We’re obsessed with time in our working lives. We trade our most productive hours for salary and benefits. We agree office hours, vacation time and PTO. But time is just an input. It’s not a deliverable. Are we measuring the right thing?
Regardless of the system you use, a To Do list is an excellent productivity tool. However just like money and fire, a To Do list is a good servant but a terrible master.
A popular request in Silicon Valley is to ‘meet for coffee’. This is often a euphemism for a short meeting with no fixed agenda, beyond getting to know one another. As far as it goes, this can be productive – business is social after all. Many strong business relationships – with clients, partners, investors and potential employees start with an informal intro. But how do you make the most of them?
Amid the ever expanding choice of communications methods, the use of the humble telephone is in decline. Who responds to voicemails right? But here are ten task which need you to pick up the phone. Don’t hide behind email, take a deep breath and dial. It’s faster and more productive.
We all fail from time to time. Projects don’t turn out as planned; we make mistakes; circumstances conspire against us; and sometimes we’re just plain unlucky. It happens. We’ve all heard that it’s how we react to failure which defines our success. It’s one thing to cope with failure, and another to learn from it however.
We’re starting to research new office space, prior to moving in Summer 2011. During the five years we’ve been in our current location, working practices and expectations of staff/clients have changed. So is an open plan office still the best layout?
Many of us listen to music when working. Some say it helps concentration by blocking out background noise. Others claim it’s a distraction and inhibits performance. So is music good or bad?
We’re often advised to know our limits. We shouldn’t over-reach or over-step the mark, but instead operate comfortably within our capabilities. Then we know we’ll deliver and we won’t embarrass ourselves with failure.
The problem is this leads to entropy. Unless we push ourselves, how do we even know what our limits are?
Unless you are a robot, you might not have full control over your emotions at all times. However with some practice and by building emotional awareness, we can learn to select the right emotion for each situation.
A victim of multitasking is not just our productivity, but the attention we give to those around us. We’ve all been in meetings where people are working merrily on their laptops; been on conference calls as people check their email; even been sitting face-to-face talking to someone as they check their smartphone. I am guilty of this, even with my kids.