When to Do and when to Learn to Do

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I agree with a lot of what Seth Godin says. He is a rarity in that he consistantly observes, communictates, and then explains the ’so what’. That last bit is a differntiator. But listening to his interview with Merlin Mann today he used an old, tired, jibe – rather than spend 12 hours a day learning how to be productive, you should spend them BEING productive.

This is something that Tim Ferriss advocates in 4 Hour Work Week – drastically cut down the amount of non-fiction reading that you do to the absolute bare minimum.

I disagree. But then you knew that didn’t you… I think it is an easy statement to make, because on the face of it its logic is infallible – but is being made by people who make a living from writing the material they claim we are wasting 12 hours a day reading. God I love sweet irony.

You see, your time is an asset – an asset for you to invest and demand a return from. It is the same as cash. If I have $12 then I would be willing to spend $11 dollars to make another $12. Equally, if I have 12 hours free, then I am happy to spend 11 of these to find a productivity hack, or self development techniqhue that’ll save me 12 hours.

In fact I’d spend more. Why? Because not only am I getting back the 11 hours I have already spent, I am giving myself a tool that will save me more time from now on.

How about and example? George can type at at 30 words per minute. His weekly 10,000 word target for the eBook he is writing is taking him just over 5 hours. One Saturday, rather than bang away for 5 hours, he spends 3 hours researching, and 2 hours completing a typing course on the internet. This boosts his words per minute to 60. He still needs to write his 10,000 words, but it will now only take him 2.5 hours – and every week after he’ll be saving that amount of time. Worth it? Certainly.

What is key is discipline. This certainly isn’t a carte blanche to down a 12 hour Wikipedia spiral every day. You need to decide what you want to learn, and give yourself a set amount of time – for example, only allow yourself 15 RSS feeds maximum; keep research to your lunch hour or an hour in the evening; or focus on one topic at a time and don’t be distracted on to tangents.

Okay, now you’ve learnt something – go and spend a few hours reading other Half-a-dozen Monkeys articles…

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A Different Point of View

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I hate blogs that start posts with “In my last post…”. However, in my almost last post I rambled on about mountaineering in one of the worlds loosest metaphors. Well guess what – another story from the hills, but one I was reflecting on in a negotiation this morning.

The mountain in the picture above is the Matterhorn, which as some of you may know, sit above the lovely village on Zermatt in the Swiss Alps. Zermatt has been a farming village for hundreds of years, living in the shadow of this tooth on the horizon.

In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, humans, particularly the British, decided it would be jolly nice to get to the top of all these large snowy objects that rose up in the middle of the continent. The Matterhorn, striking in appearance as it is, obviously gathered a lot of interest, but no one could work out how it would be possible to climb such steep terrain – every ridge looked vertical or overhanging!

Then one summer, the most persistent and controversial of aspirants decided to cross to Zermatt from the Italian village of Breuil – a route often used by shepherds but not by climbers. To his surprise, he saw the Matterhorn from a very different view:

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As you can see – the ridge that looked so vertiginous from Switzerland, looks like a 45 degree stroll from Italy.

We base our values, our thoughts, our hopes, and our desires on assumptions we and our environment make. These assumptions are the biggest limiting factor to our development and improvement. If we always look at our problems from Switzerland then they will always look impenetrable – but if every once in a while we climb to that other side of the valley, we may be surprised by what we see.

This morning a set of potential customers we upset as they had read a contract in the frame of mind “they are trying to screw us – lets spot how…”. It is amazing how worked up they got. I explained to them what I was trying to achieve in the contract, and suggested if they had any suggestions on how to do this then they we welcome. The mood brightened, and we agreed it all in 20 minutes. There is always a better view somewhere!

p.s. The story of the the first accent of the Matterhorn is a first class adventure story and mystery saga – highly recommended! The Ascent of the Matterhorn [Affiliate Link - thought you should know!]

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The Power of Silence

January 28, 2010

No, this isn’t about 80’s Rock ballads (although, there is an idea…). What I want to ramble about today is the insessent background ‘noise’ we have in this information age. And more importantly, I want to ramble about the benefit to creative thinking of hiding from this noise on a regular basis.
Maybe I should define [...]

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At the Sharp End

January 27, 2010

Other than getting nothing done due to reading productivity and personal development blogs, my true passion is mountaineering. “So what?” I hear you shrug. Well, I want to talk about a concept from climbing that has a big application in our everyday life.
The traditional set-up for two climbers ascending a mountain is for them to [...]

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How Much of You to Develop at Once

January 20, 2010

How many ‘goals’ or ‘development points’ do you focus on at any one point in time? Do you choose one thing you are working on or towards, and leave that as you sole purpose? Or do you monitor all your targets, and apply each one as and when it is most appropriate?
I ask this as [...]

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How to Cope with an Addiction to Learning

January 13, 2010

A passion for learning is a good thing right? Any thing that helps motivate you to grow, improve and develop must be an advantage? The thing is though, that some of us have taken this to the point of addiction.
Addiction may seem a strong word, but often our desire to learn about something ends up [...]

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Making Decision-making Easier

January 7, 2010

What is the hardest thing that most of us have to do during our day? What activity keeps us awake at night, and plagues us during the day? Making decisions.
We have to make hundreds, probably thousands, every day of our lives – from ‘tea or coffee’ and ‘overtake that car or not’, to ’shall I [...]

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Why You Should Take a Break From What You Enjoy

January 5, 2010

So I took a holiday. I decided not to post anything over the Holidays. Why? Well aside from spending two weeks travelling aorund the cournty visiting those people I only normally see at weddings and funerals, I wanted to consciously do nothing constructive. I haven’t read my RSS feeds, looked at any other blogs, and [...]

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Is There Such Thing as Moderation?

December 15, 2009

Moderation is gray. I don’t mean it is dull; I mean it is that shading in between the black and white of all or nothing. It is not a pin point or a thin line, but a broad spectrum that bridges the extremes. But does is this spectrum actually benefit us in our everyday lives?
“Of [...]

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How Cutting Steel Can Make You More Productive

December 10, 2009

I was wandering around one of our manufacturing plants last week and got into an interesting discussion about how you cut a sheet of steel. No, I wouldn’t have thought that was interesting either, but I assure you it was. Why I hear you ask? Well, there was an interesting parallel between the many options [...]

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