Productivity Is About Attention Management • Hacker News Board

Re: Productivity Is About Attention Management

#61

Post by mjburgess » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 5:35 AM UTC

tylerhou wrote: post #38

netwanderer3 wrote: post #28

There's a general misconception between being productive and being effective. One can fill their days by completing many mindless tasks and consider themselves as productive, but in the end hardly any of those tasks really matters. On the other hand, another person may only complete one or two tasks in a very short time during their day but these were critical tasks that could generate much higher values. This subseq…

> This is quite similar to the cognitive and decision fatigue principle which indicates that each of us only has a limited pool of cognitive resources and so we must be very selective in choosing what activities we engage in. Watch out — many of the studies which displayed “cognitive fatigue” (I assume you actually mean ego depletion) have not been replicated successfully. http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_sci…

The general idea even in a loose, more metaphorical sense, holds however. 'Mental fatigue' is well established, and your volition along with mental faculties generally become harder to exercise the longer they are used without break.

The specifics are disputed, but we needn't be so specific for the advise to hold.

Re: Productivity Is About Attention Management

#62

Post by dang » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 5:37 AM UTC

dmitryminkovsky wrote: post #19

mhluongo wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want HN to look at your stuff, post a Show HN ️

I considered that but at the same time I would like incremental feedback at this point. But maybe I should do a Show HN. I don’t want to bother people. Should we do a Show HN?

Please see my second email to you. It would be fine to do a Show HN, but at this point you need to wait several weeks to flush the caches here, or it will probably generate more resentful responses. Probably 2 or 3 months from now would be best.

Re: Productivity Is About Attention Management

#63

Post by cpeterso » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 5:39 AM UTC

mark_l_watson wrote: post #41

ChuckMcM wrote: post #18

Interesting take on it, I certainly resonate with the "Michigan weather making work the only thing to do" anecdote. I struggle with productivity, and feeling productive. and when I look back on times when I felt productive the attention thing does stand out. It occurred to me when I thought of myself as a younger programmer that I used to love the time between midnight and 3AM, there was literally nothing on TV to di…

Hey, I have enjoyed your comments over the years on HN, so I am happy to have some good advice to share with you: use something like Instapaper or a transient bookmark list to note interesting/useful things but do your reading just a few times a week. I find that this keeps me from link-following behavior that afterwards seemed like a waste of time. Make the saved link reading time special by setting aside reading ti…

I use Pocket for exactly this purpose. I save interesting articles from my desktop or mobile browser to Pocket. Instead of reading random junk news or scrolling social media when I have a few free minutes on the go or at the end on the day, I have quality articles on my phone in my pocket.

(Disclosure: I work at Mozilla and Mozilla owns Pocket.)

Re: Productivity Is About Attention Management

#64

Post by cgriswald » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 5:47 AM UTC

war1025 wrote: post #44

netwanderer3 wrote: post #28

There's a general misconception between being productive and being effective. One can fill their days by completing many mindless tasks and consider themselves as productive, but in the end hardly any of those tasks really matters. On the other hand, another person may only complete one or two tasks in a very short time during their day but these were critical tasks that could generate much higher values. This subseq…

Reminds me of when I was a kid and raced the same track over and over something like 1000 times on a game to get enough money to buy the fanciest car in the game rather than building my skills enough to do races where I would actually make decent money on each race and only have to do 5 or ten to buy said car.

On one of many playthroughs of the original Phantasy Star, I saved up 15K for the Diamond Armor by killing low level baddies and then breezed through the game until the end game.

Re: Productivity Is About Attention Management

#65

Post by cgriswald » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 5:50 AM UTC

cven714 wrote: post #22

revskill wrote: post #14

For most of technical works i do, concentration only happens AFTER i figure out what i need to do to solve the problem. Else most of the time, the "researching phase" is the most daunting task.

I have the exact same problem. When I know what needs to get done, even if it's tedious, it's not so bad to put my nose to the grindstone and work through it. But when I'm not sure how to approach a task, suddenly every distraction in the world is more appealing. You often see the suggestion to break up big tasks into smaller, baby step chunks to avoid this analysis paralysis. Doesn't help when I'm not even sure what…

Figuring out how to approach a task is a problem that can be broken down all on its own. Make a list of possibilities (even if they are “dumb”). Work through them. What happens for me is that either one of them is right or (more frequently) I suddenly “get it” and it’s off to the races.

Re: Productivity Is About Attention Management

#66

Post by cgriswald » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 5:54 AM UTC

kumarvvr wrote: post #30

marcv81 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to think like you until I met a coworker. He could not code to save his life, nobody in the team liked working with him. Until one day we had a boring data entry task. He could do it for hours at a time, and barely made any mistake. This experience taught me something.

To each his own I guess. Maybe that person is most comfortable in a semi- auto pilot mode. I have noticed that some people are very much averse to prolonged thinking / problem solving / creative work. These are the kinds of people, who, if stuck in a problem, go to their friends and family for advise and solve their problems. They usually have a lot of people / socializing / networking skills. I myself am an introver…

I don’t think those things are mutually exclusive. I love to sit and think in a problem. I also love to turn off my brain completely and solve sudoku for hours on end while my mind is elsewhere.

Re: Productivity Is About Attention Management

#67

Post by djakjxnanjak » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 6:13 AM UTC

mark_l_watson wrote: post #41

ChuckMcM wrote: post #18

Interesting take on it, I certainly resonate with the "Michigan weather making work the only thing to do" anecdote. I struggle with productivity, and feeling productive. and when I look back on times when I felt productive the attention thing does stand out. It occurred to me when I thought of myself as a younger programmer that I used to love the time between midnight and 3AM, there was literally nothing on TV to di…

Hey, I have enjoyed your comments over the years on HN, so I am happy to have some good advice to share with you: use something like Instapaper or a transient bookmark list to note interesting/useful things but do your reading just a few times a week. I find that this keeps me from link-following behavior that afterwards seemed like a waste of time. Make the saved link reading time special by setting aside reading ti…

iOS has a feature “save to reading list” that I use to save stories that seem interesting but that I don’t need to read for my current task. However, I haven’t taken to time to learn to access my reading list :)

Re: Productivity Is About Attention Management

#68

Post by theyinwhy » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 6:34 AM UTC

Although interesting, I think the example is a sign of over self improvement. When your only way to do more work is going to the toilet less often you are overbooked big time and there will be no way to get more productive, no matter what angle you look at it. Quite contrary, you will be less effective (!) on the long run. It is a vicious circle.

Re: Productivity Is About Attention Management

#69

Post by dmitryminkovsky » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 6:36 AM UTC

dang wrote: post #62

dmitryminkovsky wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I considered that but at the same time I would like incremental feedback at this point. But maybe I should do a Show HN. I don’t want to bother people. Should we do a Show HN?

Please see my second email to you. It would be fine to do a Show HN, but at this point you need to wait several weeks to flush the caches here, or it will probably generate more resentful responses. Probably 2 or 3 months from now would be best.

Correct. I misjudged the feedback. See you then.

Re: Productivity Is About Attention Management

#70

Post by atemerev » Mon, Apr 01, 2019, 6:39 AM UTC

As a person with diagnosed adult ADD, this is one thing I cannot do — manage attention. Medication and meditation help a little, but I probably will never reach the productive capabilities of a regular person. Sigh.