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What Andy's Doing
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Recently Written
- Passionate People: Get What You Deserve, Become a Career Renegade!
- Featured Blog: Patrick Rhone and His Journal
- Ask The Readers: Can You Disconnect And Still Be Productive?
- Why Working Long, Hard Hours Gets You Behind (?)
- How to Help Great Productivity Blogs Get Discovered
- My Scandelous Confession and A Royal Rant About GTD
- On New Beginnings (And More About Your Host)
- Parting is Such Sweet Sorrow
- How to Use Basecamp and Backback In Perfect Harmony
- How to Chill Out
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Converting Coworkers to GTD
So you’ve read through GTD for the ump-teenth time and it looks like you used it to beat back a pack of wild boar. You’ve got your all of your inputs handled and your edges are so clean you could eat off of them. I hate to pee in anybody’s punch, but that was the easy part.
Your officemate and frequent collaborator, Bob, has an in-basket that looks like an open-faced filing cabinet. He might as well change the name of his Outlook inbox to “freaking everything”. In short, his personal productivity system makes your skin crawl. What recourse do you have? How can you show Bob the One True Way?
Well, the short answer is - you can’t. Think of it as a marriage. For years and years, you’ve been arranging your toiletries a certain way, then along comes your brand new spouse. You’re equally excited about joining your separate existences into a unified organism of love or something. But the jerk can’t seem to understand why the toothpaste cap needs to be replaced once the paste has been dispensed. And it makes you want to go over the table on him (and not in the newlywed sort of way).
You can browbeat your coworkers until you’re blue in the face about how if only they would read this delightful book, then all of their problems will be solved - but it really won’t solve anything. The key to winning the hearts and notebooks of your unenlightened coworkers is to lead by example. You have to be a freaking ninja at this stuff before you can go around proselytising. Because, if your credibility in such matters is even a little shaky, you’ll be dismissed quicker than the class clown in third period french.
If you consistenly out-perform those around you (and still leave the office on time), your superiors will start to notice. And once they do, they’ll start poking around, watching you work. Before you know it, they’ll be asking you to lead seminars and lunchtime meetings for your coworkers and colleagues because the brass want the rest of the rank and file to crank on their work the same way that you do.
So, unless Bob asks, save your GTD speech for the ears of those who really want to hear it. It’ll go eons farther, I promise you.
Get a Job Interview: 5 Tactics for Drastically Increasing Your Odds
The recent financial turmoil has created a situation where unemployment could be a problem for quite some time. The good news for the unemployed is that there are tangible things that you can do to increase your chances of getting noticed for the jobs that are available.
Sure, jobs are going away, but jobs are also always being created. Increasing unemployment numbers just mean there are more of the former. Hires are still happening everyday. Plus, jobs are being recycled at companies all over the country. For example:
- People move for a variety of reasons and have to resign,
- People screw up and get terminated,
- People get pregnant and quit to raise their children, etc. etc.
Oftentimes these are all people who (should) have been providing a vital function to the organization they worked for and that organization will look to fill the void that they left behind.
I recently ran a job ad for a “recycled” position and received hundreds of resumes, literally. I’ve never seen anything like it. Some applicants were so over-qualified it bordered on ridiculousness, yet when we called they were grateful just to hear back from someone.
This post is not about how to write a great resume, there are plenty of resources out there for that. What I hope to do today is to give you insights into the mind of someone who has been responsible for making hiring decisions in this job market. My goal is to help you get you in front of as many potential employers as possible. Here goes:
Switchtasking
This post was written by business coach Dave Crenshaw, author of the great new book The Myth of Multitasking
I’d like to share a valuable principle with you. It’s something I’ve taught to many business owners and executives I’ve worked with. This principle may go against the grain of some of your beliefs about time and the best way to get things done. Because of that, I ask you to keep an open mind.
Multitasking is a myth. It just plain doesn’t exist.
My Son Teaches Me about Professional Communication
One of my favorite things to do with my kids while my wife is at work is to take walks around the neighborhood. We usually have a destination, but if the weather is especially nice and we’re having a good time, I won’t exactly rush home.
Recently, we were on just such a walk on a very mild summer afternoon. My son was sipping on a cold chocolate milk and asking all sorts of questions about the various cars and houses we passed as we walked. It wasn’t until we were getting close to home that we happened upon this, sitting in the grass near the street:
How to Not Screw Up Your New Job
It’s one of the best feelings in the world, heading in for your first day at a new job. Everything feels fresh and new, you feel like you’re starting with a clean slate and that you’re really going to ace this one. You’re just so positive about everything, especially if it’s the kind of job you’ve been hoping for and working toward for a long time. You know, the kind you see on commercials for online employment sites where the dude in the tie is doing the arms-raised-high and both-feet-hitting-his-lower-back-type jump, fueled by that new job joy.
But, starting a new job can be especially difficult for some. Perhaps you just can’t seem to fit in, no matter where your career takes you (this happens a lot more often than people think, I assure you). Here are some things to avoid doing (many of which I’ve personally witnessed) that will go a long way in getting your ass on the outside curb quicker than you thought possible.
The Definitive Guide to Covering Your Ass
Doing the kind of work I do, I’m often asked questions like “Do you know if the changes to suchandsuch.com were pushed to the live site?” or “Did Timmy get those edits done?”. Hell, even in my own house: “Did [mother-in-law] give [son] a bath?”. Questions to which, most of the time, I don’t have concrete answers. So, I answer in a non-concrete fashion.
It always slays me when people answer categorically “No” or “Yes” to a question when they don’t even know, for a fact, that their answer is correct. Not to get too geeky, but a former coworker of mine once asked another former coworker “Does C# support multiple inheritance?”. The latter coworker, without batting an eye, said “Yes”. He was wrong. (The meaning of the question is unimportant - so don’t spend too much time trying to figure it out - just an example). His problem? He didn’t cover his freakin’ ass.
6 Simple Ways to be a Nicer Person
I consider myself to be pretty easy-going most of the time. I tend to get along well with people and I find it pretty easy to talk to most folks that I come in contact with.
As to why I’m a nice guy, that you can attribute to my parents. My father was a hardass and my mother is pretty much the sweetest lady ever. My father went out of his way to make sure that I did certain things when dealing with other people that are pretty much reflex now.
Not saying that I’m an authority on “nice” or anything, but I’ve certainly picked up a few nuggets in my young life. It’s surprisingly easy, actually - even for people who tend to be on the shy side.
How to Backup *All* of Your Data for Pennies per Month
Every so often when I’m out running errands on the weekends, I’ll catch a radio talk show dealing with technology (users call in with questions, etc.). I swear I can’t get through an hour of this show without the subject of data backup coming up at least once (or perhaps the entire hour will be spent covering different backup strategies). It’s safe to say that most people don’t properly backup their information and personal files, despite the myriad of available applications.
I think it’s because the solutions come in one of two forms:
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Transform Your Cell Phone into a Productivity Juggernaut
All of us productivity nerds have our tools of choice. Some instinctively reach for a stack of index cards, others for a PDA or Pocket PC. I’m here to tell you that your regular, everyday cell phone can probably be just as effective as any other swiss army knife out there.
It’s all about taking your phones built-in features and combining them with some terribly powerful websites/services available today. And your phone doesn’t have to be anything fancy - this ain’t just for you iPhone/Treo folk, oh no. I’m talking to those of us with normal, average-joe-type cell phones - usually the kind that comes free with a new contract.
Most of these services require only the ability to send and receive text messages (and, obviously, phone calls). Ready?
Don’t Take a Break Unless You Need One
One area where I find myself disagreeing with many of the community gurus is the area of breaks and the taking of breaks. Many will say that one should work n minutes per hour and take a 60-n minute break, like clockwork. I disagree. Attempting to shoehorn humans into a robotic schedule when their work doesn’t dictate such a schedule is, in my opinion, counterproductive. After all, when you take a break, you’re no longer being productive (and, yes, I understand that “recharging” is important to overall productivity - I just don’t believe it to be something that should be scheduled).
We’ve all heard about “the zone” (though, perhaps by a different name). Those rare occasions when you’re completely focused on what you’re doing and you’re at the peak of productivity. The rest of the world has faded into the background and it’s just you and [your task]. For those of us who have been there, it’s a bit like a good night’s sleep: you don’t realize how awesome it was until it’s over. This is my main reason for not taking scheduled breaks.
