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How I Hired Someone On Craigslist And Quadrupled My Productivity

hackthesystem.com

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41–50 of 129 posts

Re: How I Hired Someone On Craigslist And Quadrupled My Productivity

#41

Post by andyakb »

one of my friends did something very similar [without the slapping] and had the same results. he is a high stakes poker player and paid somebody just to sit next to him and make sure he didnt surf the web, chat on aim, etc while playing poker. it let the "attendant" watch a skilled player at work, and it kept the player focused and earning more money.

is it best to will yourself to not get distracted? of course, but we all know thats easier said than done and for people with high hourly rates, it is often going to be worth it to just pay somebody to help ensure compliance.

Re: How I Hired Someone On Craigslist And Quadrupled My Productivity

#42

Post by kscaldef »

jc4p wrote: post #15
pg wrote: post #14

Henry Moore used to live over his studio. Whenever the noise of his chisel stopped, his wife would call down and ask why he had stopped working.

Economically speaking, I'm fairly certain finding a wife is more expensive than a $8/hr freelancer though.

If your wife expects you to support her financially. Fortunately, such arrangements are no longer mandatory.

Re: How I Hired Someone On Craigslist And Quadrupled My Productivity

#43

Post by irunbackwards »

tejaswiy wrote: post #29
tjic wrote: post #5

As a productivity system, this is idiotic. As a blog post that serves as link-bait, it is GENIUS. ...which is to say, I think it excelled at the REAL goal. ;-)

Can you elaborate on why it's idiotic? As much as computer programmers like to think they're precious snow flakes to whom productivity tips don't apply to, this sort of system works for fitness, sales and from PGs post, sculptors.

Because as a one-time experiment, the subject is likely to do well as the phenomena itself is new. As the experiment progresses into multiple days or weeks, the subject is likely to say, "What the fuck? Stop slapping me. You're fired, I want to browse reddit." In my opinion, anyways.

Re: How I Hired Someone On Craigslist And Quadrupled My Productivity

#47

Post by bennesvig »

The social element works. I've experienced big productivity gains by having someone I connected with on Hacker News call me every night at 10:00pm and ask me 4 Yes/No questions that I wrote. The pressure to not say no provides extra fuel to stay on track and get more done.

Re: How I Hired Someone On Craigslist And Quadrupled My Productivity

#49

Post by joshmlewis »

I like this concept, I laughed.

However, don't put a popup in my face while I'm reading your stuff to join whatever site it is. And don't bloat the side of the page with "share" stuff. If I like the content, I will share and/or signup, or at least bug me once I reach the end but not while I'm in the middle of reading and on a mobile device this is even worse. /rant

Re: How I Hired Someone On Craigslist And Quadrupled My Productivity

#50

Post by tptacek »

jamesaguilar wrote: post #32
slewis wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this, folks, is one of the reasons yc discourages single founders!

Interesting, is this legal? At first I thought it wouldn't be, but then I realized that an investor relationship might not be one of the relationships protected by workplace sexual harassment laws.

Anti-discrimination laws do not apply to investors. In fact, in California, they don't even apply to independent contractors.
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