ProductivityTips
Latest
Productivity Tip: Synchronizing tasks for the individual
This week's Productivity Tip... As a kid I used little Day Timer notebooks to keep track of my schedules and projects. Of course my duties in high school were minimal compared to today, but those pocket-able sprial-bound notepads were great for capturing and tracking all my "stuff." In film school I met a videographer who kept track of his schedule using a PalmPilot. I loved how, for years, my PalmPilot kept perfect sync with my Mac -- provided I put it in the cradle every day and hit the Sync button. Today, we don't have that sync button. The "cloud" has removed the need for it, right? Well, that depends. Brain sync There's a famous story of Charles Schwab, at the time the president of Bethlehem Steel, who advised Ivy Lee (his generation's Covey or Allen) that he could increase Lee's team's efficiency with one simple tip. That tip was to write down the six most important things you have to do the next day before going to bed. At the end of the next day, anything still on that list went onto the next day's six things, and so on. Inspired by this, and by Federico Vittici's use of Drafts and Day One, I've started a similar ritual. Instead of one daily pass, however, I've started journaling in the morning (using Day One) and reviewing my tasks at night (using OmniFocus). You can do both of these using Drafts, in fact. Lists can be sent to Clear as tasks -- which I do if the day has only single-task items needed -- or OmniFocus, or Due, etc. The reason I call this "brain sync" is that I now have, via Day One, a running list of my personal and professional thoughts and goals every day. Coupled with a focused task list, I can reflect on where I am at any point. Making the simple list at the end of the night helps me sleep better, knowing exactly what my priorities are for the next day. Waking up and jotting down thoughts often yields solutions to problems, but also keeps a running log of what my mushy brain thinks is important contrasted with the hard reality of my task list. The goal is to align them over time, as much as possible. When to sync The Cloud: Syncs all the time, in theory. If you use iCloud, your iOS or Mac device will sync more or less seamlessly in the background at intervals regularly enough to cause few issues for an individual user. With iCloud, the system monitors a specific folder outside of the app itself, so changes made on your iPhone to, say, a Byword document, will appear on your Mac when you open up the document there. There are some issues with cloud sync, however. Depending on the mechanism, you might run into version conflicts. Services like Dropbox allow you to roll back, but iCloud really doesn't. Also, if you force quit an app while a sync is in progress and the app isn't using iCloud, you could end that sync session and wind up with problems. This is a rare one, but it's something to consider if you're the type of person who routinely "cleans up" their list of open apps on iOS. Apps: If an app is using iCloud, sync "just happens." Dropbox also has a sort of background sync, and apps that are in the process of uploading data can continue to "stay live" when closed for up to 10 minutes. Provided you don't lose your network connection, that should be ample time for Evernote and other such apps to sync their data. There are times when you will want to manually sync, however. In OmniFocus, for example, the default is to sync when opened. I also like to click the sync button if I've just gone through entering a bunch of data (after a review on my iPad, or if I've just powered through some errands). Then there are some apps which allow you to see when a sync happens, or force a sync when you wish or maybe even require you to manually initiate a sync. Again, I recommend doing this before closing the app. When I move a timer to the next day using Due, for example, I like to pull to refresh the timer so my Mac isn't sitting there chiming for a couple of minutes before sync happens. Paper: If you're using a mix of apps and paper, for best results sync at least once daily, then do a top-down check once a week to make sure everything is on track. It's sort of like reconciling your bank accounts. How to sync Cloud: I highly recommend using the sync service preferred by the application you use. iCloud is Apple's effort to push a ubiquitous sync solution in iOS. Unfortunately, as of this writing there are some serious problems with iCloud. Gus Mueller goes into the gory details, but I have hope that with WWDC looming, Apple is going to fix this. OmniFocus uses Omni's own sync service, and I have almost never had issues with it. Omni's sync is now available to other apps from the company as well, which makes for a delightful experience. Apps like Drafts and Simplenote use Simperium. There are tons of apps out there with Dropbox integration (I use Byword with Dropbox), and of course Google's products are all starting to get connected and sync up. Most of the time, all of this stuff "just works," and it works much better than it used to! Paper: How you sync if you blend paper and digital will, of course, depend upon the mix of the two. If you're lucky enough to be able to easily transcribe your paper stuff into digital stuff, you're way ahead of the game. Things like the Livescribe pen are expensive, but you can also use Evernote to scan your handwriting and do its best to find your words (it does pretty well, in fact). Personally I'm not afraid to spend some time scribbling notes in my project books or notepads, then spend about 10 minutes a day transferring what I need to OmniFocus. Perhaps the best of all worlds is this fancy Evernote Moleskine, which I haven't tried yet. What I do, now, is keep a collection of 3-ring binders. Each binder is a particular context, more or less. There's one notebook for home, comprising my DIY projects (repairs and improvements), tasks like checking on insurance and so on. There's another for work, which contains projects and plans for TUAW. Like Behance's Action Method, anything that needs to be done beyond a single-step is a project, and gets a sheet in the notebook. One sheet, that's all, for every single project I cook up. I wind up using leftover ruled paper I buy every school year for this. I use dividers, emergent task planning sheets and the like in these notebooks, but ultimately those are all for my mush-brain to write out and try to analyze. Once I have a specific path organized and ready to go, I put in the relevant project tasks into OmniFocus or my calendar (or sometimes Clear). This setup gives me the flexibility of being able to plan with sheets of paper -- and that's how my mind works best -- but digitize and distill the action steps needed to get there. Each week I sync up tasks completed and marked in my digital tools with the notebooks on the shelf, ensuring I can see progress towards the goals. Each project has a page, with a goal. Each project has a set of tasks. Those tasks go digital, then are scratched off digitally, then on paper. If reshuffling and more planning are needed, I find it's easier to manage this in paper form, with notes in margins, arrows pointing to milestones, etc. There's a benefit to me to having all of this on paper and having to double-check things. This is actually a rather new system for me, so I'll be detailing progress and usage in posts to come. For now, I wanted to give a concrete example to anyone out there with so much as a simple notepad they use to track tasks. My recommendation is that you try to sync at least once a week, and consider tools to help transcribe your notes. Conclusion We're currently enjoying the best way to sync so far right now, but cloud services have their caveats. Network problems, data collisions and more can turn sync into stink. I find myself doing more work on paper first, then transmuting it into digital forms for dispersal and action. That way I have some form of backup for my thought processes. No matter what you do, consider a "brain sync" twice a day to help keep you focused on those most important tasks, whether you keep them digitally or on paper -- and never forget to back up your critical data!
Productivity Tip: When and how to use paper vs software
One of the problems with giving people advice is that certain topics are so... personal. Our previous experiences, current technology and outside pressures inevitably corral us into a particular line of thinking or acting. So it is with the debate over paper vs. software solutions. Personally, I've found a mix of both to be handy. A quick poll of the TUAW crew indicates a similar divide: Some of us use paper almost to the exclusion of software, whereas some of us went digital once we found enough apps to deliver us from dead trees. Most of us use a blend of both, however. In this week's productivity tip, I want to discuss when you might want to use paper or an app, and some specific apps and resources for both. Paper (and whiteboards, etc.) The thing about paper is that you have to write on it. That seems simplistic, but for some that's actually a big deal. I happen to learn by doing something, and I find I remember notes better if I write them out versus typing them. The other (obvious) thing about paper is that it isn't connected to distractions like social networks and calendars, push notifications, etc.. If those are your problem, maybe switching on Do Not Disturb and sitting outside with pen and paper are a way to really focus on whatever you're trying to capture. I'm also a big fan of mind mapping, and while there are apps for this (discussed below), I have yet to replace my large format rolls of paper with an iOS device. There's something primitive and powerful about scrawling ideas and notes on a giant canvas, then seeing what patterns you can divine. Another advantage to paper is that you can hang the stuff wherever you want so things are always top-of-mind. Steve uses Post-It notes for reminders. Megan uses a Moleskine for capturing checklists -- and she correctly notes that there's something satisfying about actually drawing a line through stuff you've done. Dave has written a great post on Unclutterer about using a notebook for the ARC system. As for me, I can just do more with paper in certain ways. As this post from a time before the iPad notes, "paper is just more usable than a computer monitor." Sure, I can make annotations on a PDF, but it's not as easy in a PDF app to tear off 3 pages and line them up side-by-side to examine them. Similarly, as you can see in the image at the top of this post, I've created a simple "task board" when apps like 30/30 and OmniFocus weren't really nailing a certain workflow for me. In this case, I have a certain number of things I have to do regularly, but they can't be called a project per se, they're more like categories. I also don't have to do every one of them every day, so I pull these (I call them pommes, which is why they have little apples on them) out of an envelope each day and set them up on the board. When I complete one, I put it below the middle of the board (hence the "Done" with a down arrow). Each one of these "pommes" typically maps to a context in OmniFocus (and GTD, for that matter), and they represent the many hats I wear at TUAW. Each one is meant to be completed (more or less) in under 30 minutes. Some days I don't feel like digging into a lot of research, or maybe I just want to focus on writing. By putting them up on the board and being able to easily see them right there in front of me, I'm quickly able to see how much I've done or not done. Yes, I have tasks and projects in OmniFocus, but this allows me to structure my day around types of tasks, and greatly reduces the stress and feeling of being overwhelmed with "too much to do." I'm still working on this system, but on my most productive days it's a good way to batch my time. Some other low-tech things I do, sometimes with a high-tech twist: Use a whiteboard for mocking up web pages and quick mind mapping. Then I take a pic to save in Evernote. In my kitchen I use a whiteboard calendar so my kids can easily see the stuff that is relevant to them. Often this means writing stuff from my Google calendar on the board, but there are worse things in life -- like the stress of kids not knowing what they are walking into when they come stay with me. Use Moleskine notebooks when I travel. Often power is at a premium, and I like to travel light. Plus, during takeoff and landing I can't use my iDevices. Again, I try to capture this digitally later, either in OmniFocus, Evernote or a mind-mapping app. Big ideas beg for a big canvas. I keep very large rolls of paper and oversized sketch pads in my house so I can periodically clear the kitchen table and go to town with ideas and connecting them. Sometimes this requires stitching pics together before dumping into (you guessed it) Evernote. Cornell has a notes template here if you're in a meeting and worry about capturing things. Lastly there are times when you just can't avoid using paper. Coupons I get at the self-checkout are printed, though I wish I could add them to Passbook (if Kroger ever hops on that wagon). But when I see a poster for a show on a telephone pole, I snap a pic of it. Nothing jogs the memory like seeing that pop up in your Photo Stream. You can also use something like the iNotebook, Inkling or LiveScribe's offerings to write and capture to digital. I've only used the LiveScribe Pulse, but I find that adding complications subtracts from the organic nature of simply using paper. These also add considerable cost. Digital Obviously there are lots of limits when it comes to paper. Sharing among a distributed group is somewhat difficult. Contacts are better handled digitally when you get an email and can quickly add phone and address to your address book, or if you use a business card scanner app and text recognition. Speaking of recognition, natural language parsing has come a long way, so adding reminders and calendar events via Siri or Fantastical or Google Calendar is just so easy I will never use a paper calendar again. When I was in middle school I used FastTrack Schedule to plan projects. Now I use a combination of DevonTHINK Pro (for research materials) and OmniFocus, but there are a good number of capable project managers out there, including Merlin and OmniPlan. If I were handling larger projects, I am sure I would rely upon those heavily. Notes can absolutely have an advantage in digital form if you're busy linking things, as you can do in a wiki or software such as VoodooPad, which is excellent. There's also nvALT and a host of other note applications out there which can cross-link and insert multimedia in ways you can't replicate on paper. When it comes to capturing ideas, Doc uses Drafts and voice recognition to quickly capture items. Similarly, Siri does a great job for adding Reminders. Fancy tricks like geolocation are all but impossible on paper. The only problem with all of these: You have to know how to use them. Everyone knows how to use paper, however. Some digital tools I use that attempt to simulate or replace paper-based equivalents: SimpleMind for mind mapping (this has sync so I can access my maps on my Mac), although MindNode is good and Grafio allows a sort of scrapbooking. Passbook as much as I can for plane tickets and customer loyalty cards. Some folks in team chat mentioned Lemon Wallet as well. I just hate fumbling for a paper ticket while I wait for first class to board. Fantastical for scheduling (Mac and iOS) and BusyCal on my Mac instead of iCal. Sketch Club for sketches, although Autodesk's SketchBook is good (just overkill for my needs usually), and Paper on iPad is simply wonderful. I also use Procreate (and a Pogo Connect) when I want to make a really great drawing. Now that Penultimate is integrated with Evernote, it's hard to beat. That said, I kinda like Sketch Rolls when I don't have access to my paper at home. But when to use what? Well, this is really a personal choice. What I tell people is to try both and see what fits you best. It's hard to argue that digital contact management is a bad thing, and calendars are another one which paper doesn't do better than digital tools. When it comes to notes and creating tasks, it all depends on how much you have to share with others and your own personal style. If you are building a spaceship, you're probably going to need some pretty complex project management tools, and paper will likely reduce your efficiency. If you juggle a couple of things a day, it's really satisfying to whip out a sheet of paper or note card and start crossing off tasks through the day. I used to use the heck out of these DIY "hipster" planners, and Dave Caolo points out these awesome productivity tools you can print courtesy of David Seah. Try this: Pick one or the other for a solid week and see how it feels. If you get into the groove of reviewing your tasks in OmniFocus and you find satisfaction in clicking check boxes, there you go. If, on the other hand, you feel more accomplished writing down tasks and scratching through them, paper is your friend. Because we all work in such different ways, this sort of A/B testing is critical for determining your preferences. Hint: Use a simple to do app to prevent having to read a huge manual. Conclusion While I love gadgets and technology, we simply aren't in the Diamond Age just yet. I'd love to have an iPad which really felt like a book, but that doesn't exist yet. Yes, I'd love to save some trees, but there are times when my old monkey brain just wants to poke at a sheet of paper with a stick filled with graphite. There's still a case for paper. That said, I turn 40 this year and maybe I'm just wed to a particular workflow. In the end try out the tools and make an honest assessment of what works best for you. Let me know if you have any suggestions in the comments below!
Productivity Tip: Using specialized lists for specific use cases
It's time for this week's Productivity Tips column. While I use OmniFocus for just about everything, there are times when I prefer other task managers to handle certain things. Many productivity gurus advise against using more than one tool to list tasks, but I don't like putting short-term list items into OmniFocus. More to the point, I use specialized list tools for specialized tasks -- groceries, kid chores and the like. While you can put all of that into OmniFocus and see it only when you want to, there's something to be said for specialized tools which are tuned to a specific purpose, and may offer features not found in a more general-purpose product like OmniFocus. You can always use one task manager to rule them all, of course, but there are limitations. OmniFocus, for example, isn't where I store my recipes. If I want to create a grocery list in Sous Chef, it's a relatively easy affair. Better yet, I can plan a week's worth of meals and then make a grocery list easily from those menus. To do this in OmniFocus (or other general-purpose task managers like Remember the Milk), I have to do a lot of copy and paste work -- which sort of defeats the purpose of using these magnificent technology products, doesn't it? If I need a short list for a short period of time, I use a "punch list," which requires no contexts or setup. Sometimes an app with a narrow focus has so many great features that I can't help but use it. I've also found geofenced reminders in OmniFocus to be less useful than I'd like, but that's another story. Here are a few ideas for when to use specific task managers, and some of the ones I use. Punch Lists A punch list -- the term comes from the construction industry -- is the stuff you need to do in sequence, right now or by a specific deadline. It's often used for the "fixes" that accumulate towards the end of a project, with only a few loose ends or tweaks to finish off. For quick turnaround projects, it may be all you need. As I tend to use OmniFocus for bigger/long-term projects, I do also sometimes use it for these punch lists, but only when a series of steps will take me longer than an hour or so to complete. If I'm making a quick list to prep for my kids coming over to stay for a weekend, I use a short-term list tool (I don't always have to do the same things each time they come over). Apps: For general, short term lists I love Clear. If I have 3 or 4 things to do in a given hour, and I'm just coming up with that list on the fly, I'm likely to use Clear to quickly set those up and knock them down. Quick, short-term lists are great with Clear, which also syncs with my Mac. Wunderlist is a great solution as well, and so is Remember The Milk if you need to collaborate. There's also iOS/OS X Reminders, but I have wired most of my reminders to go to OmniFocus because I want to capture once and process later. When it comes to making lists that need to be in cold storage for a while (like Christmas wish lists), or lists of info which I need but not on a regular basis, I use Evernote. Evernote makes it easy to find lists I've made earlier, and add to those from anywhere. Kids or pets As a divorced dad, I have to keep up with a lot of info on my kids. From wish lists (often generated while we are at a store -- the old "daddy I want this!" cry) to favorite foods to blood types and other medical info, my puny brain can't keep it all. We've also started a chore chart, and I wanted to use something a bit friendlier than OmniFocus. If you have pets, there are a number of things to track and keep on top of, from vet visits to dietary needs and more. Luckily, there are a few apps for that. Apps: If you have pets, check out PetMinder, which will track all sorts of things about your pet including vet appointments and allergies. If you have those other household inhabitants known as "human children" I have been loving iAllowance for their chores. iAllowance allows me to use Dave Ramsey's system for saving, spending and giving, and handles all the math and checklists for me. I can even sync with my iOS devices, so I put the iPad on a table and as kids finish items they come and mark them off. Travel Do you really want all those shops, restaurants and tourist sites in your task manager along with all your work stuff? Aren't you supposed to be on vacation? Just like how I use Firefox for work stuff (well, and Chrome) and Safari and Opera for personal browsing, I like to keep my vacation info and work info very separate. A great example of a punch list, too, is your typical packing list. Again, you could keep a list of potential packing items in your task manager, but that could add hundreds of items that you may only need once in a while. I find packing lists are an easy win when testing list apps, not to mention there are some great special-purpose apps for this. Apps: Travel apps could be an entire month's worth of posts, so all I'll say here is that if you frequently travel for leisure you'll want to look into the "to do" aspects of Foursquare and Yelp. By creating accounts and using the app's bookmarking features as your wish list of stuff to do, you can quickly get directions and reviews in the app, saving you time. If you want a packing list, PackingPro is one of the best, and Stow features a clever Q&A method for using templates. If you're collaborating on a list with your partner or spouse, Avocado's one-to-one messaging includes a flexible list feature as well -- good for those last-minute pretrip items. Food There are some outstanding apps for wine and beer out there. To replicate those databases elsewhere would be onerous at best. So if you're a fan of touring wine country and want a list of wines to check out, you're more likely to use one of these special purpose apps here. Everyday cooking and food shopping are greatly enhanced when using one of the dozens of great cooking apps available. I am still in the process of finding my favorite, but most of them offer features out of the box that would be a pain to replicate in a general "to do" app. Apps: When it comes to food, I use Sous Chef or Groceries. If I haven't planned my meals, Groceries has a nice interface and makes it super easy to add items (even those not in its database). Sous Chef is my go-to for meal planning and recipe-keeping. Fitness Along with food, there are some great fitness apps out there with lists of exercises or tools to track your weight, food, etc. Apps: I don't actually use a lot of fitness apps, but I have used 30/30 to create a workout routine and it's great. 30/30 can also be used for daily routines, and I love the interface and experience. I used Lift for a while, and if you're trying to get into a habit of doing something, it's quite good. My only problem with Lift was that the entire interface was completely dependent on a network connection. Given AT&T's coverage where I live (and in many cities where the networks are clogged), I found that the simple act of loading the basic interface would sometimes fail -- which isn't very encouraging. That said, there are lots of options here for goal-setting apps, and they are all essentially list tools. DIY There are a number of awesome apps available to help you plan construction projects or minor repairs at your house. Like a food app, these take a project and break it into a parts list -- again something which you'd have to copy over to another tool. Along with DIY home projects, anything involving crafting, knitting, sewing, etc. will result in a specialized list. Do you need that list of yarn for that one project forever archived in your task manager? Probably not. Apps: DIY is another huge topic, but as an example of specialized apps, I like to point to My Measures and Woodcraft. My Measures will create a list of dimensions for a room and its fixtures. Woodcraft will create a list of wood you need for a given project. Both are quite excellent, and getting that data into another app is onerous and not that useful. I'm sure there are similar apps for sewing and other crafty stuff. Daily Routines, Location-Based Reminders While OmniFocus is pretty good at most things, I have resisted using it for daily repeating actions. For one thing, I keep running into a repeating item that starts multiplying itself over time (no, I don't need to balance my checkbook 4 times a day!). Also, there are tools out there which are more aimed at motivation (like the goal-setting apps mentioned in the fitness section) vs. plowing through a set of tasks. If you are self-motivated a one-size-fits-all approach might work for you. If not, check out some recommendations below. Lastly, OmniFocus does have a pretty good location system but I found it a bit onerous to use (espeically on the desktop) and annoying in daily use. No, I don't need to be reminded to fix something every single time I pull into my driveway. But I do need to be reminded to put out the trash when I arrive home on Wednesday mornings. For this, I use Siri and it's the easiest method I've found so far. "Remind me when I get home to..." just sounds like the future, doesn't it? Apps: For daily routine stuff I do wind up using my squishy brain for a lot -- but I also have a variable schedule. If I have a set of routines for a day, I hop into 30/30, where I have a list. I also use Due to remind me about repeating items. Due is very insistent, but makes it easy to move an item to another day, plus it sync with my Mac. Conclusion I do not use a separate app for inboxing items. I do believe that this is important, because the more complexity in your task management, the less likely you're going to get things done. I still use OmniFocus+Siri to capture stuff. In rare cases I use Clear to make a quick list, but that list is very quickly sorted and knocked out, eliminating the need for messing around in OmniFocus for those tasks. Similarly, if you find yourself needing one-off or specialized lists, consider looking at a specialized tool. While OmniFocus and other power tools can be bent to your will, sometimes an app offers features you would have to spend a lot of time replicating elsewhere. And that's what this is all about, really: Getting things done and saving you time. Isn't that what technology should be doing? Shout out your favorite special-purpose apps in the comments below and we here at TUAW will try to review any we haven't looked at before.
Productivity Tip: Take a break
In the past couple of installments of TUAW's productivity tips, I've discussed a number of ways to keep you focused on your tasks. Managing those tasks will be the next big-picture topic, but this week I wanted to keep it short and simple, just like your breaks should be. Yes, you should take breaks, especially if you are a knowledge worker and/or you have to focus on tasks which require a great deal of problem solving. There's a lot of evidence that shows our brains need frequent rest in order to function at their best, so don't skimp on the breaks even if you are worried about a deadline. Why is this important? Aside from how you should really be taking a vacation, your brain can suffer from decision fatigue. While you're busy processing your inbox or responding to emails, your brain is getting quite the electro-chemical workout. As with any of our organs, after a while it tires out. Just like a physical workout, you should allow for a cool-down period to let your brain rejeuvinate itself. At AOL we're quite fond of naps, too. Timing breaks As I discussed in my article on timers, you should aim to take a quick break after a period of intense focus. Pomodoros are set up for this purpose, giving you 25 minutes of task time plus a five-minute break. I've read of 90-minute work sessions followed by a 30-minute break time (which allows time for a walk or run or yoga), but ultimately you'll have to experiment and see what works for you as a person and in your job. I like to take frequent breaks. The key to timing your breaks is definitely scheduling them around those periods of intensity. Again, your brain gets worn out after too many decisions in a fixed amount of time -- let that thing cool off! The time of your break should be somewhat proportional to the period of intensity, however. Five minutes after 25 makes sense, as does 30 after 90. Taking an hour nap after 20 minutes of email is a bit much, however. Types of breaks Now, do you need to rest or do you need to re-energize? One allows things to cool down, while the other is more like a warm up. Often we just need to rest our eyes, or just stretch to shake off the tightness of sitting for too long. For short breaks I tend to make sure I have a bottle of water, then go gaze out a window for a few minutes. Or, since I work at home, I'll go spend a few minutes washing dishes (a very peaceful activity, honestly). These short breaks help refocus you later, and serve as a brief cool-down for your brain. Be careful not to overdo it; tidying your desk or going to the break room might seem like a quick rest, yet you're still making all sorts of decisions, leading again to decision fatigue. A better short break fully disengages your brain for a bit. Staring is actually good. Stretching is even better, and there are lots of exercises you can do, even in a cubicle. The more you allow your body to work, the better it will be able to assist your brain. Anything that literally "takes your mind off of things" is good, which means social media checking is likely bad as you're likely to see things which make you angry as well as happy on any given day. Naps are excellent, but most people don't use them correctly. Here's a great primer, and here are some tips from the Mayo clinic. I have found that a 25-minute or less nap has made me feel more energized in the afternoons if I am not already sleep deprived. If I haven't had enough sleep that day already, I tend to get a headache later and feel sleepier. That said, naps can be very effective when done properly. I have found a short walk or run, or even time with a Kinect game, helps the afternoon doldrums significantly. A few jumping jacks or standing on your head can also get the blood flowing. Apps to help For simple breaks, I like to use Due's timers and have set a 5, 10, and 15 minute timer as default break times. Siri can do this in a pinch as well. For naps I use Naturespace (which has a timer), or Pzizz, a longtime Mac app which was ported to iOS some time ago. Pzizz is, in my opinion, the best napping app; it guides you into a restful state much like hypnosis, can be set for various times, and can be configured in numerous ways while still using a set of sounds and tones which help lull you to rest. Other TUAWers enthusiastically recommend Andrew Johnson's apps and audiofiles for guided rest periods. Meditation is a good rest plan, and we've already mentioned a few apps for this. I'm currently using Mind, which is as simple a meditation timer as you're likely to find. There are also a number of exercise apps on the store, including some niche products like Healthy Break, which adds simple stretches to a break timer. I haven't had much success with these, as I tend to look up things online, learn them, and have a few I do over and over again. It's best to discuss your options with your doctor or trainer (if you're lucky enough to have a trainer). Conclusion While you can push through a day with no breaks, you will wind up making worse decisions as time wears on, and as those decisions wear you out. As your productivity and quality of work decrease, you become less efficient. The best way to combat this: get plenty of rest to begin with, and allow yourself breaks through the day. By setting timers for breaks and having a collection of short activities to break to, you'll set yourself up to stay productive longer than before, with better results.
Productivity Tip: Focus time
In order to stay productive, you must accomplish tasks. Unfortunately, as communications have sped up and become omnipresent, our focus has been sliced and diced to the paper-thin setting. How many times a day does a calendar invite, Facebook update, email or Tweet send you off your task and down a rabbit hole? Remember when your car didn't have a phone, web browser and fart app in it? In this productivity tip I argue for a cone of silence and a focus on really doing -- by focusing. The timer As I mentioned last week, you should set a timer for each task on your to do list. I like 20-25 minutes, but I also acknowledge that there are tasks which might take more time. Just remember that your brain does get fatigued, which is why Pomodoros are set to 25 minutes each. The cone Hey, see that Do Not Disturb button on your iPhone's Settings? Activate that when you are going "periscope down." I'm not a huge fan of Apple's VIP email, so I tend to not use it to alert me to new emails from certain people. I'll handle email in some posts down the road; it's a huge topic in itself. If you're on your Mac, did you know you can quickly turn off notifications from Notification Center? If you option-click a Notification Center icon in your menu bar, it will toggle on / off those pop-ups which may distract more than help. Oh, and if you're worried about missing an appointment, here's how to avoid that anxiety: Set your timer to end with plenty of time before your next appointment. It seems simple, but if you are carving out actual focus time, you should first look at your calendar and ensure you have plenty of time. A quick glance to remind you about that meeting at 4 PM will allow you to set your timer at 3:30 for 20 minutes, giving you plenty of time to pick up and head down to the conference room. (Like email, calendar management is something we'll handle later; it's a huge topic.) If you've shut down your iDevices from making noise and distracting you, and you've got notifications under control on your Mac, it's time to focus. The workspace Without getting too far afield of TUAW's main beat, I'll just say that a clean workspace, proper lighting and a healthy body will aid your focus time immensely. But what about music? What about full-screen apps? What about a program that locks you out of social networks for a specific amount of time? Music I personally don't recommend music if you really need to focus. Sound, on the other hand, can help you focus. An app like Naturespace not only tunes out distractions by providing a seamless, repeating audio landscape, but can also help keep your mind and body calm by simulating the outdoors. I listen to music when checking email or doing reviews, but when I have to focus on numbers or edit words, I find a simple audioscape blends into the background, helping my focus without a melodic hook to distract me. Full-screen apps Full-screen apps are all the rage since Apple started featuring them in Lion, but will they help you focus? In my opinion they will, if you let them. An application running in full-screen mode will obscure that funny desktop picture, and obliterates any dock alerts or menu items. So if you find those keep nagging at your mind, use full-screen mode. Still, it's easy enough to Cmd-Tab to another app and get distracted, so I'm not convinced this alone will enhance your focus time. Social networks Better still, particularly if you have Facebook on speed dial, is an application which will (virtually) smack your hand when you access your social sites -- or cut off access altogether, if you're incorrigible. If you are constantly wondering what George Takei is posting, or how many likes, favorites or retweets that clever thing you posted 30 minutes ago received, you may need something to force you to ignore the big social world out there for a while. Since I do research online, I can't fall back to the old "turn off the internet" trick. Instead, I rely on apps to help center my attention -- and working at home introduces a whole raft of distractions we'll cover another time. There's a good roundup of "focus" apps here at Mac.AppStorm, but I want to point out two that can really help: Anti-social and Houdini. Houdini will automatically hide applications after a set amount of time, and it's free. If you combine this with an app like Backdrop, which will hide your cluttered desktop (well, mine gets bad after a day's work but yet again this is a topic for another day), you'll soon find you have drifted into a focus zone. That's because whatever you're working on is the only visible application and desktop distractions are minimized. If you routinely have more than six applications open on your Mac at a time, this can be a timesaver versus going through each one and hiding the app (Cmd-H). My favorite app for focus, besides my timer, is Anti-Social. It costs $15, but if you find yourself instinctively reaching for Twitter or Facebook in your browser everytime a pithy phrase pops into your head, Anti-Social will force you to stay focused. The application will block the social sites you specify for a set amount of time. If you want to tweet before the time limit (which you set) expires, you'll have to reboot your Mac! Of course, you could always use your phone, but let's pretend you're putting that away during focus time. Easy does it To prevent procrastination and ensure you're making time to focus, schedule time on your calendar. Turn off notifications. Turn on social blockers or enable a timer and stick with it. The simpler you make your cone of silence, the more likely you are to ensconce yourself in it at least once a day. While there are times for multi-tasking, there are many more times where it behooves you to carve out focus time and stick with it. I believe that you'll find you get more done in less time if you stick with one task at a time. As for task management, guess what? Yep, that's what we'll handle in an upcoming post.
Productivity Tip: Time for timers
Every day you have the same 24 hours as the rest of us to get what is likely a crushing amount of work done and out of your way so you can spend some time relaxing. Or, as one author has framed it, you have 168 hours in a week to accomplish what you want and move forward toward your goals. How do some people manage this while others are constantly rushing around late to everything? I was certainly guilty of this until I started minding my time in small chunks. Here are some ways to get those tactical moments -- the day-to-day stuff -- managed and under your control. What are you doing? At any given time, what are you doing? Probably the most significant thing you aren't doing is being mindful of the time you are spending on tasks. While the Pomodoro technique might not be for everyone, simply setting a timer to keep track of how long you're working on a given task is absolutely vital. At the end of the day you will have a better idea of where your time went, and by not getting bogged down in one or two things during the day, you'll find you can better cope with the myriad items you happen to be juggling. Think about it like this: How many times have you become engrossed in your work so much that you "lost track of time?" While being in a state of flow and working on something for a long stretch can be beneficial, over time you'll find that you tire easily and get "burnt out" after too many of these marathons sessions. You'll also find smaller stuff starts slipping through the cracks. Brain scientists and productivity experts agree that there are good reasons to break up marathon work sessions into smaller chunks. This is to avoid fatigue, primarily, but also so that you are making sure you get to all the stuff you have to do in a day, not just the one thing you're communing with that morning. Mindfulness Guess what? There's an app that ships with every iOS device currently made which will help you be mindful of your time on tasks. The Clock app has both a stopwatch and a countdown timer. If you use Siri, you can easily set a timer just by telling your iDevice for how long. But of course, there are dozens of timer and productivity apps on the store to help you out. First I'm going to explain what you should be doing, then I'll list some apps to help you out. Mindfulness has a specific meaning for Buddhists, but I'm really referring to the awareness aspect. By becoming more aware of how quickly time passes while our minds are engaged in a task, we can start to feel more in control of our daily tasks. Even emergencies (which I'll handle in a moment) won't throw our life into disarray if we have the knowledge of how our time flows at any moment. I cannot stress enough how important it is to be mindful of your time, and this doesn't mean checking the clock every hour or setting a chime. Being mindful of your time means you are setting the rules, you are taking control and you are paying attention. In the book 168 Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think by Laura Vanderkam, one of her first suggestions is making a log of your time for an entire week. Everything, from brushing your teeth to making your bed to your commute and break times should be logged. While it sounds onerous, logging everything you do in a week is much like a very thorough physical exam. In this case you are getting an x-ray into your life. By seeing how much time you spend in the morning making espresso, you can determine whether that time is well-spent. A lot of what we do is wasted time, maybe because we're not familiar with a tool we use or maybe because we're still doing things manually when they could be automated. In any case, a complete time log is the first step to awareness and will lay bare which parts of your day are being spent doing wasteful things. Note that I'm not referring to recreation time, which I feel (like family time if you have kids) is a necessary thing. So is sleep, although I have yet to accomplish 8 hours a day of sleep as Vanderkam claims is possible! Once you see what you are doing and how long it takes you, it's time to start forcing yourself to be more mindful of your time. If you are the shortcut type, you may skip to this next part without a week's worth of data... Set a timer After you are done reading this article try an experiment. If you don't already time your tasks or use a countdown timer, try this: Choose a task to tackle next, something that's part of a project but not something you know will just take a couple of minutes, then set a timer for 20 minutes and see how far you get towards finishing that task. Pomodoros are 25 minutes, and then it is recommended to take a 5 minute break. Personally I like to go in 20 minute sprints, then take 10 minutes to read, make coffee or a snack, or just get up and walk. I find, since I work at home, that 10 minutes is enough time to handle light chores in-between work tasks. So that's it! Set a timer for 20 minutes, then get to work and do not look at the timer. If you were really engrossed in your work, that 20 minutes didn't exactly crawl by, did it? It never does. If you were bored, you likely kept wanting to look up to see how much time you had left. This is how time escapes us, as the perception of time is fluid in our brains. Once you begin to time yourself, you begin to really manage what you are doing, and time becomes just a metric for focus. The joy for me comes in knowing that, in an hour, I can likely work on two tasks (possibly to completion) and get a couple of chores done. Now multiply that by 8 (not that any of us works a mere 8 hours a day) and all of a sudden you are making steps towards completing all sorts of larger goals by forcing yourself to march to a drumbeat of small time chunks. If you pace yourself, you can go anywhere with this, just like a march in real life. Don't forget to budget time to be social, however. Emergencies and schedules What about emergencies? I have tried a regimented schedule, and frankly, it isn't for me. I'm not the guy who gets up at 6am every day, refreshed and ready to start another day carefully portioned out in hour-long blocks. For one thing, my life is messy. For another thing, the news business isn't really conducive to careful planning of one's day. Instead, I needed a way to handle the numerous emergencies at work and in life with my larger schedule and long-term goals. Here's how. First, you have to have goals. We'll cover this in another post, but for now let's just say it's impossible to know where you're going if you don't have a destination. All of your tasks are just steps toward that finish line. Next, you have to have priorities for those goals. As I said last time, I use OmniFocus to help me sort through all the things I have to do to determine, based on priority and time, what I need to do next. Only when you know what has to get done can you plan to do it. Yes, that sounds simplistic, but I find that a couple of times a year most of us could benefit from a housecleaning of our tasks and goals, otherwise we find ourselves swimming upstream with a constant torrent of downstream asks which can overwhelm us. If you know what you have to do each day (again, something we'll work on in future posts), handling emergencies actually becomes a lot easier. Yes, you will have to shift things around. No, you will not have to freak out about it. The secret is simple: Be mindful of your time. Also give yourself a break every so often. As an example, let's say you are going through email in a 20-25 minute block. You've set a timer, you dive in, and about 5 minutes into the task you see an email from your boss with the ominous, all-caps subject URGENT: RESPONSE REQUIRED. Knowing you have to respond to this, you open the email (still part of your "check email task") and read it. It takes another 5 minutes or so to read the email and scratch down a quick list of what needs to be done. As you look at the list of 3 things needed, you can break down what is needed to accomplish this emergency goal -- or not! If it's a report "due tomorrow without fail" you can probably finish your email session and then get to work. If it's due by the end of the day, it's time to reset that timer, take 5 minutes to clear your head and then restart the timer and get back to work! Again, if this is an emergency then everything else is on hold. By keeping at it in small, 20-25 minute sprints toward the finish broken up by short breaks, you can stay focused. You might even throw in a 20-minute "do something else" task if you start getting tunnel vision. The brain can only take so much, depending on your age, etc. Above all, don't panic. Know that like a brick mason laying brick by brick, over time your tasks will build towards the goal. Unless you are really terrible at what you do, you'll get there. Over time you'll learn to see how your pace is affected by longer sprints. At the end of the day you'll find you can say "I spend X hours on this" and you will feel good about the fact that you put the time in. If you didn't get that emergency handled, you'll probably know why that happened, too. It wasn't because you weren't focusing on what needed to be done! The other thing about emergencies is that we have to push other stuff we had hoped to accomplish in a given day back, which leads to stress. By knowing you can only spend so much time per day doing something, you'll feel less stressed knowing those time blocks will be there tomorrow, and whatever derailed your plans for today can hopefully be cleaned up for a fresh attempt in the morning. As for schedules, we'll talk more about them in another post, but for now it's important that you stop thinking about your day in terms of appointments, and think more about what you're trying to accomplish every day. Do your best to minimize distractions on your calendar, as in your life. Timers help you focus, as long as you don't get distracted during those times. Apps that can help I've tried a number of timer apps but have settled into only using a few. As you can imagine, too many choices means you'll just trip up on what to use, and when. So I keep it simple, but I'm mentioning a few apps I think may be interesting to some of you, since you're not all as loose with a daily schedule as I am. On iOS: Clock Well, this is free and from Apple and you have no excuse not to use the Timer function starting today. While Apple's Clock is a no-frills affair, you can set your own alert sound and the timer is Siri-enabled, if you're into that sort of thing. Untime I love this timer app for a number of reasons. It's free, it's fast and it looks cool. Not only that, the dots on the screen are like sands in an hourglass, showing you at a glance how much time you have remaining without numbers (until the last 10 seconds, when a countdown appears). I love that the numbers go away, so your brain only sees how "much" time you have remaining. The alarm is pretty great as well, and the whole app reminds me of something Tron might use. Untime is simple, elegant and cool -- just how I like my apps. Due My favorite across platforms, Due has been covered before. iCloud sync is a huge time saver when setting up task timers, however. And yes, I set multiple timers because a task of playing with Legos on the weekend with my kids takes longer than an email sweep -- this is called keeping your life balanced! 30/30 This might not be for everyone, but if you have a number of items to accomplish in a day that you do often, 30/30 is a very nicely designed app that helps you structure the order of those tasks and set timers to help you keep on target. I feel like 30/30 could benefit from a better ability to reset those lists, but on those days when I need a little more structure, 30/30 does an amazing job of helping me power through a hectic schedule. Timer Aptly named, Timer from App Cubby offers 12 slots for preset timers. I find something like this very handy if you have a number of timed things you need to do in a day. For example, I try to get in 40 minutes of cardio twice a day, so having that as a simple button makes it easy. I have a basic Pomodoro, a "sprint" of 20 minutes and a 5-minute timer all pre-set in Timer for when my day is fluid, but I still have some regimen to adhere to. App Cubby's apps are always beautifully designed, as well. (There are lots and lots of Pomodoro apps, so feel free to share your personal recommendations in the comments below.) On Mac: Due Again, since Due has a Mac version, setting timers and getting alerts doesn't get much easier, and again iCloud makes your efforts portable. ApiMac Timer If you're ready to get fancier, ApiMac's Timer is a power user's dream timer. While the free version is great, the pro version allows the app to do all sorts of awesome things like run AppleScripts, send email logs and can even put your Mac to sleep. Timebar Timebar is a minimalist's dream. It sits in the menu bar, allowing easy access to set a timer. Better yet, it shows a progress bar in the menu bar itself, and as the menu bar "drains" you have a good idea of how much time you have left on a task. For me, this only enhances my stress if I'm under pressure. For others, this might be a way to gamify certain tasks that you hope to do faster. But it's cheap, efficient and effective and offers a snooze button when you need more time. Howler Our own Kelly Hodgkins recommends this one, and if you use Growl, Howler can hook into it. Howler offers a lot of features you might not need, but if you find a basic timer isn't cutting it, or you need to loop or chain timers (perhaps you have a series of tasks which rely upon a sequence), check it out. There's also an iOS version. Wrapping up Even if you do nothing else to make your life more productive, the simple act of being aware of your time spent can have a profound impact in your happiness. When I discovered how much time I had spent mucking about in email, I began training to help change that behavior (and yes, we will cover email in another series of posts). As a result, I got about an extra hour of work time in each day without having to stay later than usual. If you feel frustrated that you can't get things done, start logging what you do and how long it takes, then start breaking up your day into manageable timed chunks no more than 30 minutes at a time. Within weeks you'll find that you feel happier and more in control than ever, and you'll know where you can improve. Don't worry about fancy tools or tricks, just keep a timer going, pause for breaks, then get back to it. Unless you are Sisyphus you will find that eventually you've rolled that boulder up that hill.
Productivity Tip: Read the manual, or take a class
There was a time when Mac owners scoffed at their PC-loving counterparts, who had to pore over paper manuals to grok the essentials of a software program before they tried to use it. When graphical user interfaces were introduced, a lot of focus was on making software intuitive and easy to use. There were also hardware constraints -- not much CPU power or memory, minimal storage, low-resolution displays -- that forced applications to be simple by design. Modern applications, whether on the desktop or on mobile, have a lot more room to maneuver, and consequently may arrive with a much steeper learning curve While your average iOS app may seem simple enough, quite often there are bells and whistles you might not know about. iPad apps may use the increased screen real estate to add more (and more obscure) options, and Mac or web applications can be far more complex than anything available on mobile platforms. While it might seem like cheap advice to "read the manual," I find very few people actually do. There's an entire industry built around learning software tools, like the Take Control series, which I find immensely helpful. Granted, most software manuals are written in plodding, feature by feature style and not as entertaining "here's how you solve this problem" books, but even that dry documentation can be vital to your efficacy when using the software. When I started using iBank, shortly after its debut, I was lured in by its accessible design. "This seems simple enough," I said as I started entering transactions. Over time it became apparent that I had barely scratched the surface of iBank's functionality. I eventually gave up on the program -- only to return over a year later, armed with more clues. This time I read the manual, in no small part because almost every question I looked up on the IGG Software Knowledgebase had an answer in the manual. Another example: Productivity software. While applications like Things are simple enough, there's often a lot of functionality hidden in the manual. You may not understand how to tap into these features if you're just reading "This does that" in the documentation. This is where additional help may be required. In my case, for task management I use OmniFocus (after trying every other "to do" application under the sun). OmniFocus isn't a simple list maker; it is a powerful database which can help you sort through mountains of tasks to allow you to focus on what exactly needs to be done next. You could likely spend days reading the manual and still come away with the "what now?" feeling. You could buy a book, but sometimes books on niche products turn out more like dry manuals. There's another answer, however. For deeper, more powerful applications, I recommend paying for additional learning materials. I bought an excellent book on DEVONThink Pro from Take Control and I no longer feel overwhelmed by the powerful software. For OmniFocus, I knew I needed to use it better, so I upped the ante and bought into the Asian Efficiency series of posts on using OmniFocus. Take Control books are great, but (for me) sometimes the low cost can cause a lack of motivation. Asian Efficiency is more like an online course, and the cost is much higher than just a book. It's a powerful motivator to know you're wasting more than an evening of poker's amount of money with a course if you ignore it. This goes double for any app that's crucial to your business workflow; if you're earning your rent with Adobe's CS suite, don't stint on the training or courseware as you move from CS 5 to CS6. The hour you save searching for that missing dialog box or hidden feature might be billable. We're starting to see some really amazing ebooks arrive on the iBookstore, too. These leverage all the multimedia functions in iBooks and if you're a visual learner, they can be vastly more effective than reading text alone. A great example is Markdown by David Sparks and Eddie Smith (our review here). By using video and audio in addition to text, there's almost no chance you'll walk away scratching your head. The downside is these media-enabled iBooks will quickly fill up your iPad's storage. I also recommend going to focused conferences, or events like Macworld/iWorld, where there are sessions aplenty on various software packages and workflows (several TUAW folks have given talks at Macworld). Often these give you a bigger picture and show you how to integrate multiple tools into a consistent workflow. You'll also have the opportunity to ask questions of speakers and attendees, and this can often be the most helpful thing of all as you share tips and tricks and learn what matters most to you. Finally, don't be afraid to seek out a guru who knows the app backwards and forwards. Many app experts share their tips and training suggestions on Twitter, Facebook or Google Plus, or on application-specific forums hosted by the developer or third-parties. Be polite, show that you've done your legwork first (if the question could have been answered by a fifteen-second scan of the manual, it's not a good use of your time or the guru's wisdom), and you might be able to draw on some help from above. This is the first in a series of weekly productivity tips here on TUAW. If you have any of your own, send them in via our feedback page.
