Productivity | Kontrary by Rebecca Thorman – Careers, Business, and Life Advice

Are Meetings Passé?

by Rebecca Thorman on August 2329 Comments

Meetings are a dying breed of face-to-face engagement that have taken on more angst, agony and abuse in recent years than even the lowly cubicle.

“There’s nothing more toxic to productivity than a meeting,” Jason Fried argues, author of the best-selling book, Rework, “They break your work day into small, incoherent pieces that disrupt your natural workflow. They often contain at least one moron that inevitably gets his turn to waste everyone’s time with nonsense… The goal is to avoid meetings. Every minute you avoid spending in a meeting is a minute you can get real work done instead.”

Did you get that?

Re-Thinking Workaholism

by Rebecca Thorman on March 2342 Comments

Productivity Work/life balance Workplace Get the free newsletter: sign up

“Work is the only thing which makes life endurable to me,” Charles Darwin wrote, later remarking that work was his “sole enjoyment in life.” Darwin’s work allowed him to withdraw from the world to concentrate entirely on his genius.

Burying yourself in work is so ingrained and glorified in our culture to survive, that nowhere is safe, even the previously safe haunts of creativity where the tradition of daydreaming and an idle nature were once protected rights. Such inefficiencies are now subject to intense bright-lights examination.

One ad agency describes the process they went through to obtain ISO 5000, a certification previously reserved only for factory lines and manufacturing.

Purge first. Creativity second.

by Rebecca Thorman on November 1920 Comments

Creativity Productivity Self-management Get the free newsletter: sign up

For creativity, you need to get rid of the crap. Your surroundings are a reflection of who you are, and the state of your environment is a reflection of the state of your mind.

I work best when everything is in its proper place. At this point, I should make a disclaimer. Everyone works differently. You might work well in crap. I cannot. The piles and dust and general disorder weigh on my mind. Like a big stinky dump truck with tin cans tied to the bumper that clang against the sides of my brain. No, I do not work well with disorder.