5 Non-Obvious Things That Are Killing Your Productivity
Hey, what is goin' on, guys.
So, on this channel, we have covered
lots of not-so-subtle and pretty obvious
productivity flaws that a lot of us are guilty of having.
Things like constantly getting distracted
multitasking, all that kind of stuff,
but today, I wanna talk about five things
that you may be doing that are subtly
and secretly killing your productivity
just as surely as all those obvious things.
An alternate title for this video,
to be quite honest, could be Five Things
That I Am Doing That are Killing My Productivity,
because this is sort-of a video we sat down
and wrote to me and a couple of good friends,
and I just kind-of asked them, like, "What do I do
"that makes me a less productive person?"
And the first thing we're gonna talk about
here is probably my number one flaw
when it comes to my professional life,
which is perfectionism, I constantly overthink
things and I have this tendency to wanna tweak
things again, and again, and again,
and if this went unchecked and I was allowed
to do this, I would probably never actually
publish anything, and actually, for a really long time,
about five years ago, my business stagnated
for about a year and a half, and part of the reason
for this was that I didn't have myself
on a strict publishing schedule, so I would allow
myself to just kind-of tinker for months
on one project without actually getting it out.
And then, around August of 2014,
right around the time I actually started doing
YouTube, I put myself on a strict publishing schedule.
I told myself, "I am going to put out one podcast
"episode, one video, and one blog post
"every single week, regardless of whether or not
"they are perfect," and as a result,
my business actually started to grow.
And another huge benefit to doing this
was that after I published 10 or 20 videos,
none of which were perfect, but all of which
were actually published in a timely manner,
I started to realize that my view
of perfection was something that I
could have never attained at the start.
And this whole idea of doing a lot of work
to gain skills over time, through learning
and through mistakes, is reminiscent of a story
in the book "Art and Fear," about a ceramics
teacher who divided his class in two.
One half of the class was told that they would
be graded on the quality of a single pot,
while the other half of the class was told
that they would be graded on the quantity
of pots that they created by weight.
And something interesting happened at the end of that class.
All of the objectively best pots that came out
of the class were created by the quantity
group and not the quality group.
See, while the people in the quality group
spent so much time theorizing about what would
make the perfect pot, all the people in the quantity
group spent time actually making pots,
and through making mistakes over time,
they got better than the quality group
could have ever hoped to get through pure theory alone.
So, if you're like me, if you struggle with perfectionism
in your work, then put yourself on a schedule.
Give your projects deadlines where you
have to put them out into the world
or put them away and move onto the next one.
Alright, so the next bit of dirty laundry
that I'm gonna air out here is what I like
to call organizational sludge.
These are the tasks in your task management system
that haven't gotten done, that have been overdue
for two weeks, they're the stuff that's been
laying on your desk or in your inbox for weeks
that you haven't processed yet.
Basically, over time, any organizational system
or area in which you do your work is gonna get
a little bit messy, just bit-by-bit,
until it starts to sap your efficiency.
It's kind-of like that story of the frog sitting
in slowly boiling water, which, actually, is that true?
(upbeat music)
(keyboard clicking)
Okay, it's definitely not true,
but the metaphor still holds.
In this story, the frog is basically a-okay with the water
as it gets hotter, and hotter, and hotter until it dies,
and it's the same with your organizational systems.
You don't realize that things are getting kind-of crusty
over time until you start really losing efficiency.
So, what I like to do is have an organizational day
every single week where I look at my systems,
I look at my task management system,
I look at my calendar, I look at my room,
my inbox, my backpack, and I ask myself,
"How can I reset this back to a usable state?"
Alright, item number three on my list
is taking inspiration from too many sources,
either online, or authors, or whatever it may be.
And this is something I really struggle with.
So, for example, on of the people I love
following on Instagram and YouTube, and in many
other places, actually, is Gary Vaynerchuk.
I take a lot of inspiration from him
and I really look up to him as a creator.
But at the same time, I also really like people
like Peter McKinnon, and Liza Koshy,
and Cal Newport, people who put a lot of time
and artistic energy into singular pieces
of work that take a really long time to produce.
So, I'm admiring these people over here
and I'm striving to be like them, but on the other hand,
I've got Gary telling me I need to put out
more content, content every single day.
Put stuff on Instagram, and Snapchat, and Musical.ly,
and YouTube, and I can't do both, and that's the problem.
I'm following all these people online
and I feel like I can be like all of them,
but when I step back and I really think about it,
Gary Vaynerchuk is very successful,
Liza Koshy, very successful,
Cal Newport, very successful,
but Gary Vaynerchuk does not have the life of Cal Newport.
He's not doing new and original research
into computer science, and by the same token,
Cal Newport is not spending his time
making incredibly polished comedy videos.
He's teaching students, he's writing books,
and he's doing research, and he's definitely
not building a Snapchat empire.
So, at the end of the day, I need to realize
that I could really only be great at one,
or at most, a very small group of things.
I can't be just as good at everything
as all the people I'm following online are,
because they've kind-of chosen their lanes
and they're staying in them, and I kind-of
have to do the same if I wanna keep doing really good work.
And before we move on to the next item,
I do really wanna mention that another
very related point here is that it's very easy
to try to please everyone, and when you're trying
to please too many people, people who have
lots of different desires, you're gonna spread
yourself too thin, just as you would
if you were trying to follow too many influences.
So, whatever the kind of work you're doing is,
remember that at the end of the day,
you are the ultimate authority
as to the direction that it should go in.
Alright, item number four on our list
is believing that you are the exception to the rule.
What is the rule?
Well, the rule might be you need to sleep
seven hours a night, or you need to close all
of your tabs, and slack, and your instant messenger
when you're writing a paper on your computer.
Or, like we just talked about in the previous tip,
that you can't be just as great as all
the diverse online influences that you follow.
And again, this is a huge problem for me.
I run a self-development channel, and I constantly
tell people that you have to focus, that you can
only be great if you have a few objects
that you're pursuing, and yet, I constantly
tell myself, or at least, like, there's this little
part of my brain that constantly tells me,
"Yeah, but you're the exception.
"You can do all those things, as long as you
"figure out the most efficient learning
"techniques out there, you can do them
"because you're good enough."
And that's not true, that's just self-dellusion.
That's just me fantasizing and trying
to turn it to reality, and that's a fruitless pursuit.
So, whether it's my particular problem
of spreading myself too thin, or it's believing
that you could pull and all-nighter,
realize that no, you are most likely not the exception,
and that you should probably follow the established
best practices for whatever you're trying to do.
And that brings us to our final subtle
productivity killer, which is the refusal
to acknowledge and adapt to delays in your work.
This is actually something that my friend Martin
said was an issue for him, but when he said it
in the car when were talking about it, I realized
that this is also an issue for me.
Essentially, when I plan to do something
and I hit a delay, or something comes up
and interrupts my work, or takes longer
than expected, the next day, I'll often wake up
and sort-of trick myself into believing
that I can do everything that didn't get done
from the day before, while still doing
everything that was planned for today.
And Martin put it really well.
He said, "You have to realize that if you have a delay
"in your work, then where you are right now
"is your new starting point."
Regardless of what you may tell yourself,
you can't do everything from the day
before and all of today's stuff.
If you didn't get it done yesterday,
why do you think today is going to be any different?
Now, that doesn't mean you shouldn't work hard
and try to catch up if you can, but the problem is,
a lot of us beat ourselves up when we can't
catch up like this, and then we end up
just getting further and further behind.
So, instead, try to be flexible.
Adapt to your new starting point,
rework your plan, and move forward.
Additionally, if the delay was caused
by your own procrastination, or some
productivity failing on your part,
don't beat yourself up about that, either.
Consider that the first mistake, and as James Clear
would say, "What you want to avoid is the second mistake,
"the one that starts a trend."
As long as you can hop back up in the proverbial
horse and keep riding, then that one mistake
isn't really gonna hurt you in the long run.
After all, making mistakes is an essential part
of growth, as long as we can pinpoint what caused
the mistake and learn from it.
And speaking of mistakes, nowhere is that point
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These are two disciplines where mastery
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So, if you are interested in learning more
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