Thriving in a Knowledge Economy
The 4 Disciplines of Execution by C. McChesney, S. Covey, and J. Huling
“Like a fish discovering the water it’s been swimming in the whole time, we finally realized that the fundamental problem with execution had always been right in front of us…” ― The 4 Disciplines of Execution
Are you struggling to execute your great ideas and wildly important goals? If so, you might enjoy this book summary:
1-Page PDF Summary of 4DX
Eat That Frog! by Brian Tracy
“The most valuable tasks you can do each day are often the hardest and most complex. But the payoff and rewards for completing these tasks efficiently can be tremendous.” – Brian Tracy
What ‘frog’ are you avoiding in your professional life? What difficult task are you putting off?
In the book ‘Eat That Frog!’ author Brian Tracy provides effective strategies for eating your biggest frog (your most important task). The following video and PDF summary detail those strategies:
Getting Things Done by David Allen
Most people have lived in a semistressful experience so consistently, for so long, they don’t know that it could be quite different—that there is another and more positive place from which to engage with their world.” – David Allen, Getting Things Done
An inability to remember all ‘things’ we want to do or need to do but can’t complete in this moment, creates stress.
Without a trusted system to capture, clarify and remind us of our ‘things,’ we are forced to live in a semistressful state all day long…..
1-Page PDF Summary of ‘Getting Things Done’
The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss
Being Busy is a form of laziness, lazy thinking and indiscriminate action.”– Tim Ferriss, The 4 Hour Workweek
1-Page PDF Summary of ‘The 4-Hour Workweek’
Deep Work by Cal Newport
Deep work is not some nostalgic affectation of writers and early-twentieth-century philosophers. It’s instead a skill that has great value today.” – Cal Newport, Deep Work
Deep work generates results that other people find hard to replicate. In our hyperconnected world, deep work creates products that scale and impact millions of people. But we live in an age of constant distraction where deep work is a dying skill.
I’ve made the following video to help you understand why deep work is essential and how you can incorporate deep work into your daily schedule:
Smarter Faster Better by Charles Duhigg
“Productive people and companies force themselves to make choices most other people are content to ignore. Productivity emerges when people push themselves to think differently.” – Charles Duhigg
Bestselling author Charles Duhigg has recently written the book ‘Smarter Faster Better: The Secrets of Being Productive in Life and Business’. In the book, he explains that the key to productivity is ‘choice’. Watch the following video to understand why:
The pursuit of success can be a catalyst for failure. Put another way, success can distract us from focusing on the essential things that produce success in the first place.” – Greg McKeown
The basic value proposition of Essentialism:
Only once you give yourself permission to stop trying to do it all, to stop saying yes to everyone, can you make your highest contribution towards the things that really matter.” – Greg McKeown
In the following video I summarize Greg’s book and provide a framework for preventing the non-essential from creeping into your life:
“How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.” – Annie Dillard
When we look back on our lives, we should be proud of the days we’ve spent living it. We need to be more intentional with how we spend our days.
“We miss a big opportunity if we simply let the day happen to us.” – Caroline Webb
In the following video I outline a method you can use to ensure you have a good day (insights gathered from reading Caroline Webb’s book – How to Have a Good Day):
Insights from the book ‘Procrastinate on Purpose‘ by Rory Vaden.
Time to read: 6:36 minutes
Procrastination has evolved over the years.
Thanks to our ‘information age’ we have adopted an advanced form of procrastination called ‘priority dilution’.
“Priority Dilution has nothing to do with being lazy, apathetic or disengaged. Yet it is the same net result: We delay the day’s most important activities by consciously or unconsciously allowing our attention to shift to less important tasks…To someone struggling with Priority Dilution, it can sometimes feel like the harder they work, the more they fall behind. For every e-mail they send out, they get two in return. And each task they complete seems to hold behind it two more additionally that need to be done.” – Rory Vaden, Procrastinate on Purpose
We are bombarded by hundreds of requests (emails, phone calls, texts) and thousands of distractions throughout the day (advertisements, newsfeeds, status updates). All this information clouds our priorities and leads us into ‘reaction mode’.
In ‘reaction mode’ we don’t take the time to consider the significance of something.
Significance is different than importance.
I mistake importance for significance all the time. When I first had the idea to start my own business I took the time to build a business plan. A business plan seemed important at the time and it probably was important…up to a certain point. I spent weeks trying to perfect my business plan. Even after weeks of work my work on the business plan it still ‘felt’ important. However, looking back, the more time I spent on the business plan the less time I spent testing my ideas, building productive systems and hiring people to grow my business grow – all significant items that would have a lasting impact.
Minute-by-minute we all believe we are performing important tasks. As the days pass we look back at our results we realize how ‘unimportant’ many of those tasks were.
The main reason we believe things are more important than they really are is due to our sense of urgency. The pace needed to keep up with the information coming our way and the impatience of others around us causes us to think everything is urgent AND important.
“As you factor in a calculation for Significance, it begins to offset some of the weight and pull of Urgency— which is the exact cause of Priority Dilution!” – Rory Vaden
The feeling of importance and the sense of urgency form our two-dimensional time management model. However, when we expand our thinking to consider the ‘significance of a result’ we uncover a third dimension of time management: significance.
“Those making the Significance calculation are operating on a plane of different perspective. They are considering not only what matters now but also what matters later. Therefore that person is better able to resist the temptation of the tyranny of the urgent— which is exactly what ultra-performers do.” – Rory Vaden
By thinking “how long will this matter?” we move truly important items to the top of the priority list. By considering the impact of our next action on our life and the lives of others we can see that most things are just noise.
However, it’s unrealistic to pause and consider the ‘significance’ of every option we face. We need a system to automatically filter external requests and actionable insights.
Author Rory Vaden suggests that we filter each idea/request through the following stages before we commit our time to completing it:
By the time we think through steps 1 through 4 you end up ‘concentrating’ on something that is likely to have a significant impact.
If we can’t eliminate it then we try automating it. If we can’t automate it then we try to delegate it. If we can’t delegate it then we try procrastinating on it (deliberating waiting until you have all the information necessary to confidently completely the task OR until the task is deemed unnecessary). If the thought of procrastinating on something is unbearable or simply unacceptable, then we have permission to focus all your energy on the item until it is complete.
“Until you accomplish your next most Significant priority, everything else is a distraction.” – Rory Vaden
When we don’t filter items through our ‘focus funnel’ we inevitably begin:
“Trading the things we know we should be doing for the things that other people want us to do. Allowing ourselves to be commanded by the Tyranny of the Urgent into things that are not Significant, but they are in front of us.” – Rory Vaden
Author Rory Vaden identifies each stage of the focus funnel as a ‘permission’.
But…
The focus funnel is a very productive way to think.
I resonate with almost all the ideas in ‘Procrastinate on Purpose’ but based on my experience I there is one step missing from the funnel process: the 2-minute capture or complete.
The author suggests that every item we can’t ignore should go straight into the systemizing and delegation phase. However, depending on our current state of mind and the intensity of a situation we may not have the courage to ignore/eliminate certain items that should be ignored/eliminated. We might think (based on your current circumstances) that we can’t live without it. If it gets past our ‘elimination’ filter we might start building a system around it and waste a considerable amount of time doing so. If we go into the delegating phase we might waste a considerable amount of time and money doing so (creating a whole host of other problems in the process).
I suggest that we use the ‘2-minute rule’ (as explained in the book ‘Getting Things Done’ by David Allen) to initiate the focus funnel. The ‘2-minute rule’ states that we either complete an item within 2-minutes of receiving it or capture the details of the idea/request and schedule it to be completed at a later date.
The ‘2-minute rule’ prevents small but necessary items from piling up and it allows us to capture items that may seem critical at the time but end up being less critical when we check in them at later date (with a fresh perspective).
We can also use the ‘2-minutes rule’ to initiate the idea/request to see if it is worthwhile or to gather more data.
For example:
Two minutes is long enough to take the action needed so we can stop thinking about it (for now). Two minutes is short enough to not disturb our current work task (you are able to easily remember where you left off and resume working – minimizing the switching cost associated from having to re-direct and re-focus our attention).
We need a systematic way to filter the things that come our way, otherwise we start living life according to other people’s agendas and never see the opportunity to leveraging the systems and people that can give us more room to concentration on what is truly important to us.
Give yourself the permission to ignore, invest, accept imperfect results, leave less significant things incomplete (for the time being) and focus on just one thing that could have a lasting impact.
“Work double-time part-time (on significant items) and you shall soon embrace the full-time free time.” – Rory Vaden
Use the revised focus funnel (click here a condensed Task Filtering Flow Chart):
During scheduled blocks of time or when you receive a reminder, look back at that time and ask:
If you can’t eliminate it, delay it, automate it, delegate/outsource it, then you must block out all distractions and Concentrate your effort on completing it yourself.