Author: brianjohnson

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Downtime – Switching Tasks Can Take ALL the Time

We hear all the time that distractions are killing our productivity in today’s hyper-connected world. But what’s the logical takeaway from that? Just turn off the phone for a while? Put headphones on? And what is the actual problem with the distractions?

I have now concluded that it’s not really the “distractions” that are even the problem; it’s the switching of tasks and, more importantly, the time wasted between the two tasks.

For me, I’ve noticed that every single time I “finish” a task (or potentially even when I have some kind of distraction), a process takes over where I go and seek out other distractions.

For example, let’s say I just finished a difficult task. I’ll check it off my list, and then check Facebook quick for notifications, then possibly the news, then my texts, then emails. It’s almost automatic behavior.

If I only did two things all day, this wouldn’t be an issue. But that’s not how it works. I probably switch tasks many dozens of times each day, and so these distractions are huge. That’s a ton of time.

And it can happen even when I’m not switching tasks. If I check texts or whatever, it’s likely I’ll go through the same routine.

So what do I do with this information?

I think the first step is to just work on being hyper-aware of it when it’s happening. I need to overwrite that script and habit, and being aware it’s happening is the first step.

Then, I just need to fight that urge and go right on to the next thing.

When I think of all my most productive days, I remember just plowing through and going right from one task to the next. A common theme is usually that I had a good “to-do” for the day, too.

I think it’s important to make it as easy as possible to go to the next thing in the list. Having a to-do list means that you don’t have to think about what’s coming next, and that means you’ll be way less likely to procrastinate about moving on. So always make that to-do!

But most importantly, I need to constantly be thinking about the distractions and how I can rewrite that script.

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Need to Constantly Focus on Improving Habits

When it comes to habits, I’ve had some successes and I’ve had some failures. Giving up the “snooze” button has notably failed thus far. But pounding through emails and working out have generally succeeded.

I believe that building proper habits is the key to… Well, everything! “Motivation” is not really a thing and I’ve learned that I, like everyone else, am regularly completely powerless to fight how I’m “feeling”. It’s fantasy to believe anything else.

Only habit stands in the way of biology.

It’s the one thing I can rely on to get myself to do things even when I don’t feel like. If properly built-up, habits can ensure that I do all of the things that are good for me and will lead to a better life. Because sheer force of will and motivation don’t seem to go very far.

In my reading I’ve learned that it’s difficult to build up more than one significant habit at the same time, and that it’s better to focus on just one until it’s well-established. So what am I working on right now?

Not really anything! Time to fix that.

I’d like to actually break the habit of seeking out mindless entertainment, especially when I’m procrastinating. This means being okay not having anything to do.

Specifically, this means no browsing the web before I get out of bed. No more browsing after eating lunch or during the work day. Any single session of non-productive internet usage should be limited to 15 minutes maximum.

At the moment, this habit-breaking doesn’t necessarily need to extend to replacing this old habit with anything productive. We’ll get there. But for now, I just want to address the real time-waster. As long as I’m not forcing myself to do something less fun in its place, I believe it will be much easier to give up this habit.

I think from now on, I should also track my habit-building progress on here. I should always be building a habit and tracking how it’s going. I think the more good habits I have, the easier life will be and the more effective I’ll be in all areas.

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Must Fill “Free Time” With Activities I Value

I need to always commit to filling “free time” with valued activities.

Now, I don’t mean “free time” like, any time I have that doesn’t have some scheduled activity or where I’m home or not working or anything. I’m referring to periods of time where I could be doing something but my options are very limited, such as when I’m driving a car.

These are times when I have a choice between doing something productive such as listening to Spanish lessons and educational audio-books, something mindlessly entertaining like listening to the radio, or nothing at all.

As a quick side-note: while writing this, I realized that I should be filling ALL of my time, without qualification, on things I value. That could be a whole other blog post but it’s actually more profound of a thought than I had originally imagined.

But for something like driving a car, it’s time where I’m already just sitting there doing nothing, and I could be productive. I could be learning and improving. And over the course of my life, I’m going to drive a lot most likely.

It’s worth mentioning here that I do not value mindless entertainment very highly. It’s extremely easy to access anywhere, anytime, it isn’t fulfilling, and barely does anything for me even in the short term. Therefor, it’s not something I should be doing a whole lot of.

While driving a car, I need to be doing valuable things. At the moment, that means learning Spanish. In the future, it could mean lots of other things.

I think there are a lot of these “free times” when I could be productive. Maybe I’m waiting for something to start or get done, I’m traveling, or I simply don’t have motivation to do anything else.

It’s worth noting, too, that I don’t think I need to have a high burden on myself for these things. I don’t need to necessarily commit to extreme attention and active listening. Attention and focus are limited resources, and if I always require 100%, I know I’m just not even going to do it.

But even having a Spanish disc on and passively listening to it is likely to be beneficial. At the very least, it will be much more beneficial than listening to the radio! So I need to do it.

I think that focusing heavily on this will have significant benefits long-term. Compared to most people who will never do anything productive while driving or in these other “free times,” I should be fairly far ahead of the curve.

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Focus Must Always be on Freeing Up Time

I’ll open up today’s thoughts with an example. I have a project that requires some custom coding. It will be a little tricky to implement, and is outside of my current skill-set. My team is already busy with other things, and I don’t want to burden them with this additional task.

It’s also already behind schedule, yet quite important. It needs to get done soon.

I figured I would just handle it myself! So I spent probably over an hour messing around with it. To finish the whole thing, I started realizing would take many hours.

And then I realized… Why am I doing this? Am I really utilizing my time most effectively?

No. I wasn’t.

So what did I do?

I realized that I could just outsource this to my go-to contractor for code-heavy tasks. He’s usually fast and can work with anything. All I needed to do was spend 10 minutes putting together specific requirements and sending him the passwords and documentation, and I was done.

It will probably take him fewer hours than it would have taken me, plus now I am free to work on other things.

I need to always be thinking about how I can free up more time, and I need to have an aggressive mindset of avoiding work that others could be doing. It’s not that I can’t do those things or even that I don’t want to. It may even be on the contrary! It’s that the only way to grow is to focus all of my energy on running the business and making the operations as self-sufficient as I can.

Every time I’m bogged down working on actual client work, it’s completely unscalable and I’m hurting my future success.

If I can keep that in mind always, and constantly be looking at how I can improve that, I will me more profitable and will have fewer headaches in the business.

I need to be honest and fair with myself as well, however. I can’t change everything overnight. To be honest, one day I’d like to not only avoid doing sales myself, but also focus all of my time on the direction of the company and none of it interacting with clients.

But that can’t happen overnight. Hiring a salesperson is a very difficult thing to be able to do. And currently, I handle most of the client interactions, which is how it needs to stay (with the exception of having developers interact with clients during projects, which can and should be happening as much as possible.)

So I can’t beat myself up at the moment when things come up that I need to deal with. The goal is constant improvement in these areas, not overnight changes.

But overall I just want to re-state my focus so I can continue to improve.

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Pragmatism, not Idealism

As someone who probably tends to be overly optimistic, especially when it comes to my ability to do things or general predictions for the future, I think I’ve always had a propensity to focus on idealism. Whenever I’m making decisions, I basically make them assuming that I’m going to be perfect in every relevant category.

Having trouble focusing and getting stuff done consistently? Not a problem! I’ll have the perfectly solved with my elite-level self-control in the near future. Weak in some business-related skill? Not to worry! I’m sure a year from now I’ll have read 100 books on the topic and will be an expert.

Now, I don’t intend to make this a lengthy discussion on the value of optimism. I believe there are myriad ways in which being unrealistically optimistic can help you out. It helps you move forward when things are hard or unlikely to succeed, makes your more likable, and just generally helps out.

But if you define “optimism” as being more positive than can be justified by the evidence, then there are certain areas in which it can be quite pernicious. Self-improvement and self-management, for instance, is quite ineffective if you’re overly optimistic or idealistic.

I think I need to adopt a strategy of strict adherence to a pragmatic policy. If something isn’t working, I need to change it up. If I’m relying on unlimited willpower to get things done, it’s simply not going to happen. At the end of the day we’re still just really smart apes and we have powerful limits on motivation and desires.

Ramit Sethi talks a lot about being “brutally honest” with yourself. You need to look in the mirror and admit when something isn’t working. Beating yourself up for failing at perfection isn’t only pointless, it’s actively counter-productive.

I’m going to fall short, and I’m going to fail. The question is: how can I move forward from that? What is a realistic solution that takes into account the world and myself as we are, and then proposes steps that will produce real value and improvement?

For me, the biggest takeaway from this post (and the thing I’d like to keep in the back of my mind) is to constantly be shifting my mindset towards pragmatic solutions. In everything I do, I need to be honest with myself, fix what’s broken, and avoid the trap of thinking that I’m going to somehow succeed where everyone else (including myself) has failed because I can just power through and git’r’done.

What next?

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These Blogs are the Most Important Thing

It’s been something like six weeks since I last posted. And yet, I’ve already mentioned how I think these are the most important thing when it comes to both my business and, probably, my life. But I haven’t been doing them!

Sure, I could say that I’ve been busy, which is true. I’ve also had other things going on in my personal life that have caused me to be both busier and less productive while working.

But if something is truly “the most important thing,” shouldn’t it come before literally anything else?

The answer is clearly ‘yes’.

Maybe I should revisit why it’s the most important thing. Let’s make a list, shall we?

  1. It focuses my mind and efforts on productivity, growth, and improvement.
  2. It reminds me of past goals, thoughts, methods, and efforts which helps those things contribute more to improvement.
  3. It’s about the only time and place where I really work through difficult problems in a clear, productive, and concrete way, and then holds me accountable to my conclusions.
  4. It clears up what I need to be focusing my time and efforts on in order to achieve my goals.
  5. It makes me more productive, even in the short term (such as that day).

It seems to me that without this, I’m simply going day-to-day, performing routine tasks as they come up without any guidance or thought. Honestly, I suspect that’s how the vast majority of people live their lives.

But I don’t want to do that! I’m still young, and any investments I make in self-improvement now will pay off over the course of the majority of a lifetime. It’s more important that I do them now than ever.

It really is critical that I do this regularly. Even to the point where I can be neglecting other responsibilities and projects to do it. If it is the most important thing, then it needs to come first, or else everything else ultimately suffers.

And realistically, it’s not very hard or all that time-consuming, and it makes me feel better to do it. So there’s no reason not to!

 

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Feedback from Partners Regarding my Focus and Strengths

At a B2B meeting for BNI today, I asked my business partners to brainstorm and share with me what they think my unique strengths are in the marketplace and what value I bring. The goal was to fine-tune my marketing and targeting as well as messaging.

Some wonderful insight came from this meeting.

Here are a select few of the biggest things people said about my strengths:

  • We are great experts and partners, and are capable of guiding people to what works best for them rather than just giving them what they want
  • We have an intuitive sense for what client’s needs are
  • We have the ability to fully customize functionality and design to an extent that can’t be found elsewhere
  • We have an intuitive sense of beauty as well as a practical business sense that allows us to create stunning, effective websites
  • Our design sense is fresh and clean
  • We are interested in investing in long-term relationships and offering ongoing support, which most places don’t do

Much of that is really great! I feel like I’ve touched on many of those in my marketing and messaging before but never really focused too much on others. It’s nice to hear the biggest things that these partners value.

I think to summarize where to go with this, I think we should basically present ourselves as the experienced experts who offer thoughtful long-term solutions to website needs.

There’s probably a better way to phrase all of that, but that’s basically it! We need clients to know that we are experts, we can help them figure out the best course of action, we can implement it effectively and beautifully, and we’re looking to stick around for the long-term.

Maybe, using this information, I should get more feedback from others and look for better ways to phrase it all and make it cohesive.

I didn’t really identify what specific clients to work with in this meeting, but knowing what value I bring will bring me one step closer to that!

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Potential Clients Want to Feel Like You are Extremely Comfortable with Their Needs

I had a thought today that the longer it takes to get a client a proposal, the more you need from them, and the less prepared you seem, the less likely you are to get that client.

Here are some observations and pieces of evidence to support that:

  • One of the main reasons a new potential client reached out to me was because, “The company we are currently working with has spent more than four weeks putting a proposal together. It seems like they don’t really have experience in this area.”
  • Particularly for larger potential clients, they have been excited to work with me and have lost interest as time went on and I requested more resources from them. And that’s before I even sent over a proposal and price. They most likely just lost faith that we would be able to handle the project as well as a competitor.

I think it is pretty clear that making the proposal process as easy as possible for a client will make them more likely to work with you. That seems pretty obvious, and it makes lots of sense. But how to accomplish that may not be so obvious, especially with complicated projects.

The problem comes when there is ambiguity. When the client isn’t sure what they want but they want you to give them a proposal, it’s extremely difficult to give them a number.

In the past, I’ve done my best to work with them and try to narrow down what would be included and tried to quote that.

But now, I think that what I need to do instead is this:

In situations where there is a great deal of ambiguity in a given project, act as the consultant, figure out what would be best for them, and put together a proposal outlining exactly what you plan on doing even when most of what you’re proposing isn’t something you’ve talked about yet.

After writing it out, it almost seems obvious! We are the expert, we know what works, and clients are looking to us to provide these things to them. Make assumptions and suggestions as needed.

After all, why not? If they don’t like something you’ve included, they can and will ask you to change it. But if you give them nothing and instead spend tons of time trying to get them to make up their minds, you’ve lost the sale and now you’re back to square one.

Additionally, if you’re making the decisions, you can better steer them towards great solutions that will add value. If they are coming to their own conclusions, that will often not be the case.

So from now on, just do it! If you need more information, just make assumptions and state them explicitly. Just watch out for scope creep and you’ll be fine.

If you want to get in with bigger clients, you need to be the expert and not just the contractor.

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Planning for Extra Time Between Projects

A thought occurred to me today. I should be planning for extra time between projects. So for instance, if I think my next five projects are going to take two weeks each, I might add in a couple 1-week periods to my timeline where no project is planned.

Why is this?

A number of reasons! The first and most obvious is that it allows for some wiggle room if projects go past their deadlines. Currently, if one project goes over, all of the remaining ones will be delayed as well, which causes problems.

No one will be upset if a project is done early. But a project done late tends to upset people.

The other reason is because sometimes projects come up that have very strict timelines, and might require us to complete it right away. Obviously we don’t want overbearing, entitled clients who want to take advantage of us, but occasionally there are great opportunities that require immediate attention. If I have extra time between projects, I can take these on as they come up.

And sometimes it’s not even totally new projects. Occasionally I’ll have dormant clients who I’ve given proposals to show up out of nowhere wanting to act on their proposal. Sometimes, when I originally met with them and wrote the proposal, it was a time when I could take on their project right away. But perhaps now I’m booked out for months.

It’s nice to have the flexibility to be able to work with these people, and with the originally suggested timeline.

Overall, it will allow me to be much more flexible with which projects we can take on, and will also remove some stress and problems caused by getting behind schedule and having it create a domino effect.

Of course there might be downsides, but I don’t think they are even close to the benefits from doing it. Really the only thing is that when I’m writing proposals, I’ll have to tell potential clients that we wouldn’t be able to start until a further point in time. This could be enough that some of them decide not to work with me.

That’s fine, though. Realistically, the only time that would even be a big problem is if I didn’t have any projects lined up. But if I didn’t have projects lined up, there wouldn’t really be a wait, so that wouldn’t happen.

So I think it’s definitely something I should do!

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Everybody Likes to Show Strength and Hide Weaknesses

Gaming has come up before in this blog, and I find I keep learning little life lessons from my experiences in gaming.

A little background to make a point: sometimes I like to play Counter-Strike: Global Offensive in short bursts to train my aim in first-person shooters. There are maps where you can train weapons quite efficiently.

Sometimes, I’ll do this practicing in the middle of the day, when I could be working. Historically, when I’ve done this, I’ve made sure to go “offline” in Steam and Discord in an effort to hide the fact that I’m playing games in the middle of the day.

And the thought hit me… Why am I hiding it? Why don’t I want people to know?

Well, it’s because I don’t want people to see me as irresponsible and unable to stay focused on work. That would be weakness.

And then I thought… What if I reframed it, and wanted to “show off” that I have a job where I have the option of playing games in the middle of the day? Suddenly, it seems like a positive thing. In fact, it seems like the exact type of thing I see people sharing on social media all the time. If I cared about such things, I might even do it myself.

I realized that the reason for both reactions is that I want to hide my weaknesses from others and yet display my strengths. Almost universally. People might post negative things on Facebook, but they rarely reveal actual weaknesses.

Someone might post, “I’ve had a really hard year” but never, “I’ve been really irresponsible and and suffered as a result”. Because having a difficult year but sticking through it is a strength. And people love sharing that.

I’m sure there are lots of social reasons why this is the case. Social status is important, and inflating your public image improves your social status. But that’s for a social scientist to really explain.

I can’t help but think, though, that all social media and public communication is inherently dishonest as a result. You’re only ever getting half of the picture.

You see everyone’s strengths but they are hiding all of their weaknesses. This might be one of the biggest reasons social media is making people so unhappy. We already know that people see the lives of others, and can’t help but compare them with their own lives.

I feel like now I understand why that’s so damaging. You’re literally being bombarded by the best of everyone, and none of the bad. I guess in today’s day and age, you have to suffer alone, thinking you are the only one with weaknesses and actual problems.

It also makes it all the more meaningful when someone actual opens up and is honest enough to share their weaknesses. They are no longer trying to inflate their social standing in front of you.

Maybe it’s not even others that are the biggest problem. Maybe people aren’t even honest with themselves, and hide all of their own weaknesses with themselves with rationalization or even just willful ignorance or delusions.

That’s a very interesting thought to me. There are lots of repercussions of that.

Everyone not only wants to actually have high social standing, they want to feel like they have it. They want to feel like the are great, and have lots of strengths and are generally doing better than average. And for many people (half of all people, technically), that’s going to involve some self-deception.

It also can explain a lot of behavior. Like, (to bring things back to games) take cheaters in video games. Cheating in many games is rampant. To many of us, it seems completely pointless. Yeah you win, but… You cheated. You didn’t demonstrate better skill, and by all accounts, you are in fact worse.

And yet people do it. I think it’s because it still feels good. They can trick themselves into feeling the same way others do when they win fairly. They feel the same sense of accomplishment and strength that others do by actually demonstrating their strength. They are willing to completely ignore the fact that they don’t deserve it.

There are tons of areas this could address, but I think I’ll stop here for today and leave it for another post.