In his book Getting Things Done, David Allen calls the Weekly Review the “Master Key to GTD.” He claims it is the single most critical habit one must adopt to capture open loops, manage commitments on an ongoing basis, and maintain a “mind like water.” Yet it is also the most difficult habit to maintain….
I was honored to be interviewed on the official Evernote podcast, Take Note, a couple weeks ago. We discuss my approach to “small batch” productivity, follow up on my previous post about changing the value curve of our work, and of course, the latest round of my online bootcamp on personal knowledge management, Building a…
I believe that moods (or less colloquially, states of mind) can be used not just defensively, making the best of whatever mood you’re in (as I described in Productivity for Precious Snowflakes). They can also be used offensively, to proactively create the conditions for rapid acceleration and value creation. Let’s begin with a simple question:…
I recently recorded an hour-long interview with Khe Hy of RadReads, on a wide range of topics related to productivity, my background, GTD, Personal Knowledge Management, creativity, email overload, and trends in the future of work. Listen to the recording below, or check out the full description over at RadReads.
A SERIES OF 5-MINUTE POSTS ON APPLYING PRINCIPLES OF FLOW TO KNOWLEDGE WORK
If I asked you to tell me how many minutes it takes you to get to work, what would you say?
The number you thought of is probably an average. Sometimes it takes less, sometimes more, but most days it’s clustered around the middle. Let’s say it’s 30 minutes:
A SERIES OF 5-MINUTE POSTS ON APPLYING PRINCIPLES OF FLOW TO KNOWLEDGE WORK
Previously, I described how to go about subordinating the non-constraints of an organization in order to maximize its throughput. The next step, #4 in the Five Focusing Steps, is to elevate (or relieve) the constraint itself:
Identify the constraint
Optimize the constraint
A year ago in Productivity for Precious Snowflakes, I introduced the idea of Mood-First Productivity — that our moods, or unique states of mind, are fundamental drivers of creative knowledge work. But something was missing: how does one advance in the practice of Mood-First Productivity, besides noticing what mood you’re in at any given time, and trying…
An Integrated Total Life Management System By Tiago Forte of Forte Labs To learn more, check out our online bootcamp on Personal Knowledge Management, Building a Second Brain. One of the key insights of Getting Things Done, the book on personal productivity by David Allen that spawned the worldwide movement known as GTD, was that…
Learning in the 21st century is not about acquiring more information, knowledge, or even insights. The goal is to maximize the throughput of invalidated assumptions. But you have to get there one step at a time. When you first start learning, early in life, there is a bottleneck in the amount of information you have…
We are, I believe, in the third wave of online learning. The first wave, known as Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), consisted of traditional educational institutions putting their lectures online. The bottleneck was basic tech knowledge, and the innovators of this era were those institutions able to set up a basic website, film and edit…
Originally published on the Evernote blog To learn more, check out our online bootcamp on Personal Knowledge Management, Building a Second Brain. Consider a typical working session of a couple hours. You set aside the time, silence your phone, and clear your desk, determined to finish some Work of Real Value. We know that time…
A SERIES OF 5-MINUTE POSTS ON APPLYING PRINCIPLES OF FLOW TO KNOWLEDGE WORK
Previously, I described how to go about optimizing the constraint in an organization. The next step, #3 in the Five Focusing Steps, is to subordinate the work of all other employees to that constraint:
Identify the constraint
Optimize the constraint
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