You Are Running on an Old Version

When did you last update yourself?

Last week I bought a book that was first published 25 years ago.

It is called Getting Things Done, by David Allen. The subtitle is The Art of Stress-Free Productivity. It came out in 2001.

And before buying it I had a decision to make, one I did not expect to spend any time on.

There are two editions. The original from 2001, and a revised one from 2015.

I went for the original first. My logic was simple, and I suspect you would have followed it too.

The first one is the real thing. The pure version. The one closest to what the author actually meant, before anybody talked him into changing anything.

Then I stopped and looked into why he revised it at all.

I read what people who had used both editions were saying. I watched David Allen explain why he believed a new version was necessary.

And I ended up doing something I almost never do with a book. I compared the two editions before deciding which one to buy.

The difference was obvious once I looked. He rewrote it to reflect how much information technology had changed in between. In 2001 the inbox was one more tray on your desk. By 2015 it had become the desk.

The world he was describing had moved. So he moved with it.

But here is the part that stayed with me, and the reason you are reading about a productivity book in a broadcasting newsletter.

He did not rewrite the principles. The basics of the system are the same in both editions. What he updated was how those principles meet a world that no longer looks the same.

I bought the 2015 one.

And then, somewhere between paying for it and the first chapter, the question turned around and pointed at me.

When was the last time you updated the way you work?

Not your values. Not your work ethic. The actual mechanics.

The way you run your day, prepare a show, take your notes, hand off information, learn something new.

When did you last look at any of that on purpose?

I asked myself and the honest answer was uncomfortable.

Many of the habits I still use, I built when I was editing on three quarter inch tape.

Then everything moved to Betacam. Then DVCPro. Then digital editing, and the tape disappeared from the room completely.

I started in a world where satellite was basically the only way to move a signal. Then fiber became more available. Then IP took over, and soon the conversation will change again.

So yes, I have updated. Many times.

But I updated because the world left me no choice. The tape machine was gone, so I learned the new system. The satellite booking became a fiber order, so I adapted.

I never sat down and decided to update. I was pushed, and I called it evolving.

That is what the book did to me, before it taught me a single thing about productivity.

It just made me notice that a 25 year old book had been more deliberate about staying current than I have been about my own way of working.

The book got a second edition on purpose. Mine kept getting rewritten by circumstances.

Being updated is not the same as updating yourself

There is a real difference between the two.

When the change is forced on you, you learn the minimum you need to survive it. You keep your old logic and you paint the new tool on top of it.

When you choose the change, you get to ask better questions. What is actually still working here? What am I doing only because I have always done it this way?

One of those keeps you current. The other one keeps you a step ahead.

And let me be clear about what does not get updated.

Your values do not change. Your work ethic does not change. How you treat the people around you, the way you back up your team, your standard for kindness, all of that stays exactly where it is.

Everything else is fair game. If it does not go against your values, it can be changed.

Why this moment

The excuse to wait has disappeared.

Automation is already inside newsrooms. It is showing up in sports production. The AI conversation is not coming, it is here, and most of us are somewhere between curious and quietly nervous about it.

I believe our industry will change more in the next five years than it did in the last thirty. That is my read, not something I can prove to you.

Which makes this the best possible moment to do it on purpose.

Not because someone told you your role is disappearing. Because you decided to look at your own way of working before anyone forced you to.

That is the whole difference between updating and being replaced by the update.

How to actually do it

Some people work better one step at a time. One habit, one tool, one process a month. If that is you, do that.

Some people need the big dramatic change for it to feel real. If that is you, go for it.

The method matters less than the honesty that comes before it.

Acknowledge that a change is needed. Acknowledge that you have been doing the same thing the same way for years, and that some of it is only habit now.

Then start.

And this is the important part. Start with action, not with planning.

Do not build a system to decide how to change. Do not read five more articles about it. Do not wait for the quiet week that is never coming.

Learn one new thing. Change one process. Break one habit that you know is only a leftover from a machine that does not exist in your building anymore.

Change starts moving the moment you do something different, not the moment you finally understand it perfectly.

Software does not update itself. Somebody decides it is time, sits down, and does the work. That is still true today, in the middle of all this AI.

The book did not earn a second edition either. Its author chose to write one.

Nothing updates itself. Not the tools, not the book, not you.

Keep the principles. Update everything else.

P.S. If you want this as one question, here it is. Pick one thing you did at work this week and ask yourself why you do it that way. If the only answer is “because that is how we have always done it,” you might have found your first update. I already found mine.