How to Organize Your Work & Your LifeIn Praise of Pessimism
I’m at it again: writing a tricky headline to catch extra interest in hopes of spreading this idea a little wider than it might otherwise go. The truth is I’m not praising pessimism as better than optimism, or suggesting that pessimists have…
Get More from Yourself
In this space, I write about productivity and success, some of which comes from technique, some of which comes from smart choices, and some of which comes from solid self-management. This time, let’s consider how to get more and better results from…
The Power of Boredom
Some of us are more readily susceptible than others to the feeling, but we all hate boredom. Although we’ve all experienced long periods of it, few of us have learned to recognize the power of boredom as a signal of opportunity. Think…
Start with What You Control
Much of what we think and believe is an illusion. There is a growing body of science to support this idea. One of the main takeaways from this understanding is the importance of recognizing what’s real and what’s not, and – in…
The Inner Game of Productivity
I remember being very impressed with the book “The Inner Game of Tennis,” which pretty much began the trend of looking inward to find and reduce the sources of many different performance problems. Later, I was happy to lead the editorial work…
A Productivity Mindset
I’ve been studying productivity for more decades than I care to remember, and much of my effort has gone into developing and teaching practical techniques to get more of the important agenda items done sooner rather than later. But underlying all of…
Giving Up on Certainty
Most of us crave certainty, but there’s precious little of it to be had. In the vast majority of situations, we are forced to make do instead with probabilities, guesses, trade-offs, and outright surprises. But this doesn’t have to be a bad…
What to Do After You Decide
I ran into an experienced, old-school IBM salesperson the other day and we talked about how she achieved all the success she racked up. In the course of our conversation, she said something intriguing to me that I’d like to pass along.…
HOLD Those Decisions
There’s a lot to be said about making good decisions. In fact, I’ve been among those who have said some of it, for example, here, here, and here. But more recently, I was thinking about the well-known SWOT paradigm, in which you…
You’ll Take It and Like It
The title here contains a little twist on conventional meaning. In literature and cinematic conflicts (like one of my favorites: The Maltese Falcon), you’ll encounter this phrase when someone in a stronger position enforces acceptance on someone in a weaker position –…
Four Characteristics to Improve
Human beings are complex, and any effort to improve ourselves has the potential to involve a good deal of that complexity. That’s one reason it’s impossible for me to tell you – individually – exactly where you can best improve your work…
Career Reset
Every once in a while, you reach a point in your work and your life when it’s time to drill down to the bedrock of who you are and what you want to be. Once there, you can begin to build up…
