The “personal” in productivity doesn’t just act as some form of ownership, it also represents how you feel about the choices you make to achieve your level of productivity.
This is a great point. I’ve extolled the virtues of GTD and OmniFocus to friends and coworkers in the past (most frequently after someone asked me to explain how I stay so organized). Some have given one or both a shot. Almost no one stuck with their new system.
What’s worse is that they often felt like failures afterward, which really bummed my head. Here I was trying to help someone feel better, and the opposite happened. And I think Vardy nails why that occurred.
This stuff by its very nature has to connect with your own way of working. Some systems like GTD have broad appeal because they’re very adaptable. But folks will only take the time to adapt a system if it already jibes with their predefined working style.
It would be a rare occurrence if someone could simply adopt another person’s productivity workflow wholesale.