Michael Linenberger, author of Seize the Work Day, recently agreed to field a few questions about his guide to adopting the Tablet PC. The book offers a wealth of practical, hands-on recommendations about configuring a Tablet PC for maximum productivity as well as comprehensive reviews and implementation guidelines for software applications that take advantage of digital ink. Linenberger, a former executive with Accenture and a long-time technologist and knowledge worker, develops a model built around a digital "binder" containing your "power documents" - those documents that, regardless of their source, are critical to the work at hand.

I found the book to be an extraordinary aid in getting my Tablet PC system configured and a good set of software tools installed and integrated. While my work circumstances differ from Linenberger's (I work in a software company and have very few outside meetings with clients) and so came to somewhat different conclusions on form factor and work style, virtually every recommendation made in the book was worthy of consideration and most have become part of my approach to making the Tablet PC the central tool in my work.

As a long-time student of David Allen and his Getting Things Done system for personal productivity, I was particularly intrigued to read that Linenberger, who had much more familiarity with the FranklinCovey planning approach, had been introduced to Allen's method while writing the book. His easy approach to integrating the best practices from both systems fascinated me (it's a constant source of conversation and debate in GTD communities) and I wanted to follow up on that point with him in this interview.

I've also been using one PDA or another since the original Newton Message Pad was introduced and I was fascinated by the notion of a Tablet PC replacing the handheld and functioning as a "super PDA". While I'm not ready to completely lose the PDA as a highly portable tool for instant information retrieval, my Tablet PC usage has relegated the smaller device to a reference tool. I do very little data input on the PDA anymore. If you are considering the Tablet PC platform or are already using one, I recommend you visit the book web site - www.seizetheworkday.com - to learn more about Linenberger and the book. You can download sample chapters there to get the flavor of his easy-going and approachable writing style.

Marc Orchant: You relate, in your introduction, how your expectations of the Tablet PC changed despite your initial hands-on impression. Can you summarize your feelings about how handwriting recognition fits in the Tablet PC usage scheme?

Michael Linenberger: All successful Tablet PC users, whether they know it or not, quickly adopt a strategy for using handwriting recognition. Many first time users of the tablet wrongly bring their PDA habits with them, where nearly everything written needs to be converted to text to be useful. If you try to do that you will be disappointed with the Tablet. First time users often have trouble realizing that using digital ink as the target format is usually better. Not to avoid incomplete conversion, but to preserve the subtleties that handwriting contains. I think many new users see digital ink as a giant step backwards; after all, we use computers to create cleanly formatted text on the screen, and clean laser printing, right?

But the best uses of the tablet are well beyond that. Note taking, brainstorming, pen-based manipulation of programs during meetings. Again, I feel the tablet is a killer meeting productivity tool, and one rarely needs to create long segments of converted text from work created in a meeting. I convert maybe 20 % of my "inputs" to text. Most of my inputs on the tablet (usually in meetings) consist either of note-taking or brainstorming in ink, and short converted segments of text (say adding to-dos to my list or writing e-mails). The rest of the time is spent using the pen as a point and click device in read mode: surfing through the XP file system, finding and scrolling through reference material, researching the web. Extensive handwriting recognition just isn't needed for these uses.

The other place I use long input on the tablet is sitting in my back yard, writing. In that case, I use speech recognition (it really works great, I wrote the entire book using speech recognition on a tablet). But at my desk I always use a keyboard with the tablet in a docking station. There are appropriate times for handwriting recognition, and many times not to use it; any new tablet user will learn them quickly.

MO: You counsel using "dead time" in meetings to address other, sometimes unrelated work. This seems dangerous to me as you can get absorbed in the "other" stuff and may perhaps be caught off-guard if the conversation suddenly shifts back to you. How do you avoid this?

ML: Most workers, business people, can easily, during a meeting, take pen or pencil notes in their paper notebook, and not loose track of the meeting. Why is that? I think it goes back to our student days where we learned to write with one hand and still keep the brain alert to activities in the room. Perhaps as a result of that long training, the brain can stay engaged in a meeting, even with one hand using a pen. (If you type with two hands however you loose it; the brain becomes too engaged in your work). The tablet is just like that, you are operating with one hand on a pen, and the rest of the brain engaged in the meeting. Admittedly, you need to become a bit proficient with the tablet before jumping right into your first meeting. But the tablet quickly becomes just a note pad device, no more distracting than that. You do need to know what NOT to do while in a meeting. Your reference to unrelated work is the key... unless the meeting has really slowed down or clearly drifted away from your topics, don't try to surf the web (unless part of the work of the meeting), and don't start reading e-mail (unless pertinent to the meeting). Otherwise what you described can happen. And yes, it is possible that the meeting could drift back to you and catch you off-guard in those situations. But that rarely happens to me, I seem to be able to sense it coming back and I re-engage.

MO: You refer to the Tablet PC as being a "Super PDA". I recently experimented on a business trip by leaving my PDA at home and relied exclusively on the Tablet PC for all my information gathering and retrieval. It worked great! My PDA is relegated to being the device I use when it's not practical to take my Tablet along. Does this jibe with your continued experience? Have you dropped the PDA entirely?

ML: This describes exactly what has happened to me as well. I was a heavy PDA user, and have dropped the PDA entirely. Although I would not say the tablet has completely replaced the need for my PDA, it's just that it has replaced enough of the need that I cannot justify the effort of a carrying and syncing a PDA anymore. Not all users have a similar experience, and it depends on your degree and style of mobility. I contend that the tablet's greatest business mobility use (other than for vertical markets) is mobility between the office desk and the office conference room.

While this may be one of the shortest mobility distances of concern, it is probably the most critical. Many office workers spend half their day in meetings. To be there with none of their computer tools at-hand is a crime. Since meetings were where I used my PDA the most, I quickly lost the need for it once I started carrying the tablet in. The tablet has ten times the usefulness of a PDA in a meeting, so there is no contest. And since I never shut down my tablet, but leave it in standby (the tablet works very well and quickly with standby), it is on nearly instantly if I ever need to lookup a phone number while on the go. The places I miss the PDA are doing that while driving, or at a restaurant. A tablet is just a bit much for those situations.

MO: At the time you wrote the book, you had just been exposed to David Allen's Getting Things Done method. Have you continued to integrate some of his concepts and techniques into your workflow?

ML: Yes I have and my use continues to grow. I continue to combine many of the FranklinCovey principles with David's, I think they complement each other. David's task management methods really take the FC approaches to a new and needed level. Excellent stuff. I communicated with David when I wrote the book, to get permission to use his material. He gladly offered that, but remained firm that he does not support any method that uses priorities (as extensively as FC does). But again, I find they compliment. I would not say I am doing anything different than what is in chapters 6 and 7 of the book, just more of it.

MO: Things change fast in the hardware and software world. When can we expect updated content for the book?

ML: I have a chapter update section on my website (www.seizetheworkday.com) where readers can get free updates to specific sections of chapters. When material there accumulates enough to warrant a new edition, I'll do that. Probably some months after the next XP release, or next year.

MO: Are there any new tools you've adopted or recommend since the book was finished?

ML: I use David Allen's stuff more than I did when I wrote the book. The other place I am experimenting is using much of my task and e-mail processing in non-Tablet PC environments. I have been working recently with a large corporation that has a no-non-standard PC policy, and so no tablets are allowed on the network. So I am helping them with some of the same concepts. Boy, though, what an opportunity they miss without the tablet... effectiveness is much lower when you cannot use a tablet as your main computer, particularly in meetings.

MO: What's next for Michael Linenberger? Do you plan to travel and speak to promote the book? Do you have plans to start a blog or newsletter for your readers?

ML: Book writing in a niche area is rarely a highly profitable venture, and this is true even though this book is the best selling Tablet PC book on Amazon. You really need to believe in what you are doing and believe that the value of the book to the readers is itself a payoff (which it really is for me). But I do intend to travel and speak, just for the enjoyment of that, as much as anything. This book really needed to be written; there is nothing else out there like it. It uncovers what I feel are the tablet's greatest values, and scores of readers have told me that. It is satisfying to have written it, just for those reasons.  And yes, blogs may be on their way... I would use the www.seizetheworkday.com site for that.