INTERNAL SCORECARD #13: When Good, And When Not
I write up an "Internal Scorecard" of my production to share looks at what actually positively and negatively affects getting things done. For the readers here, it gives an inside look into finishing things. For me, it gives me a public accountability mechanism.
This one covers the two-week span from 17 August to 31 August.
DO IT
Before we kick off, this is now my favorite video of all time. It's incredibly important:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ys3nbwGbeDQ
Feel free to skip the opening where the speaker is being introduced. I'd recommend you watch the whole thing (17 minutes) because it's got some incredible insights, even if you don't agree with everything. But no matter what, don't miss from 16:57 on.
THE ARC OF THE LAST TWO WEEKS
This might be interesting or boring for you. It looks at, day-by-day, rising and falling productivity. If the minute details aren't interesting for you, skim past it. If you want to see what rising and falling performance look like in a fairly detailed fashion, this might be intriguing for you --
It's been an eventful two weeks.
September 17th and 18th were incredibly action-packed, continuing the trend I wrote about in Internal Scorecard #12: "Sustainability was still shaky: I averaged 5.5 hours of sleep per night and consumed too much caffeine again. Nutrition was better. I had a couple crazy days (3.5 hours sleep followed by 15+ hours of work)."
I had two more days like that. The 17th was a normal, action-packed the day. The 18th was Beijing Barcamp.
Barcamp was amazing. I met some incredible people. I liked speaking there. I also woke up on four hours of sleep, and proceeded to have an action-packed 18 hour day.
The crash was utterly predictable. On the 19th, I met a friend at his company on a social call, and nothing else. On the 20th, I did some work with consulting clients and played poker in the evening, and nothing else. The 21st was also almost a wasted day. The 22nd, I had a bunch of work scheduled and did it all, but it was all rather flat and uninspired.
Things started to pick up around the 23rd. The 24th was a normal day too.
Then things kicked off into hyper-drive again. Took the train to Shanghai on the 25th, and got some amazing work in on the dining car of the train, and realized some important things about myself. (More on this in a moment.)
On the 26th, I had a strange day. I opened a bunch of books about philosophy and productivity, and was just thinking about how to organize things better. I started to list out all my current projects and organize my affairs more. 28th, 29th, 30th, and 31st all were hyper-intense with tons of great work happening.
If you're following along, then, we had about three weeks of high intensity work done with poor sustainability from 28 July to 17 August (covered in the last two scorecards). Two more days of it, culminating in an intense 18-hour day on only four hours of sleep. Followed by a 4-day crash with no great work.
Things picked up slowly for a couple days, then a great day, then a strange philosophical day and getting organized, then being on fire for four days (and longer actually, the trend is continuing).
AUDITING OF WHEN YOU'RE GOOD AND NOT
On a whim, I wrote down these questions and then answered them slowly:
What situations/work mixes am I most productive in?What are the traps/pitfalls that get me?How to engineer more of the former and less of the latter?
I recommend you do this exercise yourself. It's incredibly illuminating.
I also recommend you observe yourself during thriving times and during down times, to re-calibrate and re-adjust your understanding. Humans aren't naturally good at noticing this stuff.
MY ANSWERS: WHEN I'M GOOD, WHEN I'M NOT
What situations/work mixes am I most productive in?
1. I realized I need OFFLINE TIME mixed into what I do, in interesting atmospheres. In Taipei that means no iPhone (tethering) too.
2. Need a mix of people around and time by myself.
3. Being in environments of being really highly regarded and respected helps. (As opposed to being in a city where no-one knows me for an extended period.)
4. Momentum helps me a lot. When off-track, I ought to build it.
5. Physical fitness is key.
6. Some learning but not too much. (Too much learning suppresses my productivity. It's hard to describe precisely the correct mix, but I know it when I've got it.)
7. Great audio to listen to: Podcasts, audiobooks. These turn boring frustrating times into highly useful and enjoyable times.
8. MUSIC is good. This one surprised me. But twice in this cycle, I found a place with great music. One was an enjoyable cafe/lounge. I did amazingly good work there, breaking through on things that were stuck. The other was a bar with loud good electronic music, and some totally neglected tables in the back corner where I was able to work alone for a few hours, again doing breakthrough work.
9. SELF-CARE and GROOMING. Finally, I've noticed from my notes a very strong correlation between doing slightly more rather than less self-care and grooming. Over and above basic showering/brushing teeth/etc, doing one or two little extra actions goes a long way. It's hard to describe exactly how/why. It was nice staying in the Marriott the past week; they have body lotion for free there. So I'd lotion my hands or feet, cut my fingernails/toenails, clean my boots, do laundry, shave. Heck, I've started shaving more frequently just to get an additional worthwhile grooming activity. This was a surprisingly finding but seems to hold for me.
What are the traps/pitfalls that get me?
1. Web surfing.
2. Being in the same place too long.
3. Too much time online, not enough offline.
4. Not enough smart people or too many incompetent people around.
5. Neglecting fitness.
How to engineer more of the former and less of the latter?
Need a constant check during my weekly review for key productivity.
COMMENTS, QUESTIONS, TSR, CLARITY
Your questions and comments are welcome and appreciated, as always.
I'm also thrilled that we've got around 400 subscribers to The Strategic Review and the first issue came out yesterday, and we got some great feedback and high praise. More of your thoughts are welcome, and if you haven't a grabbed a copy yet -- do it!
Finally -- if you've been looking to connect with me to help improve your business growth or the projects you're working on, I'm now on clarity.fm
You can book time to speak with me using this link: https://clarity.fm/sebastianmarshall
Looking forward to hearing from you.