Étiquette : English

Tying Productivity, Methods and Tools

Your Hump Day Success Edge Post #3

Productivity is a loose word as it may mean a lot of different things for different people. As per the Oxford dictionary, productivity is the state or quality of being productive, that is to be able to achieve a significant amount or result. If I need to deliver 10 actions in the course of the day, I want to deliver as fast as possible with the required quality. Therefore, productivity is generally linked to a form of time management (method) and to tools we use.

Make your own productivity methods

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Unfortunately for any human being, there are plentiful time management, goal setting, project management methods, just to name a few « buzzword ». The most important method is the one that works for you. I’ve seen many failed attempts to fit a square peg in a round hole. The only way to make any method work is to adapt it to our own existence and adapt our own existence to the method. This means making a conscious effort, but not a too steep one. It needs to make sense for you. If the method does not make any sense, change it!

Make your productivity tool work for you (not the opposite)

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As a professional, I keep track of my goals and what I need to do in Microsoft Outlook, because it replicates to all my devices and is easy to capture any new task. But I’m not a classical user of Outlook, I’m a deep user of Tasks and Calendar, on my own terms. However, Outlook may not work in every situation, particularly for team work, for which I am using my own version of Scrum in simple Excel spreadsheet. Because my motto in productivity tool is: Keep It Simple, Stupid! If any tool requires more that one hour to master, I throw it away.

Does this make sense? Let me know!

17 février 2016
The one behavior that makes a huge performance difference

Recently Inc.com published a post entitled The Productivity Secret Behind Bill Gates’s Incredible Success. The title entices you with the idea that Bill’s success is a matter of just a productivity secret, which is, of course, not really true. However, it puts the finger on something that has now been demonstrated numerous times: intensity of focus is a game-changing behavior and increases performance.

Monotask

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For peak performance, the first to get rid of is distraction. Second, you need to concentrate on the one task you have to do. If you’ve ever been totally absorbed in what you do, like coding or painting, or any pleasurable activity, you should have been amazed at how time flies fast and how much you have done. This is the power of dedicating all your energy to one activity and one activity only. Of course our brain and body are multitasking: we breathe without thinking about it, we digest, we do all sorts of things without being conscious about them. However, dedicating our conscious energy to one thing only is what I’m calling monotasking here.

Concentrate

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When you are about to do something difficult, you often need to concentrate. This moment of deep thinking allows to focus our mind and energy on what we are about to do. Unfortunately, with all distractions, many people have lost the ability to concentrate and dedicate oneself to deep work. If you are prone to distraction, you may need to start with short period of concentration, like 10 minutes, and increase slowly to be able to sustain an hour or more of deep concentration. Concentration will bring you to the next performance level.

Meditation can help you reach your concentration goal. By bringing back focused monotasking in your daily work, you will soon be amazed at your results!

10 février 2016
The only thing you can control is you…

Your Hump Day Success Edge Post #1

Today’s inspiration comes from Kevin Turner, Microsoft’s COO. During a presentation on Monday, he used this quote: « the only thing you can control is you, the only thing you cannot control is everything else ». When you reflect on this, you realize it’s common sense on one side, but really powerful when you’re interested in learning and growing. Do the Iowa results have an effect on what you do and think? If you’re in politics and your career depends on it, may be. Otherwise? Can you control what Cruz or Clinton will do? Probably not. Even Bill does not control Hillary! Joke aside, focusing on what you can control is the best, if not the only way, of creating a better you.

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Of course, you can argue that you can control any kind of machinery, your car or your direct reports, for instance. However, think for a moment. What if something breaks in your machine or car, what if one of your direct reports is sick? Can you still control them? The only thing you can really control is you, you are in charge of your actions and your emotions, and it’s within your power and decision to take control of your actions and emotions. Once you let go what is around you that you have no effect on, you can concentrate on what matters really: becoming a better you, to serve better others!

3 février 2016
Your Hump Day Success Edge

You open a newspaper, it’s all about politics, war, and horrors. Between lies from politicians, finance institutions ripping off your savings, and big corporation making billions, it seems the world is going down to the cellar. However, there are millions of individuals who have understood the underlying forces of success, who are living successful lives, and who seem to go through difficulties with ease. This is what I’m interested in. As a successful entrepreneur and professional, I’ve gone through tough days, weeks, months and years, gone through tremendous successes, and leveraged all my experience to continue to strive in whatever I start and do.

I created this blog after the financial crisis of 2008 (if you are still wondering what happened, go and watch The Big Short) because I was fed up of all the negativity that was floating around. Yes, the financial system is rotten. Yes, politicians are corrupted. Yes, we can see the world is killing itself. Or we can be optimistic while not delusional, we can build on positive thoughts and actions, we can put a brick in the wall of the new world. And this is what I want to help people with, through this blog and my new resolution for the year: the hump day success edge.

For non-English natives, hump day is Wednesday. Why hump day? From urbandictionary.com, hump day comes from « the context of climbing a proverbial hill to get through a tough week ». Therefore, the hump day is the best day of the week, because the weekend gets closer. However, I see this has the pinnacle of the week, the day of hope, of maximum energy. And because I want ultimate success, this is the best day to stop for 15 minutes and reflect on our lives, loves and craft. So this year, I will, every Wednesday, write on what can make each of us more successful in every aspect of our personal and professional lives. Simple no non-sense ideas, easy to execute, and game-changing.

Get ready for the Hump Day Success Edge! Live February 3!

31 janvier 2016
Is dropping the jack planned obsolescence? A simple view and behavior on progress
Intrigued by the title, wondering what jack I’m talking about? Let’s define two words (stay with me, it’s gonna be fun and provocative):
- Jack: in the context of this post, it’s a plug. There’s a good chance you are using one if you have a wired headset for your phone or mp3 player.
- Planned obsolescence: « in industrial design and economics is a policy of planning or designing a product with an artificially limited useful life, so it will become obsolete, that is, unfashionable or no longer functional after a certain period of time », wipikedia.org.
With this in mind, when there’s rumor that Apple is going to drop the jack connector on the coming iPhone 7, is this planned obsolescence? Some opponents to this choice claim that yes, I think the opposite, it’s not planned obsolescence, it’s progress. From the day we are born, until the day we are dead, we tend to want to progress, to make the next day better that the one we just lived. Although there are multiple way to do this, technical progress is one of them. Do you think that the electronics used to perform cardiac surgery has planned obsolescence and this is bad?

If I think planned obsolescence, per se, is bad because it forces consumption of more and more devices and increased pollution, all this can be managed. First by managing what you do with your electronics. Almost all electronics devices can be recycled, and more will be as environment laws will become more stringent and customers will become more conscious of the impact their behaviors have. Second by taking care of all your objects. Maintenance prolongs life of any objects. For example, if you have a car, you bring it back for service maintenance so it continues to work well, do the same with all your electronics. Third, by not listening to all the commercials out there.

We all know marketing is there to make you purchase the latest smartphone, tablet, or other gadget. But YOU decide. You can decide to keep your device one more year, but just thinking about three simple things:
1. It’s hype not to follow the herds of early adopters who spend a premium to get the new thing.
2. Purchasing the new toy triggers a shot of dopamine in your brain, so it’s not about the new toy, it’s about the shot of dopamine your body wants. Dopamine is known as the reward neurotransmitter, it makes you feel good, it’s also highly addictive.
3. The new toy, like all toys, will be old very soon and there are huge chances you’ll get bored and will use the new toy as you were using the old one.
I’m not saying you should not purchase the latest technology, I’m saying you should do it knowing what you do. You should do it understanding how to recycle the old. You should do it knowing curiosity and progress is inherent to our nature, and be happy to be able to live this incredible life. So is dropping the jack planned obsolescence? No, it’s not, it’s progress, it needs to be well managed for the present and future of mankind.

What do you think?
18 janvier 2016