Productivity

Productivity

How to Make Trees Sing

This decision – between raising the floor to limit the worst consequences, in exchange for lowering the ceiling of best possible outcomes – shows up everywhere in our lives.

Productivity

Mise en Place

French novelist Gustave Flaubert said, "Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work."

Productivity

Persistence

When a reporter asked Edison how it felt to fail so many times, it elicited Edison's famous response: "I have not failed 10,000 times. I have successfully found 10,000 ways that will not work."

Productivity

You Are Not a Computer

If you're doing a job that a computer or robot cannot, then you are more than the sum of your mechanical parts.

Productivity

Lacking in Substance

I'll never forget the feedback I received on a paper from one of my college professors: "Beautifully written as always, John, but lacking in substance."

Productivity

Working Harder vs. Smarter

Ditch digging is pretty repetitive work. It's the kind of work that requires you to just put in the time. Maybe you can dig a little faster, but there aren't really any hacks to pushing your shovel into the dirt and moving another scoop.

Productivity

Create the Conditions for Success

You can’t make yourself fall asleep by trying harder to doze off. In fact, the opposite is likely to happen.

Productivity

Your Process is the Product

Tesla doesn't make cars, it makes factories. The cars are just the byproduct.

Productivity

Reduce Friction

The swimmer who wins the race isn't necessarily the one who moved their arms the fastest. It's the person who swam the most efficiently.

Productivity

Adjacent Possible

Any evolving system has a limited set of changes that can be made.

Productivity

System Design

When a system’s outcome isn't what you wanted, there are two questions to ask.

Productivity

Store Your Work

If you can spend a day automating a task that usually takes five minutes, you'll eventually earn that day back and many more.