What I Learned About Productivity by Writing About Productivity
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Re: What I Learned About Productivity by Writing About Productivity
#2I keep finding that the more complicated the setup I use for productivity, the less I go back to it whenever there is a hiccup. Simple methods survive long term.
Currently my wife and I use a shared google doc, and while it is far from perfect, it ends up working well for us since it works on our phones and computers, is easy to bookmark, and the interface never changes.
Re: What I Learned About Productivity by Writing About Productivity
#3Sounds like Cal Newport's Time Blocking method taken to an extreme (because it suggests to block time for everything): https://www.timeblockplanner.com/
Re: What I Learned About Productivity by Writing About Productivity
#4I feel like individual productivity is a pretty much solved problem and comes down to picking your tools. Whether it's one out of a million 3rd party Todo/Note taking apps, or just whatever is available in your OS, is a matter of taste. If you want to be productive you will find your way and most importantly, just don't get too obsessed about not being at maximum productivity.
Group productivity and collaboration, however, is a problem with square root complexity (if not worse) of the number of collaborators. It is not a solved problem at all. I hate all the existing ways and tools for sharing, working on something together, planning, scheduling, all the Asanas, Trellos and Jiras of the world. They all feel somehow wrong and counter-productive for any more or less non-trivial collaboration.
I think we all know there's a golden opportunity here, just not clear yet what a better collab tool should be like for 2021 and onward.
Re: What I Learned About Productivity by Writing About Productivity
#5I had a colleague who would block out almost his entire calendar as a defensive strategy against being given new tasks.
He even tried it once with his wife to avoid clearing out the garage. That tactic he only tried once, though, for obvious reasons.
Re: What I Learned About Productivity by Writing About Productivity
#6I feel like individual productivity is a pretty much solved problem and comes down to picking your tools. Whether it's one out of a million 3rd party Todo/Note taking apps, or just whatever is available in your OS, is a matter of taste. If you want to be productive you will find your way and most importantly, just don't get too obsessed about not being at maximum productivity. Group productivity and collaboration, ho…
I feel like individual productivity is a pretty much solved problem and comes down to sitting on your ass and doing the actual work (yes, I sometimes have trouble doing that, but in the end 'just sit down and start doing it' is the best advice to listen to).
Re: What I Learned About Productivity by Writing About Productivity
#7I keep finding that the more complicated the setup I use for productivity, the less I go back to it whenever there is a hiccup. Simple methods survive long term. Currently my wife and I use a shared google doc, and while it is far from perfect, it ends up working well for us since it works on our phones and computers, is easy to bookmark, and the interface never changes.
I feel the same way about my dev environment. I'm a Linux user with a propensity for customization, but my preferred bashrcs and vimrcs have converged on something small enough to write up from memory. It's a lot of fun to have a hugely customized ultra-productive setup, but as soon as you find yourself on somebody else's system, a server, a container, or whatever, it's not so fun anymore. The less setup you need in order to be comfortable, the easier it is to be comfortable!
Re: What I Learned About Productivity by Writing About Productivity
#8I feel like individual productivity is a pretty much solved problem and comes down to picking your tools. Whether it's one out of a million 3rd party Todo/Note taking apps, or just whatever is available in your OS, is a matter of taste. If you want to be productive you will find your way and most importantly, just don't get too obsessed about not being at maximum productivity. Group productivity and collaboration, ho…
Productivity was something I struggled with for many years.
At times I was the best employee, and others the worst. Have a tricky problem to solve? Or a complicated architecture. I was the right guy for the job. Need to build 200 variations of the same feature. I was horrible.
Chief problem being that anything boring was physically painful to me.
Pair programming helped a lot, but those gigs are hard to find.
Eventually diagnosed with ADHD. Completely shocking to experience “normal” with medication. I no longer take any medication (BP), but I can somewhat deal with boring stuff now, where before I could not.
Feels like I learned how to focus. The physical pain part is gone.
Re: What I Learned About Productivity by Writing About Productivity
#9I had a colleague who would block out almost his entire calendar as a defensive strategy against being given new tasks. He even tried it once with his wife to avoid clearing out the garage. That tactic he only tried once, though, for obvious reasons.
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Re: What I Learned About Productivity by Writing About Productivity
#10Obligatory XKCD: