if you are not great at certain aspects of your job and work with a sense of meaningfulness, skill and feel satisfaction. The book is a little slow and rambles a little in the conversations but the Dalai Lama does offer practical advice and a positive attitude.

The War of Art: Break through the Blocks and Win your Inner Creative Battles
Steven Pressfield

Pressfield, author of "The Legend of Bagger Vance", looks at writing and the problems of putting words to paper but it offers much value on chronic procrastination for people with ADD too, or as Pressfield puts it "Overcoming Resistance". He breaks the book into three sections:  in "Resistance: Defining the Enemy", he identifies Resistance as fear in its endless manifestations. Pressfield demonstrates clearly that he is no stranger to the thoughts that keep the writer from writing. In the second section is "Combatting Resistance: Turning Pro", Pressfield persuades the reader to attack this form of Resistance head-on, to get on with it and do what the inner you is directing the outer you to do. Finally in the third section "Beyond Resistance: Higher Realm", Pressfield talks of muses, angels, higher intelligences and God. You can still be agnostic or atheist to connect with the sense of amazement Aristotle and other ancients did at the mystery of creative expression, where do ideas come from, where does the spark of unique, original artistic expression come from? Pressfield tells us to open ourselves to the "muses and angels" - the forces we do not understand - and let our creative thoughts out, rather than keep them inside because of fear, Pressfield's "Resistance". 

I Know What I Want, But It's Not This: A step by step guide to finding gratifying work
Julie Jansen

If getting out of bed each weekday is getting harder and wonder how you ever found your so called "successful career" worthwhile, this book offers hope. If you have ADD then not appreciating your strengths; struggles with punctuality, planning or organisation; authority problems and rapid onset of boredom, leads many to this career crossroads. In this insightful, well organized, relevant and practical book, Jensen, a career coach, takes you through a series of exercises that are less about finding a new job, more about figuring out what you find frustrating, fascinating and where your strengths, passions and values lie. The tests categorize your situation into six types: "Where's the Meaning", "Been there, Done that", "Need the Money", "Bored and Plateaued", "Bruised and Gunshy", "One Toe in the Retirement Pool". You can then work on specific exercises to set goals, to consider work related activities and rate your skill level and desire to do them. Jansen offers guidelines for anyone thinking about starting their own business but also suggests that working for someone else is fine as long as you make sure your needs are met. Many people with ADD find great satisfaction in their own business but ADD traits of procrastination and poor planning can make this difficult and many find it helpful to have a structure at work to motivate them and structure their day. Jensen discusses what it takes to be successful in work and in the job search process. Meaningful work is one of the foundations of life of wellbeing.

The Creative Habit: Learn It and Use It for Life
Twyla Tharp

Tharp, one of America's greatest choreographers, shows that the struggle to be creative is nothing new, many great artists have fought the same battles. She focuses on the habit of work, how we need to establish habits for our creative pursuits or the work will not get done and creativity will have no place to manifest. For people with ADD, procratsination is a major hurdle and establishing "habits" is an effective way to avoid getting "stuck". Tharp's belief is that practice is supreme, not sitting around waiting for the muse to make an appearance. Tharp discusses her creative career, her tough work regimen and methods for getting things done but also that of many other creative people too, such as how Mozart worked his fingers into early deformity from practicing so much.  Tharp has demons too, even in success and helps us realise that our fears are not unique, wrestling demons is part of the creative process. Her aim is not to get into a creative mood but to be creative all the time.  She addresses getting started, preparation, the creative perspective, using your experiences, research and organization, finding inspiration, expoliting the unexpected, knowing what you wish to create, becoming competent, dealing with stalls, learning from setbacks, and building on the past. Each chapter has exercises, many of which were new to me.