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Pmarca Guide to Personal Productivity (2007)

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Re: Pmarca Guide to Personal Productivity (2007)

#41

Post by SketchySeaBeast »

tuxxy wrote: post #26

> When someone emails or calls to say, "Let's meet on Tuesday at 3", the appropriate response is: "I'm not keeping a schedule for 2007, so I can't commit to that, but give me a call on Tuesday at 2:45 and if I'm available, I'll meet with you." Is it just me, or does this come off as exceptionally arrogant? It's literally just telling people to plan their lives around yours. It just seems like time spent with this ind…

100%. That actually made me mad. I took that time off to talk to you, so you better be there. I may have even spent time preparing to talk to you, so not only have you canceled and thrown out my day, you've wasted my time.

>Or, if it's important, say, "You know what, let's meet right now."

This would become the messaging for every meeting, at which point you've now limited all issues to being category 1 issues and can expect a meeting on anything at any time. It's like how during UAT when you tell the client you're only going to deal with critical issues, suddenly they are all critical.

Re: Pmarca Guide to Personal Productivity (2007)

#42

Post by adrianmsmith »

SketchySeaBeast wrote: post #41
tuxxy wrote: post #26

> When someone emails or calls to say, "Let's meet on Tuesday at 3", the appropriate response is: "I'm not keeping a schedule for 2007, so I can't commit to that, but give me a call on Tuesday at 2:45 and if I'm available, I'll meet with you." Is it just me, or does this come off as exceptionally arrogant? It's literally just telling people to plan their lives around yours. It just seems like time spent with this ind…

100%. That actually made me mad. I took that time off to talk to you, so you better be there. I may have even spent time preparing to talk to you, so not only have you canceled and thrown out my day, you've wasted my time. >Or, if it's important, say, "You know what, let's meet right now." This would become the messaging for every meeting, at which point you've now limited all issues to being category 1 issues and ca…

In this case the person would communicate "I am not reserving time on a calendar this year", so you'd know that you needn't reserve time or prepare for the meeting, as the person has not agreed to it.

Re: Pmarca Guide to Personal Productivity (2007)

#43

Post by adrianmsmith »

tuxxy wrote: post #26

> When someone emails or calls to say, "Let's meet on Tuesday at 3", the appropriate response is: "I'm not keeping a schedule for 2007, so I can't commit to that, but give me a call on Tuesday at 2:45 and if I'm available, I'll meet with you." Is it just me, or does this come off as exceptionally arrogant? It's literally just telling people to plan their lives around yours. It just seems like time spent with this ind…

"It's literally just telling people to plan their lives around yours", I agree, but on the other hand why should people have the right to tell you to plan your life around theirs, isn't that arrogant of them?

Regarding this, and also not answering the phone, and turning off email, it depends on what sort of job you have.

For me this is all about: my best work comes from when I'm in the flow. So I'll do anything to avoid being taken out of it.

I am a software developer, freelance, mostly work from home. I have deadlines, and I mostly work in fixed-price projects so the longer it takes the less I earn per unit time. I can get high-quality work done the fastest when I'm in the flow.

Is it the right of the customer to call me and interrupt me from my flow? I've agreed to deliver the software by a certain time for a certain price, that's it. They might be my client, but I did not agree to be reachable at any time for any impromptu meeting on any topic of their choosing. I agreed to deliver software, not reachability.

It's literally a zero-sum game. They want help planning something, or they have a question, they're in the flow about that, they don't want to be taken out of that flow. On the other hand, I'm in the flow about my thing, and don't want to be taken out of it. It's perfect for the other people if I always do what they want, but sometimes you have to stick up for yourself and do what's best for you.

Calling them back a few hours later when I'm out of the flow, or emailing them back 6 hours later the same day, has always worked out well for me.

I understand that not all jobs are like that. What I mean to say, it's nevertheless wrong to assume that no jobs are like that. Mine is like that, and the approach to using the phone outlined in the article. is great advice.

Re: Pmarca Guide to Personal Productivity (2007)

#44

Post by MRD85 »

all2 wrote: post #10
number6 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds unreal: Job + parenting + study? How are you doing this? This can't just come from keeping lists and or touch typing?! Can you give me some background on what you are doing?

Consider: - 8 hours of work (a generous estimate). - 4 to 6 hours of parenting (between children's wake time in the morning and the evening). - Commute time? Is she driving? Public transit? Other? We'll neglect this. - 3 hours on study (an hour per day per semester hour). With a two hour commute, that's a 19 hour day. Without, 17 hours. That leaves no room for other daily necessities, though those could be built into…

First, I'm a father (i.e. "he").

It's heavily about time management. On Monday and Tuesday nights I don't have my children. So Monday I wake at 4am, do 3 hours of uni, spend 30 minutes getting ready for work and have 30 minutes to travel to work. I work 8 hours but I have an hour for lunch (which I study in), getting home takes half an hour. That leaves me about an hour of free time and 3 more hours of study. 7.5 hours sleep.

So Monday hits 7 hours of uni, so does Tuesday. I also have Wednesday morning and 3 more lunches so now I've done 20 hours. Since I wake at 4am I can get 2 hours in the days I have kids and now I've hit the hours needed easily. If I have a lot of work due I can take a day of leave (maybe twice per semester).

I also have Sunday nights free and one Sat night + Sunday day free per fortnight. That's a lot more hours. I typically get most jobs done when I'm parenting. Parenting is actually really busy because after school pickup I have dinner, cleaning dinner, baths, homework, etc.

Re: Pmarca Guide to Personal Productivity (2007)

#45

Post by shrimp_emoji »

jumbopapa wrote: post #13
fluffycat wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You get angry when you see someone does not touch type? This sounds petty and weird.

I don't think they actually get "angry", but rather pretty annoyed. I do the same thing. If someone asks me for help or something and I see them "hunting and pecking", then I get slightly annoyed that this person hasn't spent a couple hours learning how to properly type. It would save them so much time! I just want everyone to be more productive and something like typing is a pretty easy place to gain productivity.

I fall back on touch typing when I want to keep typos at a minimum, but it's so much slower for me than "hunting and pecking" (even though I don't look at the keyboard when doing it, so it's hardly "hunting"). But that speed increase comes at the cost of accuracy. If I could get speed parity with touch typing, it'd be amazing. I've spent days trying to learn. I don't know if I'll get there. Please forgive me, senpai. :C

Re: Pmarca Guide to Personal Productivity (2007)

#46

Post by meuk »

paultopia wrote: post #6

Um. "I don't keep a calendar" means "I consider my time more important than yours, so we'll meet at my sole convenience." I would love to do that, but everyone else in the world would rightly understand it that way and would treat it as a refusal to do core elements of my job. A: "Let's schedule a committee meeting." B: "I don't keep a calendar." A: "So what you're saying is everyone else on the committee has to find…

That's like the first point he makes:

  I'm totally serious. If you pull it off -- and in many structured jobs, you simply can't -- this simple tip alone can make a huge difference in productivity.

Re: Pmarca Guide to Personal Productivity (2007)

#47

Post by paultopia »

meuk wrote: post #46
paultopia wrote: post #6

Um. "I don't keep a calendar" means "I consider my time more important than yours, so we'll meet at my sole convenience." I would love to do that, but everyone else in the world would rightly understand it that way and would treat it as a refusal to do core elements of my job. A: "Let's schedule a committee meeting." B: "I don't keep a calendar." A: "So what you're saying is everyone else on the committee has to find…

That's like the first point he makes: I'm totally serious. If you pull it off -- and in many structured jobs, you simply can't -- this simple tip alone can make a huge difference in productivity.

"Structured job" apparently means "job," though. Frankly, anyone who doesn't have a so-called "structured job" or any obligations to anyone else entitled to demand some of their time is probably rich enough already that they don't need "productivity advice."

Re: Pmarca Guide to Personal Productivity (2007)

#48

Post by paultopia »

muzani wrote: post #32
paultopia wrote: post #6

Um. "I don't keep a calendar" means "I consider my time more important than yours, so we'll meet at my sole convenience." I would love to do that, but everyone else in the world would rightly understand it that way and would treat it as a refusal to do core elements of my job. A: "Let's schedule a committee meeting." B: "I don't keep a calendar." A: "So what you're saying is everyone else on the committee has to find…

I think the idea here is to minimize scheduling. Take note that this advice comes from a top VC; meetings are his bread and butter. Not committing to a schedule greatly cuts down on the number of meetings. Most meetings are unnecessary, a huge cost to productivity. He also doesn't advice avoiding them, more like if it's important and high priority enough, everyone can agree to do one now. It cuts out the fat of sched…

Hmm. It seems to me, but I'm not sure so please correct me, that a top VC is someone to whom others mostly come as supplicants, and hence can demand scheduling on his convenience rather than theirs.

Re: Pmarca Guide to Personal Productivity (2007)

#49

Post by MRD85 »

mostlysimilar wrote: post #21
all2 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consider: - 8 hours of work (a generous estimate). - 4 to 6 hours of parenting (between children's wake time in the morning and the evening). - Commute time? Is she driving? Public transit? Other? We'll neglect this. - 3 hours on study (an hour per day per semester hour). With a two hour commute, that's a 19 hour day. Without, 17 hours. That leaves no room for other daily necessities, though those could be built into…

> Personally, I struggle with focus, energy, and decision making. I've tried lists, and other things. Sometimes I think it is a discipline issue, other times I think its diet, lack of exercise, or maybe even my semi-regular sleep schedule. I'm not really sure, and I'm too tired to figure it out. Oof. Feels like I could have typed that myself. Many of these "the power of scheduling" posts seem to be written from the v…

I'm the one that this comment chain is replying too. I mention that I'm hyper-productive compared to my past self. For me, the change involved getting diagnosed with cancer about 3 years ago. I've posted here before about it but the experience led to a lot of reflection and I realised I didn't want to die because I was unhappy with the life I was living. If I was going to die I wanted to have had a good life. I'm all cancer free now but I've still got the drive to live a good life.

Re: Pmarca Guide to Personal Productivity (2007)

#50

Post by MRD85 »

BeetleB wrote: post #34
MRD85 wrote: post #2

Some of the points in this article I disagree with but others I like. Compared to my past self I am "super productive". I have a full-time career, a single parent to two young kids (approx 70% of the time I'm not at work I'm parenting) and I study nearly full time (3 units per semester) with a perfect GPA. I somehow still have time for "wasting", like commenting on online discussion boards, going on dates, etc. * Kee…

>I get angry when I see an office worker earning 6 figures typing one finger looking at the keys. Touch typing doesn't take long to learn but it saves so much time and effort. I think this is mostly an illusion, unless your job is writing. For stuff like SW, typing is usually not the limiting factor. Thinking is. For management, typing a lot usually equates to a large bureaucracy (and lots and lots of pointless email…

I am in a large bureaucracy and the person I'm thinking of probably types 5-8 WPM in a job that involves a lot of typing and gets paid over $120k.
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