“Smarter Faster Better: The Secrets of Being Productive in Life and Business”, Charles Duhigg; My notes and thoughts from the book

Image via Fortiviti’s blog post summarising the book

Author’s book page

Why This Book?

This is the 5th book in my Year of Reading 2018 which itself is one of my responses to my One Word 2018 of “Focus”.

From my Year of Reading post:

“In June to improve my level of productivity, I will read and apply Charles Duhigg's "Smarter Faster Better: The Secrets of Being Productive in Life and Business".

I have always wanted to be a productive person. I do get a lot done and participate in lots of communities in real life and online virtually. I am a leader and a do-er and love starting new things and then doing those things over the long haul for many years.

As a Christian, I take seriously the imperative to be a wise steward of all that God has given me including time and money and also nurturing the relationships that I have with family, extended family, friends, work colleagues and virtual relationships.

I have always sought to learn new ways of doing things to save time and to be more efficient and effective.

I am guilty of possibly taking more interest in personal productivity as a theoretical subject rather than an applied subject!

I sense that Charles’ book following shortly after Cal Newport’s Deep Work is part of the process of me sorting this application bit out.

As I write this to set the context for my book notes that are to follow, I have already read the introduction and even as I read that I was thinking how would I measure my own level of productivity. I do not have a good (or indeed any) answer to that question.

I am not active all the time. I enjoy doing nothing, watching TV, films, reading books and learning. I have an escalating number of interests that I am exploring. There is never enough time.

I have similar issues at work where we all have too much work to do in the time available to support live systems and deliver new products and new solutions.

I am also aware that there are issues at the country-level for many (all?) countries where it is believed that national productivity is not improving as it should be given the huge investments in technology. I may explore this during and after reading this book.

Whilst I record time at work for the work I do on the various projects and support activities I undertake, I do not do the same for my activities outside of work. I am reminded of the Working Out Loud circle exercise about keeping score and tracking time would be one way of at least measuring where my time goes and then asking “am I productive?” and “how can I be more productive?”

As I close this introduction, I am now thinking I do need to define what I personally mean by “productivity” and how I would go about improving that “productivity” in appropriate ways. I definitely do not want to become (even more of) a machine!

The dictionary is usually a good starting for me …

productive:
adjective
producing or able to produce large amounts of goods, crops, or other commodities.
"the most productive employees"
synonyms:
fertile, fruitful, rich, fecund, high-yielding
"productive agricultural land"

My application of this book

Like the “Radical Focus” book that I read earlier this year, this book too used story to great effect. In this case there were several stories with a number of stories interwoven in each chapter as Charles developed his case for the ultimate lessons he wanted to distil from his research. The use of story certainly helps understand the issues, the subject and the lessons to learn for each subject.

Now that I have read this book there are a number of application areas for me to explore as follows:-

1. Motivation:-
1. When this is a challenge, seek to ask and fully understand the “why this task is worth doing” question.
2. When doing things that I would count as “drudge” look for the WIIFM (what’s in it for me) however small and tenuous that may be. Also look for ways to minimise the time it takes to do those things (cf Cal Newport’s stuff on this)
3. Also reminded that I need to deliberately surround myself with people that are rooting for me as well as keeping my feet to the fire.
2. Teams:-
1. Review, score myself and develop action plan as appropriate for the critical management skills
2. Start reviewing my own and other’s meeting performance (see the scoring material from Ray Dalio’s “Principles”) to identify and address common patterns for improvement myself and influencing others to.
3. Focus:-
1. Manage my stress/fear in certain situations better by trying to be calmer.
2. Experiment with the “what I expect to see” input to help speed of diagnosis.
3. Start visualising my days – may also help plan my days!
4. Key sentence “narrate your life as you are living it & you will encode those experiences deeper in your brain”, speaks to me of refection and writing things down and working out loud and sharing my work!
4. Goal Setting
1. I need to not be overwhelmed and procrastinate with certain goals and tasks and look for the activities that I can do that move me toward achieving the overall goal.
2. Part of this is also around making faster decisions.
5. Managing Others
1. Continue to bear in mind agile principles and seek to adopt these at work and in other teams e.g. standups, how to get progress reported by people who hate being interrupted, resonances with OKRs and the start of week/ end of week cycle.
6. Decision Making
1. Address my dithering and procrastination especially in the area of money management.
2. Revisit the Odyssey Maps exercise from Designing Your Life and start being wild and decisive at the same time.
7. Innovation
1. Diagnose creativity (and other!) issues in teams that I am in by reflecting more on what is going on and why and then seek to influence to improve those situations.
8. Absorbing Data
1. Generally OK at this but look for examples where data overload an issue and then ask why and address.
2. In situations where I revert to type, adopt different perspectives on the situation to get to alternative answers (this is also a reference back to the Designing Your Life Odyssey Maps).

I am sensing that reflection is again being highlighted implicitly as a way of bringing lots of these issues to the surface to address and to help me diagnose and “solve” them.

Book Notes

Introduction

[ Simon: Spooky, this is my June 2018 book and in the intro the author references Atul Gawande as someone who he consulted as he started  writing this book as someone who appeared to be a paragon of success who is the author of my July 2018 book "Better: A Surgeon's Notes On Performance”)! ]

some people pretend at productivity but others like Atul exist on a different plane of getting things done and star performing in every area of his life

productivity is the name we give our attempts to figure out the best uses of our energy, intellect and time as we try to seize the most meaningful rewards with the least wasted effort

a process of learning how to succeed with less stress and struggle

getting things done without sacrificing everything we care about along the way

there are people out there who know how to be more productive and I just need to convince them to share their secrets with me

consulted widely for this book, a handful of key insights emerged, same concepts repeated often

8 ideas that seem most important in expanding productivity

connecting the 8 ideas is a powerful underlying principle …

NOT about working more or sweating harder

NOT a product of more hours at the desk or making bigger sacrifices

IT IS about making certain choices in certain ways:-

• the way we choose to see ourselves and frame daily decisions
• the stories we tell ourselves
• the easy goals we ignore
• the sense of community we build among team mates
• the creative cultures we establish as leaders

these separate the merely busy from the genuinely productive

comments about the tech we all now have available that are supposed to make our lives easier but seem to fill our days with more work and stress

issue of staring at tools of productivity rather than the lessons that those technologies are trying to teach us

some people have figured out how to master this changing world ditto organisations

we now know how productivity really functions

the book is about how to recognise the choices that fuel true productivity

a guide to the science, techniques and opportunities that have changed lives

a book about how to become smarter, faster, better at everything you do

1: Motivation: Re-imagining Boot Camp, Nursing Home Rebellions and the Locus of Control

I

stories of people where old personalities still in place but there was a total absence of drive or momentum – their motivation was completely gone

II

story of a guessing game (1-9, higher or lower) on a computer where participants were more motivated to play simply because they believed they were in control

III

gig economy has made understanding motivation more important

self-motivated people who can prioritise tasks and allocate time etc doing better than others

motivation is a skill that can be learned and honed

[ Simon: “hone”: verb

1. sharpen (a blade). "he was carefully honing the curved blade"
synonyms:
sharpen, make sharper, make sharp, whet, strop, grind, file, put an edge on;
2. refine or perfect (something) over a period of time.
"some of the best players in the world honed their skills playing street football" ]

you can get better at self-motivation if you practice the right way

the trick is to realise that a pre-requisite to motivation is believing we have authority over our actions and surroundings

to motivate ourselves, we must feel like we are in control

when people believe they are in control, they tend to work harder & push themselves more

they are more confident & overcome setbacks faster

they often live longer than peers (!)

a way of proving we are on control is to make decisions

each choice – even small ones – reinforces the perception of control and self-efficacy

from this, a theory of motivation has emerged – to create drive:-

• give people opportunities to make choices that provide a sense of autonomy/self-determination
• find a choice, almost any choice, to exert control

IV

Marine training story: we are the first to arrive and the last to leave, we need extreme self-starters who think for themselves

the most successful Marines those with a strong “internal locus of control” – belief that they can influence their destiny through their choices

that locus of control in someone means they tend to praise/blame themselves for success/failure instead of assigning responsibility to things outside their influence

internal locus of control linked with:-

• academic success
• higher self-motivation & social maturity
• lower incidences of stress/depression
• longer life span

and:-

• tend to earn more
• have more friends
• stay married longer
• report greater professional success & satisfaction

external locus of control (belief that your life primarily influenced by events outside your control) leads to higher levels of stress as the person sees situation as beyond his/her coping abilities

your locus of control can be influenced through training and feedback

e.g. telling someone that their high scores must have meant they worked/prep-ed hard activates internal locus of control because hard work is something we choose to do

internal locus of control is a learned skill, give people practice feeling in control so it becomes a habit (Carol Dweck)

a bias towards action

never tell anyone they are a natural-born leader because it means it is outside their control

hand out unexpected compliments

praise people for doing things that are hard – that is how people learn to believe they can do them

Marine training story: we are trying to teach them that you cannot just obey orders, you have to take control and figure things out for yourself – example of having to figure out a workround

the power of why questions asked by team mates in adversity – link something hard to a choice you care about – it makes the task easier

make a chore into a meaningful decision and self-motivation will emerge

nursing home story: subversives: people who make decisions that are rebellions against the status quo; small acts of defiance are psychologically powerful = taking control

in summary, choices that are most powerful in generating motivation:-

• convince us we are in control
• endow our actions with larger meaning

[ Simon: paraphrasing this part of the book, I need to surround myself with people pushing me to choose a better me, ]

V

story of someone losing their drive: you do not lose your drive because you have lost your capacity for self-motivation rather apathy is due to an emotional dysfunction (often emotional detachment/ numbness)

some people have never learned what it feels like to be self-determined as their environment gives them so few choices or they have forgotten the rewards of autonomy

how we can help ourselves and others strengthen our internal locus of control:-

• reward initiative
• congratulate people for self-motivation
• practice self-determination
• give ourselves emotional rewards for subversive assertiveness
• prove to ourselves that our choices are meaningful – use the “why am I doing this” question
• small tasks become pieces of a larger constellation of meaningful projects, goals & values

[ Simon: I could be much better at doing all of these things. I am well-motivated for things that I have decided to do. I do see where small tasks/chores fit into the bigger picture and how such things are consistent with my core. Wondering how I now turn round other “projects” in my life where my self-motivation is sadly lacking – this is often due to being intimidated by the size of the task/ challenge. I will explore further. ]

2: Teams: Psychological Safety at Google and Saturday Night Live

[ Simon: I encourage you to play the videos that I sourced during my reading of this chapter. They can be found at the end of the notes for this chapter. Great content! And a great reminder of one of my all-time fave TV series! ]

I

story of a study group at Yale, should have been a great learning experience but was not, all wanted to be #1/leader, mistakes not tolerated

lady in question sought out another group via business competition ad, totally different experience, successful, others asking to join, ppl in that group do life together, attending each other’s weddings etc

lady joined Google’s People Analytics group studying how employees spent their time, found her life calling: use data to understand why people behave how they do

Google top place to work in USA due the execs believed due to efforts to understand staff happiness & productivity

Project Oxygen examined why some mgrs more effective than others

discovered 8 critical mgt skills:-

1. good coach
2. empowers, does not micro-manage
3. expresses interest/ concern in subordinates’ success & well-being
4. results-oriented
5. listens/shares info
6. helps with career development
7. has a clear vision & strategy
8. has key technical skills

Project Aristotle looked at why staff feedback great on managers but not so good on teams

looked at how to build perfect team

reviewed academic literature – lots of conflicting views in that literature

established criteria for measuring team effectiveness based on external factors and internal characteristics

nearly impossible to find patterns

reviewed academic research but this time looked at group norms:

“any group, over time, develops collective norms about appropriate behaviour” (Sociology of Sport Journal)

norms: traditions, behavioural standards, unwritten rules that govern how we function

norms can be positive or negative

[ Simon: this is all making me think deeply about team working at work and how productivity & effectiveness is impacted dependent on nature of the task, who leads, who defers, composition of the team members etc, including formal and ad-hoc groupings and including internal staff with/without external staff. Often this is not a positive experience with people thinking they would rather be anywhere else than in that room, right now. ]

people talked about how various teams felt

group norms play critical role in shaping the emotional experience of participating in a team

norms determine whether we feel safe/ threatened, enervated/ excited. motivated/ discouraged by our team mates

[ Simon: Dictionary: enervated:
verb
past tense: enervated; past participle: enervated
make (someone) feel drained of energy or vitality.
"enervating heat"
synonyms:
exhaust, tire, fatigue, weary, wear out, devitalize, drain, sap, weaken, make weak, make feeble, enfeeble, debilitate, incapacitate, indispose, prostrate, immobilize, lay low, put out of action;
informal: knock out, do in, take it out of one, shatter, poop, frazzle, wear to a frazzle, fag out; knacker;  rare: torpefy
"the scorching sun enervated her" ]

concluded that group norms were key to improving Google’s teams – you have to manage the how of teams not the who of teams

II

Amy Edmondson, 1st Year PhD, Harvard, medical research in hospitals wanting to show good teamwork and good medicine went together

studying medical mistakes

lots of mistakes not because of incompetence but because hospitals are complicated places with a large team often in caring for someone

different mistake rates in each department

measured team cohesion on various wards – strongest cohesion had highest mistakes

discovered that people in strong teams felt more comfortable reporting mistakes

deal with errors productively

enthusiastic norms made teams better, loyalty norms made them less effective

some norms seemed to consistently result in higher productivity – all created a sense of togetherness while also encouraging people to take a chance = psychological safety

means “shared belief held by members of a team that the group is a safe place for taking risks, a sense of confidence that the team will not embarrass, reject or punish someone for speaking up” … “it describes a team climate characterised by interpersonal trust and mutual respect in which people are comfortable being themselves” (Amy E)

Julia/ Google found Amy’s papers – psychological safety was fundamental

but how teach these inside Google?

needed clear guidelines for creating this safety without losing capacity for dissent and debate which is critical to how Google operates

III

auditions for 1st ever Saturday Night Live but creator chose people he knew or recommended by friends not those in auditions

SNL has been held up as a model of great team dynamics

inside story less rosy & remarkable in some ways that they gelled at all because of their disparate tastes

they all felt safe enough around one another to keep pitching new jokes/ ideas

“All I wanted was a bunch of “I”’s. I wanted everyone to hear each other, but no one to disappear into the group” (Lorne Michaels)

that is how psychological safety emerged

=====

“Reading the Mind in the Eyes” test – see 36 photos, choose which of 4 best described the person’s emotion – one team 49%, other 58% – prior to test, 2nd team viewed as more chaotic/ clubby

research into presence of collective intelligence emerging within a team that is distinct from any single member

lots of team tasks set with objective of maximising team’s concerns – each task needed full team participation, each needed different types of collaboration

concluded that good teams succeeded not because of innate qualities of team members but because of how they treated each other

they had norms that caused everyone to mesh particularly well

right norms can raise the collective knowledge of mediocre thinkers reverse with bad norms

common behaviours all good teams shared:-

• all members of good teams spoke in same proportion: equality in distribution of turn-taking
• high average social sensitivity: team sussed out how each other were feeling based on tone of voice, body language, facial expression

SNL succeeds because Michaels forces them to become a team – he draws in everyone

for psychological safety to emerge among a group, team mates do not have to be friends but they do need to be socially sensitive and ensure all feel heard

best way is for leader to demonstrate it

treat each person differently and show everyone else you are to draw the unique brilliance out of everyone

IV

presentation within Google by Laszlo Bock, head of People Ops, Google

biggest takeaway: how teams work matters more than who is on them

5 key norms:-

1. teams need to believe that their work is important
2. teams need to feel their work is personally meaningful
3. teams need clear goals and defined roles
4. team members need to know they can depend on one another
5. teams need psychological safety – team leaders need to model the right behaviours:-
1. do not interrupt team members in convos
2. demo you are listening by summarise what the person has said after they have said it
3. admit what you do not know
4. do not end a meeting until all have spoken at least once
5. encourage upset people to express frustrations
6. encourage team mates to respond in non-judgemental ways
7. call out inter-group conflicts
8. resolve conflict through open discussion

cf bug fixing people issues

{ Simon: I love this analogy! }

funny doing a project on team effectiveness while working on a team

proliferation of teams in organisations – we have to become great at teams

team norms are individuals willingly giving a measure of control to their teammates

[ Simon: Google’s 5 Keys to a Successful Team ft Julia Rozovsky (in the book) (webinar) ]

How to turn a group of strangers into a team | Amy Edmondson | TED Talk (posted 14 June 2018, just 3 days before I read this chapter!

Google’s re:Work Teams: web site]

[Simon: I did not know much about Saturday Night Live so I hunted down a video of the creator:
'SNL’ Turns 40: Lorne Michaels Remembers The Beginning | TODAY

[ Simon: SNL reminded me of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, written by a fave screenwriter Aaron Sorkin. It is one of my fave ever TV series. I was sad when it stopped after only one series. It was amazing! Here is why …
Studio 60-A Very Model of a Modern Network TV Show: video ]

3: Focus: Cognitive Tunnelling, Air France Flight 447 and the Power of Mental Models

[ Simon: “Focus” is the word I chose for One Word 2018, see this post: http://srjf.blogspot.com/2018/01/focus-my-one-word-for-governing-my-life_17.html. ]

Flight 447 was at the bottom of the sea not through mechanical breakdown but a failure of attention

auto-pilot and plane flies itself, previously flying manually was taxing and person flying would alternate

mental automation lets us choose, almost subconsciously, what to pay attention to and what to ignore

as automation becomes more common, risks that our attention span will fail have risen

errors particularly likely when people switch between automaticity and focus and are unusually dangerous

[ Simon: from Wikpedia entry:
automaticity:
the ability to do things without occupying the mind with the low-level details required, allowing it to become an automatic response pattern or habit. It is usually the result of learning, repetition, and practice. Examples of tasks carried out by 'muscle memory' often involve some degree of automaticity.
Examples of automaticity are common activities such as walking, speaking, bicycle-riding, assembly-line work, and driving a car (the last of these sometimes being termed "highway hypnosis"). After an activity is sufficiently practiced, it is possible to focus the mind on other activities or thoughts while undertaking an automatized activity (for example, holding a conversation or planning a speech while driving a car). ]

in the age of automation, knowing how to manage your focus is more critical than ever before

“cognitive tunnelling” (CT): a mental glitch that sometimes occurs when our brains are forced to transition abruptly from relaxed automation to panicked attention

brain’s attention span c.f. spotlight ranging from wide/ diffused to tight/ focussed

when we allow automated systems to pay attention for us, our brains dim that spotlight, allowing it to swing where it wants – in part, effort by brain to conserve energy

this ability to relax gives huge advantages:-

• helps us subconsciously manage stress levels
• makes it easier to brainstorm
• do not have to constantly monitor our environment
• helps us prep for big cognitive tasks
• our brains automatically seek out opportunities to disconnect/ unwind

CT can cause people to overly focus on what is directly in front of their eyes or become preoccupied with immediate tasks

can learn techniques to get better at switching between relaxation and concentration BUT require practice and a desire to be engaged

“reactive thinking”: how we build habits, is why to-do lists & calendars are so helpful

RT in a sense outsources choices/ control that in other settings create motivation

downside of RT is habits/ reactions can become so automatic they overpower our judgment

once our motivation is outsourced we simply react & if it is not the correct response, bad things happen

II

late 80s, psychologists at a consulting firm Klein Associates looked at why some stay calm and focused amid chaos while others become overwhelmed

their biz was helping companies make decisions

can you train people to get better at paying attention to right things

interviewed pros in extreme situations incl firefighters, military leaders, emergency rescue staff

proved frustrating – all about intuition – they could not explain

tried neo-natal intensive care units – some babies recover or get worse quickly, how do you tell which – likewise no explanation

same warning signs seen by all but only some acted correctly from hindsight point of view

some people have mental image of what an OK situation looks like and use that to compare with the now situation

those who are good at managing their attention tend to share characteristics:-

• create pictures in mind of what they expect to see
• narrate their own experiences within their heads
• more likely to answer questions with anecdotes rather than simple responses
• when daydreaming say they are imagining future convos
• visualise their days more specifically than others

this kind of habitual forecasting is named “creating mental models”

[ Simon: I suspect I do this mental models thing. I pattern match current experiences with past experiences and verbalise those naming the examples and the companies involved. For some colleagues, I get feedback on how repetitive that is. I try to make the points now without naming names and without the stories. ]

some build more robust models than others

helps where to focus & what to ignore

is constant forecasting

by doing this our mental spotlight never dims and we are not blinded when chaos strikes

cf aircraft example the 2 pilots asked each other questions and could not process the new info they were receiving

another research study – a recruitment firm

their most productive workers had following traits:-

• worked on only 5 projects at a time
• worked on projects with new colleagues & requiring new skills
• worked on projects in their early stages
• generated theories on all kinds of topics to explain to others what was going on in the organisation and with their clients = building mental models at a constant rate

to make yourself more sensitive to the small details in your work, cultivate a habit of imagining, as specifically as possible what you expect to see and do when you start in the office on a given day

narrate your life as you are living it & you will encode those experiences deeper in your brain

[ Simon: some powerful resonances with sharing your work and working out loud as an integral part of your daily work and not as an afterthought when there is often no time to do it then. ]

to improve your focus & learn to avoid distractions, visualise with as much detail as possible what you are about to do

this telling stories is a plus for those applying for jobs in interviews

III

another Airbus story this time a Qantas one: pilot “That’s why we have human pilots. It’s our job to think about what might happen, instead of what is.”

prepared his crew by posing hypothetical emergencies and what they would look for and do

pilot was being inspected as per regular process but not happy at interference with his crew re where sitting cf SNL, he wanted crew to critique one another without fear of punishment and to encourage team members to disagree

major issue happened – later called one of the worst mid-air mechanical disasters in modern aviation

pilot imagined the plane as a Cessna that he had learned on – what was still functioning on his Airbus …

… the most damaged Airbus ever to land safely

now taught as a case study in flight schools & psychology classrooms on how to maintain focus during an emergency

cited as a prime example in how mental models can put even most dire situation within our control

models help us choose where to direct attention so we can make decisions and not just act

SO if you want to do better job of paying attention to what really matters, of not getting overwhelmed/ distracted by constant flows of emails/ convos/ interruptions that are part of every working day life, of knowing where to focus and what to ignore, get into the habit of telling yourself stories

narrate your life as it is occurring then when something immediate/ urgent happens, the spotlight inside your head is ready to shine the right way

to become genuinely productive, we must take control of our attention, we must build mental models that put us firmly in charge

envision your day

in meetings etc describe to yourself what you are seeing & what it means

find others to hear your theories & challenge them

force yourself to anticipate what is next

[ Simon: I do this quite a lot when reviewing meetings/con calls that have happened re what was I expecting, what happened, why was that not the same as expected and so on including my contributions & chairing, as appropriate. Most people do not take the time to do that as there is no time to do that etc. ]

pilot: you cannot delegate thinking, computers fail, checklists fail, everything can fail, but people can’t, we have to make decisions including what deserves our attention, the key is forcing yourself to think, as long as you are thinking you are halfway there.

[ Simon: Interview with the pilot: Part 1 https://youtu.be/pEu60P1XNeg Part 2 https://youtu.be/0DLo2hc89h8 ]

4: Goal Setting, Stretch Goals and the Yom Kippur War

I

some history of Israel post Six-Day War 1967

requirement to give Israeli people likelihood of attack – warnings often contradictory & inconclusive

Eli Zeira appointed Head of Military Intelligence to address these uncertainties

his goal was to provide decision makers with “estimate as clear and as sharp as possible” and primarily to make sure alarms only raised when risks of war were real

developed criteria to assess Arab intentions (“the criteria”)

successfully predicted very low assessment vs others who won the argument

demonstrated that a disciplined approach could prevent wasteful second-guessing

II

you are asked to complete a questionnaire of 42 questions including:-

• I believe orderliness and organization are among the most important characteristics.
• I find that establishing a consistent routine enables me to enjoy life more.
• I like to have friends who are unpredictable.
• I prefer interacting with people whose opinions are very different from my own.
• My personal space is usually messy and disorganized.
• It’s annoying to listen to someone who cannot seem to make up his or her mind.

Researchers at Uni of Maryland 1994 first published this test, now core to personality tests

looks like assesses personal organisation and comfort with alternative viewpoints

BUT actually helps identify people who are more decisive, self-assured and these traits correlate with general success in life

determined & focused people tend to:-

• work harder
• get tasks done more promptly
• stay married longer
• have deeper network of friends
• have higher paying jobs

test designed to measure personality trait “the need for cognitive closure”

“the desire for a confident judgement on any issue, any confident judgement, as compared to confusion and ambiguity”

most demonstrate preference for a mix of order and chaos in their lives

20% have higher than average preference for personal organisation, decisiveness & predictability, disdain flighty friends & ambiguous situations = high emotional need for cognitive closure

need for cognitive closure can be a good thing:-

• likely to be more self-disciplined
• seen as leaders by their peers
• instinct to make judgement and stick with it forestalls needless second-guessing & prolonged debate

BUT there are risks:-

• more likely to make hasty decisions
• less likely to reconsider unwise choice
• introduces a bias into the judgemental process
• triggers closed-mindedness, authoritarian impulses, preference for conflict over co-operation
• leap to judgement on inconclusive evidence
• exhibit rigidity of thought
• reluctant to entertain views different from their own

so when people rush toward decisions simply because it makes them feel like they are getting something done, missteps more likely to occur

[ Simon: defo need to explore this further. Some colleagues come immediately to mind who are exactly like this for the risks list. I have tendencies to dither when exploring all options because I want the systems I deliver to meet current as well as likely future change. I have a strong tendency to plan and not make decisions without thinking carefully. I am capable of rapid decision making. I need to reflect and address how I can personally improve in this area but also how I work with others with these tendencies. ]

components of having a need for closure:-

• need to “seize” a goal
• need to “freeze” on an objective once set
• instinct to “seize” on a choice when it meets minimum threshold of acceptability

positive as does not lead to paralysis by analysis

but if urge for closure too strong, we “freeze” on our goals and yearn for the feeling of productivity at expense of common sense

we can become blind to details that should give us pause

back to Israel, Egyptian forces increasing in certain area became the Yom Kippur War 1974, intelligence assessment was incorrect, nearly cost Israel dearly due to eagerness to provide confident answers, make decisive judgements, avoid ambiguity

III

GE thinking about their own goals late 80s re factories not performing – success they claimed due to how well they chose goals

staff wrote down goals, how they would achieve them and to what quality standard, line manager agreed post editing/ discussion, became a work contract

became known as SMART goals – smart, measurable, achievable, realistic, timeline

quarterly, monthly, weekly

further research – high goals lead to higher performance than easy goals or vague/ abstract ones

SMART process makes plans concrete and force the setter to consider how they will achieve the goal

but some parts of GE did not get these results

issue of goals being SMART but not worth pursuing in the 1st place – achievable but inconsequential, unimportant and not ambitious

such systems can trigger our need for closure but in counterproductive ways

started to decide on a goal first without being SMART and then figure out the SMART bits

how do you foster perpetual ambition?

IV

story of Japanese railways, needing fast speeds between 2 major cities, tunnelling versus going round mountains to aid trains not having to turn

need institutional commitment to audacious goals

GE started setting SMART goals but also stretch goals where the HOW was not clear (“bullet train thinking” – use of dreams to set business targets

Welch set target of reduction of engine errors by 70%

meant GE had to change nearly everything about:-

• how workers were trained
• which workers were hired
• how factory ran

managed to reduce that by 75% & 38 months without missing  a delivery & cost of manufacturing -10% pa – SMART goals would not have done that

stretch targets can spark outsized jumps in innovation & productivity

applies to many sectors

stretch goals “serve as jolting events that disrupt complacency and promote new ways of thinking” …. “By forcing a substantial elevation in collective aspirations, stretch goals can shift attention to possible new futures and perhaps spark increased energy in the organisation. They thus can prompt exploratory learning through experimentation, innovation, broad search or playfulness” (Academy Review of Management, 2011)

fine line between motivating and crushing morale

often need to pair them with SMART goals

advantage of SMART is encourages you to break things down into achievable steps, do the same with stretch goals

one solution is to write to-do lists that pair stretch goals and SMART goals:-

• do menu of your biggest ambitions
• dream big and stretch
• describe goals that at 1st glance seem impossible
• choose one aim and start breaking it into small concrete steps:-
• what realistic progress can I make in next day, week, month

these are “proximal goals” and they make the large objective more likely to occur

goal-setting flowchart:-

• what is your stretch goal?
• what is a specific sub-goal?
• how will you measure success?
• is this achievable?
• is this realistic?
• what is your timeline?

[ Simon: slightly off the subject but while rabbit trail-ing, I found this video “Teaching Talk: Helping Students Who Procrastinate” (Tim Pychyl)
https://youtu.be/mhFQA998WiA ]

[ Simon: also the part of this relating to break something down into an actionable task reminding me of David Allen’s Getting Things Done with his “what is the next action? ]

you need items on your To Do that actually will take you to your goal and not simply make you feel better

[ Simon: Cal Newport’s Deep Work talks about maximising the work that you do relating to your core goals. ]

V

back to Israel, inquiry into why intelligence failed, Zeira had become so obsessed with avoiding unnecessary panic & making firm decisions that they lost sight of most important objective: keeping Israelis safe – Zeira was forced to resign

we need to step out of our ambitions and we still need, occasionally, to step outside day-to-day & consider if we are moving towards goals that still need sense

we still need to think

Zeira conceded he had made an error, ignored the seemingly impossible, had not thought through all the alternatives as deeply as he should

he had a note “and if not?” – prompts  him to ask bigger questions – he had not looked at it in days before the war

5: Managing Others: Solving Kidnapping with Lean and Agile Thinking & A Culture of Trust

I

Kidnapping of Frank Janssen a national security person in the USA but daughter was an Asst DA so likely to be revenge for her putting one of the gang leaders behind bars. Use of new system called Sentinel after earlier versions had not worked etc. New IT person used lean mfg techniques and Agile.

[ Simon: IT projects are a keen area of interest – it is my job!!. Found this presentation on Sentinel.  May be of interest to those running projects and/ or have an interest in Agile.
”Agile saved the FBI's Sentinel Mega-Project”; https://youtu.be/NPzgOgvO8Dw.
“Brian Wernham tells the story of how FBI switched to a successful and agile prject management method after two attempts at building a new enterprise-wide IT system failed. In this video, Brian will explain how he convinced the FBI to try agile project management after losing eight years and $600 million dollars on the “Sentinel” project. After watching, you will come out with a great example of the power of agile project management and, most importantly, tips on how to better manage your agency’s own business change projects.” ]

II

someone returns to a GM factory that he had worked at till 2 years ago for a job interview, previously a production line saboteur, worst auto factory in the world … now using Toyota Production System (aka Lean Manufacturing) … gave lots of feedback about issues when he worked there before, was scathing with specifics, got the job for his honesty & ideas, trained in Japan … we can compete by learning from them …

[ Simon: found video for “NUMMI Toyota and General Motors” – 20 years of teamwork: https://youtu.be/ZkiwJSAXgLw ]

2 Stanford professors in 1994 studied how to create atmosphere of trust in a company – needed to substantiate their claim that this was more important than strategy and that it drove profitability, used the tech sector, study lasted 15 years, 200 firms

cultures found to be 1 of 5 categories:-

• star
• top colleges, top companies used to recruit from
• fancy cafes, lavish perks
• viewed by VCs as safe bets
• engineering
• not many stars
• engineers as a group had most influence
• solve technical problems
• allow firms to grow quickly
• all staff same mindset so common norms assisting rapid growth
• bureaucracies
• cultures emerge from thick layer of middle managers
• job specs
• org charts
• employee handbooks
• work process laid down
• rituals  e.g. all staff meetings
• values communicated regularly
• autocracies
• as above but all from one person
• “you work, you do what I say, you get paid”
• commitment
• throwback to age when one company for life as employee
• may not be bad
• implies set of values that may prioritise slow/ steady growth
• paternalistic
• hesitant to lay people off
• HR pros employed
• getting culture right more imp at first than designing right product

star model produced some of the biggest winners

but less likely to get to IPO than other models, often beset by internal rivalries

only consistent winner was commitment firms, none failed:-

• fastest to go public
• highest profitability ratios
• tended to be leaner
• fewer middle managers
• recruiting slowly means you have time to find get self-directed people
• closer to customers
• detected market changes faster
• invested heavily in training
• higher levels of teamwork & psychological safety

also a sense of trust emerged in commitment firms among workers, mgt, customers

back to GM plant … Rick Madrid back from Japan, started evangelising … when 1 worker in difficulty when 1 of Japanese owner (grandson of Toyota founder) walking round on visit told him to pull the cord (to stop the plant), finally held the worker’s hand as he pulled and apologised to the worker for failing to foster a culture where that was OK

[ Simon: wow! emotional part of this story! ]

once you are entrusted with that kind of authority, you cannot help feel a sense of responsibility

the worst auto factory on earth had become one of the most productive plants using same workers as before

lots of recessions, Rick retired from NUMMI in 1992 after 40 years service, featured in Smithsonian exhibit at the National Museum of American History that included Madrid’s ID badge and his hat in a show named A Palace of Progress. NUMMI, the curators wrote, was iconic, a factory that had demonstrated it was possible to unite workers and managers around a common cause through mutual commitment and shared power.

[ Simon: found a This American Life podcast episode on NUMMI including interview with Rick: https://www.thisamericanlife.org/403/nummi. ]

[ Simon: Rick’s hat: http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_879813 ]

III

back to the kidnapping … Chad Fulgham was the person who took hold of Sentinel when project failing, was aNUMMI fan

2001 group of developers wrote Manifesto for Agile Software Development – adapted Toyota’s methods to software development – emphasised:-

• collaboration
• frequent testing
• rapid iteration
• decision making by person closest to problem

Pixar method based on Toyota, empowered low-level animators to make critical choices

Ed Catmull’s “Toyota speech” – all enabled to fix what is broken

hospitals: distribution of authority to nurses/ others who are not doctors = lean healthcare

so approach used in several industries

key attributes:-

• dedicated to devolving decision making to person closest to problem
• encouraged collaboration by allowing teams to self-manage, self-organise
• insisted on culture of commitment & trust

Chad asked for this for coders and junior field agents

saw demo of Sentinel – takes 15 mins to return query results!

applied Toyota principles to Dev team after reducing headcount on team to 30 from 400

came up with 1,000 scenarios in which Sentinel could be useful

[ Simon: sounding like use cases and user stories. ]

daily start-of-day standups, literally standing, brevity, highlights of yesterday, to-do today

[ Simon: familiar with these but include focus on issues blocking progress. ]

“government on steroids”: Chad

fortnightly demos of solution to high-ranking officials who were only allowed to offer suggestions

added functionality to identify trends/ threats & case comparisons

ultimately able to look across millions of investigations simultaneously & pick out patterns agents had missed

live 16 months after Chad started – 1st month used by 30,000 agents – since credited with helping solve thousands of crimes

from the application of Toyota to software also impacted how FBI agents operated – feeling like they can make independent decisions

IV

info from kidnapping input into Sentinel … a link was found that no one would have made directly … one of many leads to pursue … agile approach re decisions taken by those closest to situation, 2 agents followed the lead from 1 year before kidnapping took place … resulted in finding the kidnapping victim

empowered field agents to change direction of investigation based on new info

employees work smarter & better when they believe they have more decision making authority and when they believe their colleagues are committed to their success

6: Decision Making: Forecasting the Future (and Winning at Poker) with Bayesian Psychology

I

story of Annie Duke poker player … major decision in a poker tournament .. deciding whether to bet all in a 1:1 game after 8 dropped out ..

she likes the certainties, in poker he view is trick is making predictions, imagining alternative futures, then calculating probabilities of each

her family background … learned to assess probabilities of life situations at home/school

did Psychology at college – understanding why people do what they do

psychology then was going through a transition & bringing scientific rigour to understand behaviours that had long been seen as immune to methodological analysis – with economists, explaining why people do what they do – how people make decisions e.g. having kids, getting married, sending kids to private education etc

many important decisions are attempts to forecast the future

good decision making is contingent on a basic ability to envision what happens next

why are some people better at making decisions after considering alternative futures

[ Simon: making me think of the challenges I found in doing the 3 alternative Odyssey Plans in Designing Your Life. ]

Annie went on to do PhD in Psychology

still having crippling panic attacks

some exposure to poker in Vegas watching her brother

saw poker as combo of maths & cognitive science, she loved it

no stomach pains when playing poker

started winning money – bother got half

poker about using your chips to gather info faster than anyone else

moved to Vegas, quit college (i.e. wasn’t going back)

it is scary when we realise how much rides on choices when we cannot predict the future

making good decisions relies on forecasting the future

forecasting is imprecise, often terrifying science … forces us to confront how much we do not know

paradox of learning how to make better decisions is that it requires us to get comfortable with doubt

there are ways of learning to grapple with uncertainty

methods for making a vague future more foreseeable by calculating, with some precision, what you know & do not know

II

2011 US Office of Director of National Intelligence had grant money for universities for project to dramatically enhance accuracy, precision, timeliness of intelligence forecasts

many took common approaches of interviewing experts

2 did something different – The Good Judgement Project – see if they could train regular people to make better forecasts via online forecasting classes covering different ways of thinking about the future & then asked them the same qs as the experts

2 years training .. even basic training improved the accuracy of their predictions

training in how to think probabilistically significantly increased people’s abilities to forecast the future

taught them to envision tomorrow as series of possibilities that might occur

goal was to show people how to turn their intuitions into statistical estimates

example of probability of Sarkozy getting 2nd term: three probabilities/scenarios simply add probabilities together and divide by 3 – very basic example

lots of probability curves that can be used

the future is not one thing, many possible outcomes, some contradictory

probabilistic thinking: ability to hold multiple, conflicting outcomes in your mind & estimating their relative likelihoods

led to 50% increase in prediction of accuracy

requires us to question our assumptions & live with uncertainty

back to poker …

losers always look for certainty at the table

[ Simon: as I read this part of the book my issue of being risk-averse popped immediately into my head again, I am defo a worrier and often cripplingly so, re dithering to make decisions, mainly in my personal life it has to be said. ]

winners comfortable admitting to themselves what they do not know

hard part at poker is learning to make choices based on probabilities

[ Simon: not noted but the choice of colleges for poker player’s brother’s son included certs and little chance, reminded me of my UCCA form back in 1979, Stirling was my 4th choice as insurance if A level results not that good, they were not, went to Stirling and did an amazing degree and got the first first in Business Studies/ Mgt Science they had ever awarded. ]

III

Joshua Tennenbaum, prof Cognitive Science, MIT, large scale research into how people make everyday predictions

lots of everyday examples of decisions to be made where needs forecasting

power law distribution for box office hits

other distributions for other things e.g. normal distribution

people given 4 questions & no other info:-

• movie took X to date, how much will it make in total
• meet a 39 year old, how long will they live
• cake baking for 14 mins, how much longer should it stay in
• meet a US congressman who has served 15 years, how long will he serve in total

different kinds of predictions require different kinds of reasoning

majority use successful past experiences in making decisions

many successful people spend lots of time looking at failures to learn from – may learn best from people who are vocal about their failures

accurate forecasting requires exposing ourselves to as many successes & disappointments as possible

when fail, force yourself to really figure out what happened

Annie shares poker tips re prejudices then learning from how opponents actually act

wants to make the other player think she is repeatedly bluffing

wins the world tournament

she says you have to be comfortable not knowing exactly where life is going

all we can do is learn how to make the best decisions in front of us & trust over time odds in our favour

we can learn to make better decisions in part by training ourselves to think probabilistically

review past decisions and why they were successful or unsuccessful

7: Innovation: How Idea Brokers And Creative Desperation Saved Disney’s “Frozen”

I
story of 1st screening of “Frozen” inside Disney – zero response as the employees filed out – due for release in 18 months

Chief Creative Officer John Lasseter gave long list of positives but then long list of negatives, other people present also had issues

Chris Buck, film’s director not surprised – lots of issues they were aware of during the film making process

most animated films have 4-5 years to mature, this one on an accelerated schedule, release date in 18 months

had to find answers fast

how to spur innovation on a deadline or how to make creative process more productive not unique to filmmaking

“We’re obsessed with the productivity of the creative process. We think it’s something that can be managed poorly or well, and if we get the creative process right, we find innovations faster. But if we don’t manage it right, good ideas are suffocated.”
(Ed Catmull, President, Walt Disney & co-founder of Pixar)

II

1949, choreographer Jerome Robbins contacted friends Leonard Bernstein & Arthur Laurents with audacious idea for new musical – Romeo and Juliet but set in modern-day New York – goal to establish avant-garde on Broadway

he had colourful background

wanted to merge opera, ballet & play in something that would be timeless – West Side Story

going slowly Robbins impatient. not do new things but combine conventions in new ways

created a musical where dance, song & dialogue integrated into contemporary story of racism & injustice

remixing conventional ideas from other settings in new ways is remarkably effective

Brian Uzzi & Ben Jones (NorthWestern Uni) cf how combinations of existing material works in scientific research – looked at academic paper publishing

wrote algorithm to assess papers for how many different ideas each paper contained, whether ideas mentioned together before, if papers were popular or ignored

found that lots of different ways to write a creative study

90% in most creative manuscripts were previously know ideas mixed in new ways

this is not new cf Edison’s work, IDEO

[ Simon: reminding me of the opportunities we have when we have worked in multiple sectors for multiple different sizes of organisations. ]

cf Sociology calls these idea or innovation brokers (Ronald Burt)

“People connected across groups are more familiar with alternative ways of thinking and behaving. The between-group brokers are more likely to express ideas, less likely to have ideas dismissed and more likely to have ideas evaluated as valuable.” (Burt)

such people are more credible when they make suggestions because they could say which ideas had already succeeded somewhere else.

“This is not creativity born of genius. It is creativity as an import-export business.” (Burt)

almost anyone can become a broker as long as they are pushed the right way

West Side Story had traditional start – Robbins not happy with it

created instead The West Side Story Prologue – 1 of most influential pieces of theatre in last 60 years

[ Simon: a video clip of The West Side Story Prologue: https://youtu.be/m8R9GiLImSw ]

one of most popular & influential musicals in history

mixed originality & convention to create something new

III

explanation of Frozen working environment for start of day meetings

meeting where people were asked to say what had challenged/excited them about this project

we can always find the right story when we start asking ourselves what feels true

Disney method is powerful because it pushes filmmakers to dig deeper until they put themselves on screen – what’s inside our heads, our experience is raw material

Disney system forces people to use their own emotions to write dialogue for cartoon characters and infusing real feelings into situations that are unreal & fantastical

this method is worth studying: it suggests way that anyone can become an idea broker by drawing on own lives as creative fodder

key part is learning how to broker insights from one setting to another, to separate real from cliched, is paying more attention to how things make us feel

“creativity is just connecting things” (Steve Jobs)

we just need to push deeper into ourselves and learn how to pay attention to how things make us react and feel

we are more likely to recognise differences hidden in our own experiences when necessity pushes us, when panic or frustrations cause us to throw old ideas into new settings (“creative desperation”)

story of “finding” “Let It Go” song for “Frozen” that galvanised the whole team

IV

Disney term “spinning” for when filmmakers get stuck … when you are in a rut and cannot see your project from different perspectives anymore

tension often helps release creative energy

stresses of collaboration & working with people of different backgrounds trigger divergent thinking, forced to look at something from someone else’s point of view, if no tension, often people see things the same way (Francesco Gino, psychology of creativity, HBS)

in this example, appointed 2nd director with equal status to disrupt team’s dynamics

1950s, biologist, Joseph Cornell studied Oz rain forests & coral reefs to understand why bio-diversity higher in some places

found often evidence that large tree had fallen letting in sunlight but in other places, single species dominated

where too many gaps in trees eg where harvested, also bad effect

seemed like nature’s creative capacities depended on some kind of periodic disturbance that temporarily upset the natural environment – but had to be the right size

the intermediate disturbance hypothesis: local species diversity is maximised when ecological disturbance is neither too rare nor too frequent

one or two species tend to win out: competitive exclusion

human creativity is different from biological diversity

cf Disney appointing a 2nd director to let some light in and some competing views

now the lady was not just in writer role but was leading and therefore had to listen to other people’s views more clearly than before

friend of 2nd director, also a Frozen writer, texted her each day before/after her new role, her therapist asked a question “why do you di it?”, finally unlocked the film’s ending

creativity cannot be reduced to formula

but the creative process is different – we can create the conditions that help creativity to flourish

critical to maintain some distance from what we create

seeing other people’s point of view

“Creativity is just problem solving” (Catmull) – seeing it such can stop it seeming like magic

[ Simon: I found lots of this content really helpful and also goes a long way to explaining issues I have in work teams when we try to work together and the same applying to All Age Worship planning that I am involved in to put on events at church. Good to be challenged with this content and seek to improve the varying issues. ]

8: Absorbing Data: Turning Information Into Knowledge In Cincinatti’s Public Schools

I

story of poorly-performing school, South Avondale, Cincinatti

race riots 60s, factories closing 70s

a school of last resort

resources not an issue

x3 spent per pupil vs other schools

pupil dashboard for various stats re attendance & performance

at forefront of educational Big Data

aim was to tailor education to each specific student

after 6 years low usage of data by teachers

Elementary Initiative: no more resources, all about how teachers made decisions in classrooms

basis was data can be transformative but only of people know how to use it

how to convert the data into actions

lots of experiments to see if influenced scores – using index cards and hand-drawn graphs

teachers learned how to understand the data

II

proliferation of data but our ability to make sense of it has not kept pace

data often makes decisions harder to make

“information blindness”: our mind’s tendency to stop absorbing data when too much to take in

study of 401k retirement plans and uptake – fewer the choices the bigger the take up

brain reaches a breaking point with the amount of info involved

humans very good at processing info as long as we can break it down into series of smaller and smaller pieces: “winnowing” or “scaffolding” – helping us file data

e.g. choosing wine at restaurant – red/white, cheap/expensive etc

done so quickly, we do not know it is happening

brains crave reducing things to 2-3 options

experts in their field succeed by learning how to organise info to make it less overwhelming

novices have to read the whole menu while experts ignore whole sections

to overcome info blindness, one way is to process info into sequence of questions to be answered of choices to be made: “creating disfluency” – we need to do some work to make the info easier to digest

when info is made more disfluent, we learn more

1997 Chase Manhattan Bank story re why one team better at getting customers to pay their credit card bill

team leader Charlotte Fludd gave talk on her process – about scheduling outbound calls – targetted times of day to different people groups with tailored words

lots of the tips were ideas generated by the team through practice in brainstorming groups to get ideas then test them – isolate and test variables

III

story of Nancy Johnson teacher in Cincinatti, started doing supply teaching in 1996, lots of the school stats made her head hurt, had to start spending 2 sessions per week manually moving piles of student data cards

started noting on cards the test qs the kids got wrong and then acted on that info

25 kids in her class started seeing them as individuals as she split the cards into smaller groups

doubled her class scores from the prior year

started coaching teachers in other schools

2010 Cincinatti’s Educator of the Year

IV

Delia Morris started High School when Elementary Initiative was launched so did not get the benefit

Dad lost job, evicted from home

good kid, hard worker, unusually smart, college material

Western Mills High in 2009, started educational reforms with engineering courses based on leveraging the tech they used in their daily lives to solve real world problems

90% students below poverty line

teacher Deon Edwards: class was a system for decision making known as “the engineering design process” forcing students to define their dilemmas, collect data, brainstorm decisions, debate alternative approaches, conduct iterative experiments

1st test was to design electric car

had to slow the students down in decision making as they dealt with problems and decision making all day long re missing parents, violent friends, classmates on drugs

Delia was asked to babysit her 21 yo sister’s baby – obvious what right decision was re family per their Dad but she put it through the process including timetable for a day when doing that after school and when homework would get done, did memo to Dad explaining her rationale for saying no

psychologists say learning how to make decisions this way is important esp for young people so they can learn from their experiences and see choices from different experiences

this is a form of disfluency allowing us to evaluate our own lives more objectively & offset biases & emotions that might otherwise blind us to lessons in our pasts

we all have data in decisions we have made in the past

subverts our brain from thinking there is always a binary choice

research study on buying a VCR, asked a group for reasons to buy, got loads, then reasons not to buy, got none – asked 2nd group for reasons not to buy. got loads, reasons to buy, got none … so huge issue once a frame for decision making established

can uproot frames by forcing ourselves to seek fresh vantage points

Delia won the argument with evidence and saying longer term benefits to the family

[ Simon: strong resonances from this content to the Designing Your Life process and the various exercises that effectively force you to view your own life from different perspectives and looking at alternative futures from a foundational current position. ]

Delia’s family situation got worse but teachers could see her potential so helped her

she got into college and got multiple offers, won a scholarship

lots of help at college re shared dorms, study halls for people with similar backgrounds to Delia

most successful people at learning are the ones who know how to use disfluency to their advantage – they transform what life throws at them

they know the best lessons are the ones that force us to do something and manipulate info – take data, and set up experiments

cf research into note taking by laptop vs by hand – harder less efficient by hand, writing is slower than typing so fewer words recorded – writing is more disfluent than typing because requires more labour & captures fewer verbatim phrases, the hand writers learned more (2014, Princeton, UCLA)

when we encounter new info and want to learn from it, we should force ourselves to do something with the data

e.g. reading a book, explain what you have read to someone

e.g. act on weight figures from scales re plot on graph

this starts to build mental folders that are the core of learning

every choice we make in life is an experiment

South Avondale Elementary improved dramatically in the 6 years since this chapter started

Dante Williams graduated, got diploma certificate, principal said final bit of work was to personalise it, Dante put his name in the empty box

Appendix: A Reader’s Guide to Using These Ideas

[ Simon: Not read the chapter as I write this but this chapter is like the final chapter of the Leonardo da Vinci biography I read in January 2018 by Walter Isaacson. After all the reading of the book to this point with all the information provided, I was definitely thinking about how to apply what I have learned in my daily life. The two books contain lots of stories with lots of points of interest and application but it is great to get a final chapter/ Appendix to collate the authors’ view of how to apply the content of the book. Great! ]

story of how Charles (the author) had spent 2 years researching the book – came time to write – thought he would now be a productivity expert BUT struggled  to write!

his editor told him to apply what he (Charles) had learned during his research for the book

Motivation

this was one of hardest challenges

at the time of needing to commit words for the book, he was promoting last book, still a journalist on New York Time

reminded of Marines story:

motivation becomes easier when we transform a chore into a choice – doing so gives us a sense of control

e.g. processing email was a chore, started a 1-line reply to each one and then went back to complete each one – easier doing that way for me because:-

• 1 line already there
• that 1 line indicated I was in control

challenge of bigger pieces of work:

self-motivation becomes easier when we see our choices as affirmations of our deeper values and goals

this is the reason for asking the “why?” question

reminds us that this is a step along a longer path

he wrote down reasons at top of articles he was reading

Goal Setting

need 2 kinds of aims:-

• needed a stretch goal – something to spark big ambitions
• AND needed a SMART goal – to help me form a concrete plan

on my to-do list, I added the overarching goal and then sub-goals with each SMART component

[ Simon: interesting seeing Charles doing specific sentence for each element of SMART for each sub-goal. ]

took only a few minutes but made huge difference to what he got done

helped him realise he was chasing SMART goals for a higher reason

Focus

we aid our focus by building mental models – telling ourselves stories – about what we expect to see

he envisioned what he expected to happen when he sat down at his desk each morning

started exercise night before week started with sentence for each of the following:-

• My goal
• What will happen first?
• What distractions are likely to occur?
• How will you handle that distraction?
• How will you know you’ve succeeded?
• What is necessary for success?
• What will you do next?

this was now a picture inside his head of how the plan is supposed to unfold thereby making the choices that shape focus that much easier

Decision Making

how should he make decisions when confronted with the unexpected?

envision multiple futures and then force himself to figure out which ones are most likely and why

better able to influence which of those futures would actually occur

gave example of possible TV series via an offer that came while writing this book

thought of future scenarios for this and asked for advice from TV pros so options became clearer

key was that decisions were made in a deliberate way

The Big Idea

Other ideas ….

To make teams more effective ..

• manage the how not the who of teams
• psychological safety emerges when all feel they have equal air time and when fellow team members show they are sensitive to how each other feel
• as leader, think about the message your choices reveal
• rewarding the loudest speaker or encouraging all to speak
• are you showing you are listening by repeating what people say and replying to questions & thoughts
• are you demo-ing sensitivity by reacting when someone seems upset/ flustered
• do you showcase that sensitivity so other people will follow your lead

To manage others productively ..

• lean/agile techniques tell us employees work smarter/ better when they believe they have more decision making authority & when they believe colleagues are committed to their success
• pushing decision making to closest person to problem takes advantage of everyone’s expertise & unlocks innovation
• a sense of control can fuel motivation but for that to produce insights/ solutions, people need to know their suggestions won’t be ignored & mistakes held against them

To encourage innovation ..

• creativity often happens when combine old ideas in new ways – & “innovation brokers” are key
• be sensitive to your own experiences – how things make you think and feel is how we distinguish cliches from real insights
• study your own emotional reactions
• stress amid the creative process is not a sign things are falling apart
• creative desperation often critical
• anxiety can push us see old ideas in new ways
• relief at creative breakthrough may blind us to alternatives
• to retain clear eyes:-
• critique what already done
• view things from different perspectives
• give new authority to someone who did not have it before

To absorb data better ..

• force yourself to do something with new data e.g. write down what you just learned, test an idea, see data embedded in everyday decisions and use it so you learn from it

productive people/ companies force themselves to make choices most other people are happy to ignore

productivity emerges when people push themselves to think differently

example of McLean shipping container guy – interesting life etc BUT did not match the stretch goal of the book – it was not universally applicable

we can all become more productive, now you know how to start