I've been a mere two weeks off from work for paternity leave, and I missed it. One thing I missed, but didn't expect to? The utter banality of InDesign layout. Many knowledge work jobs have their weeds—when you break out your finetooth comb and lose yourself in the details. The other way to consider this … Continue reading On the nitpicking joy of InDesign layout
Tag: psychology
On letting go of LinkedIn
When I tell people that I've quit social media, I'm not being completely honest: I'm still on LinkedIn. For years, I made an exception for LinkedIn, because I considered it an outlier: a social media network that felt useful. And "felt" is the right word, because was it actually useful? It seemed like there was … Continue reading On letting go of LinkedIn
On improving experiences by focusing on endings
When my wife and I purchased a new car a few weeks ago, there wasn't much negotiating we could do: supply was low, demand was high, and our salesman shrugged off our attempts at moving the price down with a final "I'll sell this car by 2 p.m. today if you don't want it now." … Continue reading On improving experiences by focusing on endings
On creating action cues
Yesterday, I wrote about the two-minute rule from David Allen. Today, I reflect on another tool I’ve found immeasurably helpful in the past week. I think of these as “action cues”—but first encountered them as “Gibsonian affordances” in the Daniel Levitin book The Organized Mind. (I would link to the Wikipedia page, but it’s a … Continue reading On creating action cues
On doing the thing that needs to be done when you notice it
The best advice in David Allen’s productivity book (or “bible,” to the many who have a cultlike affinity for it) Getting Things Done has nothing to do with his complex organizational framework. It’s a simple heuristic: If a task will take you less than two minutes, do it now. It’s what has me emptying the … Continue reading On doing the thing that needs to be done when you notice it
On the thoroughness of hospital staff
When our first kid was born, my experience in the hospital was a rush—I was anxious, exhausted, overstimulated. My attention span was short, and my short term memory was shot. Names of nurses and doctors? Forgotten. A play-by-play commentary later requested by family? Impossible. So I was delighted that the experience of accompanying my wife … Continue reading On the thoroughness of hospital staff
On feeling hangry
I forgot my lunch the other day. An irregular schedule—along with a schedule’s habits—is one of those odd pitfalls of hybrid work that I didn’t see coming. So it’s become a pattern for me, on those two days each week that I drive into my office, to forget to pack a lunch. Annoyed, I figured … Continue reading On feeling hangry
On Dan Heath’s 3 barriers to upstream problem-solving
Since I finished Dan Heath's thoughtful book Upstream a few weeks ago, I've been more or less continuously meditating on his premise of "upstream" problem-solving. Heath suggests that everyone spends too much time solving problems once they have become problems rather than solving problems before they happen. It would be wonderful, of course, if we … Continue reading On Dan Heath’s 3 barriers to upstream problem-solving
What if context switching is part of my job?
One of the most powerful shortcuts to greater work productivity is simple: avoid context switching. Related to multitasking—the fool's errand of attempting to do two (or more!) things at once—context switching is switching different work contexts: screen and paper, Outlook and Teams, Word and Excel, etc. The problem with context switching? "Attention residue." Every time … Continue reading What if context switching is part of my job?
How many people does it take to “make a tiger”?
I came across a wonderful Chinese proverb recently—one of those proverbs mysterious enough to demand an explanation and, even better, deliver with an excellent historical parable. From Wikipedia: "Three men make a tiger" refers to an individual's tendency to accept absurd information as long as it is repeated by enough people. It refers to the … Continue reading How many people does it take to “make a tiger”?
