Matthew Crawford’s book The World Beyond Your Head (Affiliate Link) is the most important book I’ve read in quite some time. It makes a sweeping argument about what it means to be an ethical, autonomous human in the digital age. Crawford draws a strong connection from the distractions buzzing on our phones, to the evolving…
I’ve become obsessed with coaching. It started in February, when I started the 4-month Self-Expression & Leadership Program at Landmark. I was assigned an accountability group and a coach, who guided me through the process of planning and executing a community service project. That process included learning how to communicate a vision, how to recruit…
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:…
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
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
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…
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…
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
A SERIES OF 5-MINUTE POSTS ON APPLYING PRINCIPLES OF FLOW TO KNOWLEDGE WORK
In the previous post, I described how to go about identifying the constraint in a knowledge work organization. The next step, #2 in the Five Focusing Steps, is to optimize that constraint:
Identify the constraint
Optimize the constraint
Subordinate
A SERIES OF 5-MINUTE POSTS ON APPLYING PRINCIPLES OF FLOW TO KNOWLEDGE WORK
In the previous post, I introduced the Five Focusing Steps, used to improve any system of value creation:
Identify the constraint
Optimize the constraint
Subordinate the non-constraints
A SERIES OF 5-MINUTE POSTS ON APPLYING PRINCIPLES OF FLOW TO KNOWLEDGE WORK
In the previous post, I told the story of a software engineering team at Microsoft who used the Theory of Constraints to produce dramatic improvements in productivity.
But I hope something bothered you: how exactly did they know which changes to