The Get Stuff Done (GSD) Wheel
Seven collaborative steps to drive results without telling people what to do
The GSD Wheel is a seven-step cyclical process for achieving collaborative results: Listen, Clarify, Debate, Decide, Persuade, Execute, and Learn. The key insight is that skipping any step wastes time in the end, but getting stuck on any step turns collaboration into a tax rather than an investment. The wheel must be cycled through quickly and continuously.
The framework was born from Scott's observation that neither Google's bottom-up chaos nor Apple's perceived top-down control actually worked through pure authority. Both companies achieved spectacular results through a collaborative process where the boss's role was to facilitate each step, not to dictate answers. Even Steve Jobs, despite his reputation, insisted that people challenge him and worked to get things right rather than to be right.
The GSD Wheel directly counters the instinct of action-oriented managers to skip straight to execution. Scott learned this the hard way at Google when she reorganized her hundred-person team without involving them in the decision. Three of her five direct reports complained to her boss, and all three left her team. The restructuring was right, but the process was wrong.
- Telling people what to do does not work, even when you are right about what needs to be done.
- Skipping a step wastes time in the end; getting stuck on a step turns collaboration into a tax.
- The boss's role is to facilitate the process, not to be the decider at every stage.
- You can implement this wheel with your team even if your boss does not subscribe to it.
- The ultimate goal is to achieve collaboratively what you could never achieve individually.
- ListenCreate a culture where everyone is heard. Use quiet listening (like Tim Cook's deliberate silence) or loud listening (like Steve Jobs's strong opinions weakly held) depending on your style. Give the quiet ones a voice and manage the verbose. Set up systems for capturing ideas.Pro tipPaul Saffo's technique of 'strong opinions, weakly held' is a great loud listening approach. State your position strongly, then say 'Please poke holes in this idea, I know it may be terrible.'WarningIf you are a quiet listener, people may waste time guessing what you think or use your name to justify their own agendas.
- ClarifyPush yourself and your team to sharpen ideas before they enter the rough-and-tumble of debate. As Jony Ive said, new ideas are fragile and easily squished. Create safe spaces like pre-meeting reviews, 1:1s, or brainstorming sessions to nurture ideas. Use Pixar's 'plussing' technique.Pro tipDo not ask people to bring you three solutions and a recommendation. That kills innovation. Instead, help them think things through before ideas must be defended.WarningThe temptation to skip this step is strong when you are busy. But debating a half-baked idea will kill it, and solving an unclear problem produces bad solutions.
- DebateTest ideas rigorously through open debate. Keep the debate about issues, not egos. Require people to switch roles halfway through to ensure they are truly listening. Create separate 'Big Debate' meetings where everyone knows no decision will be made, lowering tension.Pro tipHaving everyone switch roles midway through a debate forces people to let go of their positions and focus on finding the best answer.WarningDo not let debates settle too quickly. Sometimes teams rush to a decision before they have fully explored the argument, just to avoid the discomfort of disagreement.
- DecideMake decisions quickly but not too quickly. Push decisions into the facts by delegating them to the people closest to the relevant information. Create separate 'Big Decision' meetings with clear deciders. Use your veto power sparingly or the process becomes meaningless.Pro tipBeing explicit about when you are debating versus deciding is the single most helpful way to figure out when a decision needs to be made.WarningDo not confuse being the boss with being the decider. Even the president does not have automatic decision-making power on everything.
- PersuadeNot everyone was involved in every step, so you must bring the broader team along. Use Aristotle's framework of ethos (credibility), logos (logic), and pathos (emotion). Show your work. Let the people who did the work present it at all-hands meetings to build the persuade muscle.Pro tipDecisions that seem mysterious or even nefarious to people who were not close to the process will undermine execution. Invest the time to persuade.WarningPersuasion at this stage can feel unnecessary to the decider, but skipping it means people execute half-heartedly or not at all.
- ExecuteBlock time for execution. Fight meeting proliferation ruthlessly. Keep your dirt under your fingernails by staying close enough to the work to understand the details. Do not become so busy managing that you cannot contribute to the actual work.Pro tipBlock think time and execution time on your calendar and defend it as sacred. Even middle managers at Google did this successfully.WarningIf you are not careful, the GSD Wheel becomes the Meetings From Hell Wheel. Make sure your team has time to actually do the work.
- LearnAfter executing, assess what worked and what did not. Be willing to change your mind when facts change. Use metrics and activity dashboards to understand what actually drove results. Then start the cycle again.Pro tipBurnout and a refusal to learn from results are the two biggest threats at this stage. When results are good, it is hard to tell who is driving success and who is along for the ride unless you measure activities.WarningConsistency can be the enemy of learning. Do not cling to decisions just because changing your mind feels like flip-flopping.
During a redesign of the AdWords front end, Sergey Brin proposed a solution and asked the team to put a couple of engineers on his approach while the rest pursued their own. The team refused. Brin banged the table and said 'If this were an ordinary company, you would all be doing it my way,' but his grin showed pride in the team's willingness to stand up to him.
A colleague argued with Jobs but eventually backed down despite believing he was right. When events proved the colleague correct, Jobs marched into his office and yelled, 'It was your job to convince me I was wrong, and you failed!' From then on, the colleague argued longer and louder until one of them was genuinely convinced.
When Scott joined Google's AdSense team, she found a hundred people all chasing the ball like a seven-year-old soccer team. She reorganized them into five specialized teams, a sensible change, but did it autocratically without involving anyone in the decision. Three of her five direct reports left. Sheryl Sandberg told her, 'You are spinning a long rope. It does not seem fast to you because you are in the center, but if you are at the end of the rope, you are hanging on for dear life.' Scott then observed how both Google and Apple achieved results collaboratively and codified the seven steps into the GSD Wheel.