Blog – Page 16 – 2Time Labs

January 3, 2013

How to Decide – Will a Tablet Help or Hurt My Productivity?

Recently I submitted an article I hope will be published by the Harvard Business Review blog having to do with performing an analysis of your productivity system before buying and trying to implement a new gadget.

I know… it sounds so blindingly obvious when I put it this way… analysis before purhase… except that most professionals have no idea how to do such an analysis even if they wanted to. For the vast majority, the thought doesn’t even cross their mind.

Manufacturers aren’t interested in doing more than putting out fancy advertisements with beautiful graphics, and getting people to line up outside their doors for the latest version with the coolest features. They only offer technical assistance on how to manipulate the device and access its doo-dahs.

They certainly don’t give a fig whether or not the damned thing actually helps you in the end or not. Not as long as you join the line for the latest upgrade at the appropriate time.

One of the blessings of my moving to live here in Jamaica might have been the need to adopt a “simpler” lifestyle. (Some would see that as a euphemism for what we call “broke-pocket.”) When I lived in the US, the latest gadget was literally five minutes away sitting on a shelf at Best Buy, waiting for me to arrive. Now, I don’t have that kind of access.

Here in the “developing world” one pays a 50% premium (due to import duties, extra shipping, higher security needs and high sales taxes) or waits for someone to bring a device down from the US at a reasonable price; which involves handling a number of tricky logistics.

Each option involves a waiting time… a cooling-off period. During this time, the effect of the envy, advertising or whatever else is driving the purchase wears off. In its place rises some well-placed doubts about the value of the purchase and its actual contribution to my productivity system.

For example, I went through a number of gyrations before buying my first smartphone. I took months to make a decision that takes others seconds, and I enjoyed asking the question – “Of what benefit is this… really?” I’m glad I did that, because when I do something stupid like answering the phone while driving on our infamous Junction Road, I am hyper-aware of the danger that I am putting myself and others in. (The truth is, I have scared/informed myself into picking up calls while driving in only the rarest of circumstances. I tell myself “I don’t care if Jesus Himself is calling…”)

Now, I’m feeling the itch to buy a shiny new tablet.

Oh sure, there is some gadget envy. My Mom just bought an iPad. The only reason I haven’t commandeered it (for experimental purposes of course) is that she’s away for a few months in Africa. Too hard to borrow it for a few hours.

Beyond these feelings is another one related to my productivity that I felt acutely, and its arisen because of a gap.

I use my calendar as my command center for all time demands, and I have two options at the moment to get into it: use my laptop – Outlook or Gcal – or use my smartphone. When I sat down at the desk this morning I felt the need to shuffle around my calendar for the day. Fifteen minutes later, I was finally able to start doing so.

Why? My laptop had to be rebooted. Both of my screens were useless while it updated whatever stuff it seems to like updating every single time it slows to a crawl. Thank you Microsoft. My smartphone screen is too small to see or do anything. (It’s a Blackberry 9700.) I doubt that a Samsung Galaxy screen would be big enough.

As I sat waiting, I started to feel the need for another screen, one that is instantly on that provides the kind of real estate that I need to get in and out of my calendar in a few minutes. In other words, I started to imagine, I need a tablet.

Well, that’s where my mind jumped and I have a few good reasons for doing so. Here’s a video of someone manipulating their iPad’s calendar in exactly the way I imagine.

Research shows that more screen space equates to greater productivity, a fact which I know from having two screens running at all times, not including my smartphone’s mini-screen.

There might be other solutions than a tablet, and I’m wiling to explore them, but once again I am back to where I was with my smartphone decision. I don’t have a single guideline to work with, other than “buy it and try it.” (Or, in my case, “wait until Mom returns from Africa and then borrow it and try it.”) Best Buy’s generous return policies meant that I could return it if I didn’t like it. It might come as news to some that here in the developing or Third world, that’s not an option.

But even if I bought/borrowed it, what the heck would I be using to evaluate its value to my productivity system? I suspect that I’d end up wanting to keep it for other reasons, like it’s effect on my friends, my ego, or the movies that I can watch while sitting on the beach… This productivity stuff would just be forgotten in a flood of cool graphics.

The fact is, I have nothing – not even a set of the most rudimentary tests to perform.

The gist of my proposed article to HBR is that we know how to make smart decisions around big corporate purchases like whether or not to use Oracle or Itanium servers. There is an established discipline for making such decisions.

However, when you hear that a company’s board has banned smartphones from its meetings you have to wonder. What sequence of stressful events led to that decision, and did it involve hilarious Pavlovian behavior?
“Put down that smartphone, Smith, we are trying to make a multi-million dollar decision here.”
“Give me a second, please, my next-door neighbor’s daughter just poked me, and I need to poke her back.”

How many of these incidents did it take for someone to “move a formal motion to prohibit smartphone use during board deliberations.” It’s remarkable that a supposedly time-saving device was inserted into the lives of the most powerful people in the company, whose productivity then became corrupted and disabled to the point where they could no longer make independent decisions.

I want to come up with something that helps me make this particular decision, before I buy one for lesser reasons or receive one as a gift: breaking the spell of not having one, and thinking about its value with some rigor. Once the spell is broken, I know from my smartphone acquisition that the device will fade into my system, and become invisible to me, even as it helps / hinders my productivity.

I notice that my mind jumps to what brand tablet I should consider, but that’s just too far down the chain of decisions to start. I need to be closer in time to the moment when I need to have instant, easy access to my calendar, and imagine myself reaching for… <fill in the blank> …in order to…<fill in the blank.>

Before the Palm was invented, Jeff Hawkins walked around with a block of wood in his pocket, pretending that his vision had been realized, and getting an idea of what he’d use it for, and when. That makes me think… not about blocks of wood, but starting to visualize what the perfect solution might be. For example, should it be a single-purpose device like my bottom of the scale Kindle, which is for reading books or listening to audio-books, and nothing else?

So, I need to go do some research on how to make productivity equipment decisions. After all, someone in this world must buy stuff like monster tractors. How do they decide what to buy? I imagine that the cost of making a mistake is enormous, so they might have figured out some decent critera, and a useful process.

I’d bet, however, that the same guy who buys those tractors is the one ahead of you in the line at the Apple Store, thirsting to get the latest i-whatever. After this article, you might be the only one to find it ironic.

P.S. If you know anything about buying monster tractors, let me know.

January 3, 2013

An Amazing Time Demand Tracker

An Amazing Time Demand Tracker… It doesn’t exist… so don’t go looking for it… but if it did, it would be a gadget used to track individual commitments.

Backing up a bit… A time demand is defined by 2Time Labs as an individual commitment to complete an action in the future. It’s a discrete, mental creation that disappears once the action is complete and is usually made up of a provisional action, duration and likely start time.

The problem is that time demands are hard to track. People who capture with high skill immediately record them in a safe place, such as a paper pad, smartphone or program like Evernote. From there, the time demand is acted upon in one of several ways once it’s emptied from the point of collection. It’s tossed away, acted on immediately, stored, scheduled or added to a list.

The challenge is that no-one (to my knowledge) has ever tried to track time demands. No tool exists to answer even basic questions such as:

– how many are created per day on average

– how long they sit in a capture point before being emptied

– how many end up being disposed in each of the different ways I listed above

The right kind of device would need a human interface due to the fact that time demands enter our lives in different ways, some of which are mental in nature e.g. during a dream.

There ARE studies, for example, of email flow, but this is too imprecise – some emails are filled with time demands while others require only one – “delete it immediately without even reading.” Too many time demands are simply made up in response to an arbitrary, unrecorded stimulus.

If this device existed, it would open up the doors to all kinds of research, and experimentation that could change the way we think of time management. Perhaps there is someone willing to invest?

December 31, 2012

An Experiment in Using More Memory

A fascinating article at the Lifehacker website got my attention – and earned a swift rebuttal from some lifehackers. The article’s author performed an experiment – to use as much memory as possible, and to use as few external devices as he could get away with.

How I Learned to Rely on My Memory (and Stop Relying on Technology)

In the article the author, Thorin Klosowski, makes a determined effort to try to remember more things by using fewer tech devices. He takes it on as a bit of an experiment, and at the end (even after a few failures) decides to try harder to remember more things than before.

The comments after the article taught me a few things… I had no idea that postpartum memory loss was real. I don’t have kids, so I thought it was a bit of a joke but there is solid research that shows that some life-changes can produce this effect.

What do you think?

December 24, 2012

Why To-Do Lists Sometimes Do Work

Daniel Markovitz wrote a great article about a year ago in the HBR Blog Network entitled “To-Do Lists Don’t Work.” From a 2Time Labs perspective it raises some provocative points but then falls into a familiar trap: it tries to argue for a one-size fits-all approach.

He does, however, start off on a strong foot by clearly stating some of the weaknesses of To-Do Lists that defy conventional wisdom.

To-Do lists that grow to be too long end up presenting too many choices to us at any/every point in time. We quickly become overwhelmed with too many choices.
Because tasks that are short are listed alongside those that are long, the mind must contend with the inherent differences between the time required to complete each task, even though they seem to be identical when placed on a list. It’s s little like looking at a row of identical apples, knowing that the one with the shiniest color always has worms.
The same applies to tasks of differing priority.
The task appears on the list without context, as if it were free-floating. For example, one critical piece of background information is always “how much time do I have available?”
His point about “commitment devices” is a bit confusing so I won’t venture a summary.

He rightly points out that when you put together a schedule to replace your To-Do list you are instantly confronted by the time you think you have, but don’t. Advocates of tracking your time spent on different tasks each day are right: when you compare what you planned to do vs. what you actually do on a regular basis, you learn to make better plans.

The article falls apart as it started, which might be a function of the way it was edited, and not written. Markovitz concludes by saying “So do yourself a favor: ditch the to-do lists, and start living in your calendar today.” That line seems out of place in the article – it’s a blunt and didactic statement that follows a nuanced and subtle argument, and it’s the only statement in the article that supports the bold claim of the headline.

While all the concepts that Markovitz outlines do fit our findings here at 2Time Labs, it’s a mistake to go the next step and imply that everyone would benefit from living out of their calendar. Our research shows that people with a low number of time demands do quite well with just a list. They don’t experience the problems he outlines above.

Also, people who cannot develop the skill of using an electronic calendar or can’t afford one are better off using a list than trying to manipulate a paper calendar for large numbers of time demands. (I know lots of people who will never own a computer in this lifetime due to its cost.)

The problem with ~~articles~~ headlines like these is that they don’t acknowledge the continuum of skills that ordinary people require to lead a daily life. It’s a problem in the time management world; a sound observation is converted into a one-size-fits-all conclusion that simply over-reaches, and causes the strength of the original argument to be rejected by those who think just a bit differently.

P.S. Dan gets a lot of flack in the comments of this article… ouch… for over-reaching. It’s tough to bring people back when they believe that they are being attacked. It’s an issue I worry about about a bit as my book will make some pointed observations that others are bound to experience this way.

December 20, 2012

More on Happiness and Time Management – Lifehack

The article I write that was just published on Stepcase Lifehack talked about a connection I picked up in the research between happiness and time management – it’s beyond just a mere time management tip.

Building on that article, I recently made an interactive video that includes a self-assessment based on the idea of flow / productive happiness by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. You can find the video here in this example of the time management training that’s being done in my online program, MyTimeDesign.

One a slightly different note, I recently posted a video on the challenge that consultants have in helping their clients get better at time management. There’s a good reason that tips, tricks and shortcuts don’t work… and we all need to pay attention to this at a time of year when we are simply inundated with trivial lists on the topic.

December 18, 2012

I Can Save You 5000 Hours Per year. Guaranteed… (Not!)

I recently decided to sharpen up my focus on certain kind of customer / reader here at 2Time Labs and MyTimeDesign.

I’ll use the headline of this post to explain what I mean.

My Time Management System Can Save You 5000 Hours Per Year. Guaranteed.

What’s your reaction?

I’m intrigued!
Bull&%$#!

This may sound ridiculous, but the first group is the one I intend to ignore.

And it’s not because I am aligning myself with the cynics in the world, against those who are open-minded.

The distinction I’m trying to draw is more of the “bridge in Brooklyn I’d like to sell you” variety. The second group knows that the flaws in the headline of this post run deep, for a number of reasons, starting with these two:

the promise cannot be verified scientifically due to problems in establishing proper measures.
professionals operate at different levels of skill, and such a promise assumes a world of universal mediocrity that, thankfully, doesn’t exist.

The second group is often insulted by time management trivia that does little to inform, and makes no difference other than to provide a cool distraction. Lists of numbered time management tips leave them cold.

Instead, they would find company in others who know that improving one’s time management skills is a difficult business. As Steve Pavlina puts it on his website, Personal Development for Smart People, “Personal development is hard work.”

Anyone who is looking for a fast, easy shortcut to better time management skills hasn’t learned the truth that, I think, can only come from real-world experience. That’s a fancy way of saying that they haven’t failed enough to know enough.

In the time management business, I can’t compete with those who write soft articles that speak to this first group. They make outrageous promises and offer over-simplified answers to tough questions and there are a lot of them who believe that an article urging people to “spend more time on stuff that’s important and less time on stuff that’s not” is a brand new message that deserves to be disseminated widely to professionals who have never heard it.

They are the ones most likely to believe that there’s a time management system that fits every person on the planet, and that you should find the best time management system and just follow it.

What I do know for a fact is that for the second group I described, that does indeed know much, much better, there is little that’s being written. Maybe 5% of the new time management articles being published address their experience and knowledge. Probably less. I curate hundreds of posts, videos and audios on time management each week and I can attest – the number of quality articles that try to speak to the second group is small.

We can blame this state of affairs on any number of people, but I won’t. Instead, I’ll focus on getting more content out to a greater number of people that actually makes a profound difference. Doing so is much, much harder… and I love it.

December 17, 2012

Breaking News from ASTD

It’s good news for us here at 2Time Labs! Christmas came early with the news that I’ll be presenting a session at the ASTD Conference in Dallas on May 20th, 2013 at their International Conference and Exposition. ASTD is the largest training and development organization in the world. My topic, as you may expect, will be related to the work we do here:

How to Stop Failing at Behavior Change Training: The Case of Time Management

I am looking forward to this opportunity to share the message behind Time Management 2.0, and also to meeting some of you who have been following the work we do for some time! Click here for the details of our presentation at ASTD on Time Management 2.0.

December 16, 2012

A Top Site for Effective Project Management

top_site_for_project_managers

Recently I was informed that the home of 2Time Labs was listed as one of the top 100 sites for Effective Project Managers.

It lines up well with some secondary research that we’re doing into the “last mile” of project management.

When I worked at AT&T Bell Labs in the late ’80s-early ’90’s, one of the challenges the company faced was that it was only allowed to connect with customers via the Local Exchange Companies such as NYTEL or Southern Bell. AT&T Employees often complained that these other companies owned “the last mile” and limited what could be offered to the customer in terms of new services.

Well, there’s a “last mile” in project management but it has nothing to do with distance. Instead, it has to do with project failure when a project manager has done a lot of good, hard work that ends up being entirely undone by poor time management skills on the part of team members. In other words, the individuals can’t effectively handle the volume of new time demands that the project places on them.

The fate of the project is entirely out of the hands of the project manager at that point who dutifully hands out tasks to team members and promises to follow-up if he/she hears nothing by pre-determined critical dates.

What are some of the things that project managers can do? Should they do some kind of assessment before a project even starts? Should they try to improve time management skills in the middle of a project? If they ignore the problem, will it go away? What do they do differently when they have completed an assessment?

These issues are worth digging into because (in theory) the Time Management 2.0 approach offers Project Managers an efficient way to evaluate the skills of team members, and effect an improvement by taking small steps.

Whether it holds up in practice remains to be seen, and I’ll be asking this question in the upcoming months to get some definitive answers.

In my soon-to-be-released book there is a critical part of the story when the protagonist / Project Manager, Bill, must lead an ineffective team in terms of time management skills. Or else…

More on the book, and Bill to come, so please stay tuned.

December 14, 2012

Flowing: A Possible New Fundamental

Recently, I watched a couple of videos that gave life to some ideas I have been mulling: that the flow state has everything to do with time management.

The flow state is defined by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi as one of high performance that gives an individual an experience that he says is “optimal.” In this state the individual loses track of time as they devote their complete attention to the task at hand. The task itself is an important one that isn’t easy to complete, and requires their full concentration.

Ever since learning about the book, Flow, and its ideas, I have been guided by them. A few years later, they were incorporated into my own time management programs.

Then, a few weeks ago I stumbled across a TED video by Matthew Killingsworth that linked happiness to the kind of unhappiness that comes from mind-wandering.

His article reinforced my thought that good time management can help prevent unhappiness, and promote productivity/happiness.

It led me to re-think the entire foundation of the 2Time labs fundamentals, which were first established back in 2006. Perhaps, in addition to the 11 fundamentals already identified, there is a twelfth – “Flowing.”

Rather than just write about it here on the blog, I decided to put together an interactive video that describes this potentially new development. It has a self-assessment built into it, and even a one-step challenge game, and I wrapped it inside the launch of the new MyTimeDesign Plus+ training to make some broader points.

Continue reading “Flowing: A Possible New Fundamental”

November 19, 2012

Established – a Time Management Library

A few hours ago, I finished scanning the last front page of the time management articles I have collected over the years.

How many? Some 78 articles.

In one fell swoop I established the single best source of academic information on the topic. I can say this with some confidence simply because I have searched high and low, hard and long to find these articles. In some cases, they are out of print, and there are many I just gave up on ever finding.

Some are available at a price, exemplifying the fight that’s being waged between scientific publishers and the new availability of Internet articles that’s bypassing them entirely. “Dis-intermediation” they call it.

As I have mentioned in prior posts, in the course of pulling together the best research, I also have not found a single time management-focused department, journal, conference, school or online forum that’s truly open to more than a single approach.

It’s a sorry state, and as I mentioned at the ICD conference, it places us squarely in the Dark Ages.

So, I’m playing my part, I guess, and maybe a grad student here or there will benefit from having a one-stop source of journals and white papers. In that spirit, if I’m missing any research that’s useful, please let me know.

Here’s the link to the 2Time Labs Library that lists the time management papers I have found to be useful.