Write every Action Step starting with a verb
An Action Step that begins with a verb is completable; one that doesn’t is usually a wish or a category, not a task.
Why it works
Language structure shapes action readiness. A task phrased as "Website redesign" requires parsing to determine what needs to happen; "Draft website redesign brief by Friday" is immediately actionable. Verb-led phrasing forces specificity: you cannot write "Send" without also identifying to whom and what. This specificity is functionally equivalent to an implementation intention — the research basis for why when-what-who task specification improves follow-through.
How to do it
- Before writing any Action Step, begin with an active verb: Send, Draft, Schedule, Decide, Review, Ask, Call.
- After the verb, identify the object (what) and, where relevant, the recipient (who) and deadline (when).
- If you cannot start with a specific verb, the item is probably a project or a theme — it needs to be broken down further.
Evidence
Implementation intention research (Gollwitzer & Sheeran 2006) demonstrates that specific when-what planning improves follow-through by a medium-to-large effect. Verb-led phrasing is the Action Method’s operationalization of that specificity. (mechanistic)
Implementation-intention research is about when-and-where specificity; verb-led phrasing is the Action Method’s proxy for that specificity. The exact mapping has not been independently tested.
Sources
- Gollwitzer & Sheeran (2006), implementation intentions and goal achievement, Advances in Experimental Social Psychology
Common mistake
Stacking multiple actions into one verb phrase ("Email John and review the proposal and schedule a call") — each is a separate Action Step and should be written as one.
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More practices for The Action Method, Made Practical
- Classify every captured item as an Action Step, Reference, or Backburner
When anything lands in your capture system, immediately sort it into one of three buckets — every item must belong to exactly one.
- Assign one owner to every Action Step
Any Action Step shared by multiple owners effectively has no owner — every step needs exactly one named person responsible.
- Review your Backburner list regularly to surface ideas whose time has come
The Backburner is not a graveyard — schedule a periodic review so good ideas that needed time can become Action Steps.
- Maximize the Action Step ratio in meetings
Judge a meeting’s productivity by the ratio of Action Steps it generates, not by how engaged or interesting it felt.
- Keep each project’s Action Steps physically separate from other projects
Mixing action steps from different projects in a single list increases context-switching cost and makes progress harder to see.
Related concepts
- Getting Things Done (GTD), Made Practical
The five steps, the next-action habit, and the science of offloading your mind
- Essentialism, Made Practical
Less but better — the disciplined pursuit of less, trade-offs, and the mechanisms
- The Ivy Lee Method, Made Practical
Six tasks, ordered by priority, worked in sequence — a 100-year-old system that still runs