Motivation

How To Act Like a President, The Seven Year Lesson From Jay Chiat

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During the high flying days of the first internet revolution I worked for a public dot com. The chairman was Jay Chiat the legendary ad man who co-founded Chiat, Day. He was the advertising genius behind many campaigns including Apple’s 1984 commercial which some say transformed the Super Bowl into the advertising event it has become. I only worked with Jay (everyone was called by their first name- it was a dot com after all)  a few times. But once, a month into my tenure as a freshly minted MBA, during an informal chat on the way back from the men’s room he made a huge impression on me.

We were talking and then he paused, crossed over to my side, bent down to picked up a small piece of paper (which I didn’t notice) and threw it out. Then he continued the conversation as if nothing happened. This act left me puzzled for over 7 years. I couldn’t understand it and theorized he was just a very clean person and this bothered him. Or maybe he was trying to make a statement- every piece of paper out of order is important- let’s portray a positive image. Or maybe his statement was that even a famous chairman like him is involved in the mundane day to day tasks.

Fast forward 7 years. I was walking back to my desk saw a little piece of paper in the hallway next to someone else’s desk, I bent down and threw it out. After I realized what I had instinctively done I started thinking about why I did it and remembered the story with Chiat those years earlier. Then it hit me, I did it because I felt responsible for the company. At the dot com I worked hard and felt responsible for my projects and surroundings, but didn’t feel as responsible for the company (even though I had stock options). At this new company as a long time employee and manager I felt a sense of ownership on the company’s success (though I wasn’t an owner). That’s probably why Chiat did it.

The lesson is simple. Act like the president of whatever company or task you’re working on. Instill in your employees a sense of ownership. Instill it in your kids. They will work
for their own pride harder than they would work for someone else’s. The way to do it is to give more responsibility.

Goal, Layering, Principles, Simple

Six Reasons You Should Layer Your Projects

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Success on a project, in business or in life can’t be achieved until you start. Layering is an approach that increases your chance for success.

The concept is simple:

  1. Break the project into small parts
  2. Launch
  3. Repeat this process with more layers of complexity

The power of layering is easy to see below.

Show results– Layering allows you to see results from your actions quickly. This will help get more buy in and give you the confidence to succeed.

Benefit from the results– You can begin benefiting from work work quickly. You don’t need to wait for the whole project to be completed.

Learn from success and failures– You can learn from the feedback of your launch and it can help set the direction of further phases of your project.

Helps determine priories– After you launch a layer the next need will become more obvious.

Determines the project’s viability– Once you get your feet wet on the project you may find that the project is more complex that originally thought and it may not be worth it to continue. This helps you cut your losses.

Doesn’t get bogged down in details– The longer a project continues the more likely it will get held up for small details. Layering may allow you to launch without the details fully developed and then you address it in a future launch.

As you can see there are huge benefits to layering. Layering is one of the principles of building your success- you can read more about it, including examples how to use it, at the Layering Page .

Goal, GTD, Success, Think

Getting Dreams Done Part 1: Making Dreams Reality

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What’s stopping you from achieving your dreams? For many people it’s simple, they haven’t verbalized their dreams. Without verbalization, dreams can’t happen. Others will fire back the usual dream, “I want to be rich and happy”. Having a dream is a step in the right direction but if you haven’t turned your dreams into actionable items and pursued it, that’s what it will remain- a dream but not reality. So how can you turn a dream into reality? There are 4 easy steps: verbalize the dream, set your goals, create a plan to turn that dream into reality and of course execute. In this part we will focus on verbalizing the dream.

Determining Your Dreams

One of the key points of the Success Making Machine (and how it enhances GTD) is that you are encouraged, dare I say required, to verbalize your dreams. In the dream phase you are picturing what success looks like. At this point, you can make them as unrealistic as you want or as generic as you want, even “I want to be rich and happy”. The more specific you are the more it will help you in the long run. One way to put some structure around your dreams is to verbalize dreams for each area of your life: career, financial, family, social, community, health etc .

Be Positive

When you are verbalizing your dreams- focus on what you want, not what you don’t want. For example, “I want to be rich” is more powerful than “I don’t want to be poor”.

Before you commit to a dream ask yourself if it’s really what you want. Picture your life with your dream achieved. You may find that it isn’t quite what you want. Growing up, many of us wanted to be sports/music or film stars. If you had the magic powers to have the talent for it would you still want it? Maybe you wanted the fun that went with being a baseball player but do you really want to play every single day for 10-20 years? Perhaps you may want it but do you want to keep up that rigorous travel schedule? How will this correspond with your goal of raising a family? So before you commit- think it through.

Buy into your dream

A dream should be something you truly want. Then set your energies to it. Your thoughts, beliefs and actions should be geared toward achieving this goal. You’ll need to believe this dream is possible. You don’t need to know all the details of how it will happen- just know that it will. As you continue to read through this series some of the next steps to success will crystallize. Some would call this the “Law of Attraction” (if you believe/act a certain way you will attract it). This site isn’t build on going into psychological tricks and unproven theories- it’s about logic and actions. Logic tells you if you believe something, invest yourself in it and your mind works toward achieving it, you will be more likely to succeed. You can call it karma- I’ll call it logic.

The Finale

Peter at I will change your life(which I recommend) has a well defined dream:

…to write a book that would help young people, or anyone really, find happiness and meaning in their life…

In the final part in this series I will outline how to use the lessons from this series to approach his dream.

What’s your dream?

Verbalize it and you’ll get closer to achieving it. Now that you’ve started to crystallize your dreams, in the next section we’ll talk about taking steps to achieve it. Subscribe to this feed to be notified when the next part of this series is posted.

Automate, Delegate, Eliminate, Enjoy, Reduce Stress

8 Ways To Do Less Of What You Don’t Like

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Readers of this blog know that being more successful can be easy and fun- all you have to do is follow The Rule of Thumb for Success: do more of what you like and less of what you don’t like. Today we’ll concentrate on doing less of what you don’t like using techniques you already know.

Identify Your Tasks That You Don’t Like
The first step in any en devour is to figure out what you’re trying to accomplish. During the course of your day there will be numerous tasks that will annoy you, cause you to pull out your hair or that you simply don’t like. Identify them- they are now put on notice. Pick a few items you will work on eliminating. I suggest you start with a few easy ones so you can see quick results (see layering). Once you get the hang of it go for the really annoying ones that may be harder to eliminate.

Eat the Tasks You Don’t like
Now that you know what you want to accomplish it’s time to plan how to do it. I recommend you Ate your task- By ATE I mean eliminATE, delegATE or automATE. Below I’ll explain the concepts and show you how you can use it. To better illustrate the power of these techniques I’ll give you specific examples using everyone’s least favorite task: washing dishes.

Eliminate

  • Decide– Decide that you don’t want to do it. It could be it’s not needed or it’s not that important anymore. If you’re doing the task for someone else ask them if they still need it. If you’re too chicken to ask your boss if he still needs that monthly report, just ask him if you can enhance it or make it better in any way. Perhaps you know of a different report that will do the job better.

Lets see how to use this to do fewer dishes: Decide you don’t want to do dishes anymore and switch to plastic (at least for really mess stuff). Decide that you don’t want to bake anymore.

  • Combine– Combine the task you dislike with something else you like. People often combine exercise with TV. Before they know it they’ve run another mile. Be sure that the tasks are compatible (e.g. no tv and washing dishes because your eyes cant do both at the same time) and that you don’t multi-task. You need to give each task the appropriate attention.

Do fewer dishes: Use dishes time as quality time with your partner. You are going to talk about your days (at least you should) and discuss future plans you may as well get something accomplished at the same time. He can even dry.

  • Simplify– Try not to over complicate the process- that may be leading to your dislike. Try to isolate the parts you don’t like doing and find a solution for that.

Do fewer dishes: Eat out/Order in. The goal is to eat- not to cook. If you don’t cook, there are no dishes. If your issue with washing dishes is that your hands get too dry be sure to have gloves handy and that will eliminate your problems.

  • Batch it– Do multiple tasks together and save setup time. It will also limit your dislike time to a small portion of the day.

Do fewer dishes: Don’t wash a dish at a time, wash them all together.

Delegate

  • Insource– See who within your organization (or family) you can get to do the horrid task. Offer to trade tasks or even bribe them. If you don’t have people capable train them. You may think it takes a while to train but it can pay huge dividends in the future.

Do fewer dishes: Trade tasks with your partner- you take care of the kids if she’ll wash the dishes.

  • Outsource– Pay someone to do it. You can find personal assistants for virtually anything. It may be expensive but you may decide to skimp on your budget elsewhere or put in extra hours just to afford the luxury.

Do fewer dishes: Hire help.

Automate

  • Automate the process– Look to computers and other technology to take care of the task for you. It may take an investment of time or effort but often can lead to huge dividends.

Do fewer dishes: Get a dishwasher.

  • Habits– Set habits for yourself that will make your job easier. You can try to set habits for others to.

Do fewer dishes: Annoyed that your kids don’t bring the dishes? Have a candy dish at the sink. When dishes are deposited then they get to take an item. Replenish it quickly at first and then less in the future until it becomes second nature.

Bonus

Sometimes there are tasks that you just have to do so try to make it more fun. Add music to it. Do it in a fun way (splash the water). Remember it’s not work if you want to do it.

At Seth’s Blog he calls our rule of thumb for success: Have to vs. Get to. Wouldn’t it be great if you get to do what you have to do.

Layering, Principles, Think

The Best Productivity System For You Guaranteed

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Everyone has their own way of doing what it takes to be successful. Is your system better than mine? Or is mine better than yours? Maybe David’s way is better than both of ours? The answer to all three of these questions is undoubtedly “Yes”.

For you, your way is better. For me, my way is better etc. Lets face it, we all do things differently. We do things different because we are in different situations. You may have a home office and need to set up barriers not to let work into your home life and I may have be overwhelmed with email and dealing with that burden is my primary goal.

No matter how well we do things our system is not perfect. This is why you’re reading and trying to get tips to improve yourself- to be more productive. I’m here to find common ground to see where we agree (or should agree)- there are certain fundamentals for success.

My goal on this site is to identify the fundamentals (roadmap and tools) to achieving success. Then you can choose how you want to implement it. You already perform many of the fundamentals yourself but we need to organize it so that we dont need to think about what’s next. Identifying a roadmap will give you a way to tackle any project. The tools will help you get there faster.

The key to any project is to start with basic building blocks: Think, Do, Enjoy. In short:

  • Think before you do something.
  • Do- Do it the best way you can.
  • Enjoy it- gives motivation and meaning to what needs to be done

There’s much more to each of those phases, but I’ve only introduced you to the basics, which you can already apply. The key is to start small- you can’t make a radical change overnight. Building your success machine will take time. You need to take on one task at a time execute it well and gradually take on more as you integrate this into your life. This process is called layering: you start with one success and build on it. Now you’ve just added a new tool to your success tool box (I’m sure you always had it but it never had a name). Next time you have a large project you’ll take the time to think first- how can I break this down into smaller parts. How can I get something done? Pretty soon you’ll be a pro at layering and your productivity will soar.

Should you use an outlook/palm combination or is it a gmail/remember the milk combination to track your to dos? That’s up to you. If i take you out of your comfort zone you wont listen to even the best system. The key to getting more productive and successful is taking it one step at a time.

The best system for you is the one that works for you. Look around here, read Getting Things Done, read other blogs take the best ideas and implement them in your life. Then you’re guaranteed to increase your chance for success.

productivity, Review

Review It Like You Mean It and You’ll Accomplish More

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For many people the weekly review is a chore- it gets in the way of doing real stuff and there’s no time- if they do it at all. Below is a way to make you’re weekly review more rewarding and allow you to accomplish more.

First avoid clutter in your review. Just review your next actions and projects. LifeHack recently had an interesting article 12 Ways to Upgrade Your Weekly Review. They mention many important elements but if you’ve turned your dreams into goals and thus actionable plans most of the reviews suggested aren’t necessary. They are on your to do list/ projects: Health, social, financial etc.

On the other hand it is important to do an optimization and productivity review. They will keep you working optimally. That’s where the Accomplishment Review comes in. It will encompass the optimization and productivity review and will be fun to do. It also gives you something solid to base your ideas off- your completed projects.

The Accomplishment Review is when you look over your completed tasks over the last week. Take pride in all you’ve done and see where you can improve by adding efficiencies. This will give you more enjoyment and motivate you in the future.

Next Action: Incorporate the accomplishment review into your review this week. Report back what you learned.

Layering, Success

How Layering Helped This Site Launch Quickly and Can Help Your Projects

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Completing a large project is difficult. You can go through a phase of requirement gathering, analysis and sign offs and still not anticipate everything that can go wrong. Plus the more time you spend on analysis the more likely the need changes. This is why large projects fail so frequently. The solution is Layering. The concept is simple: break the project into small parts, start small and “launch” frequently. Then add more layers of complexity on it. The advantage of layering is that you can see results quickly and adjust your plan to make your project more successful.

After identifying the desire to start this site I realized it would take months to set up and gather all the required content. That’s a long time. The solution: launch quickly and often. Using the layering technique I did.

1. Identify the Goal
Every project must have a clear goal- if you don’t know where you’re going how do you know when you get there. The goal was to launch a site that conveys the best methodology to achieve success.

2. Start small
I determined the first step is to get a site up, outline the system and start explaining each of the concepts one at a time. If I would have waited to write all the content for all sections to explain the whole system it would have taken a long time. Further, I wouldn’t be getting feedback from my readers along the way on tweaking the content. So this concept will actually make my end product better. I registered the domain and used blogger to get started.

3. Get better
I started adding some more content and filled out categories. But I soon realized that although blogger is good for blogging it’s not good for organizing information. The kind of information information needs a different tool. I evaluated Content Management Systems and decided on Joomla which I had used previously.

4. Tweak it
I tweaked the home page and site organization to make it easier to understand. I’ve added a Get Started page to make it easier to adopt the system. Then I added a game section to house all the fun exercises to teach the system.

5. Keep Layering
I keep adding more blog posts. Then I transform some of the small ideas from a post to the big idea for an article about the principles. I’ve come to a stable stage now, but i know that one day i’ll want to change my look and add logos and branding. But that isn’t important now as I’m building content and a community. So I’ll layer that later.

If you’ve noticed that some items in the blue print and principles aren’t built out yet, now you know why. Come back soon and they will be.

Calculated Risks, Enjoy, Motivation, Think

Do You Have The Audacity to Succeed?

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Most times when I read a blog post and it has some good ideas I’ll file it
away. But the idea usually isn’t acted on. The problem is there’s just too much information out there and without quick action a newer idea has taken its place in your mind. But there’s one post by Skelliewag that truly inspired me to act and it has already helped me achieve results.

The Problem
First, a little background. I’m interested in being more productive (aren’t we all?). I’ve read the productivity books and the productivity blogs. Some are interesting, some are useful but they’re all flawed. One common flaw is that although they can teach you how to do a task faster they don’t consider that maybe you shouldn’t be doing it at all! But the biggest flaw is that they concentrate so much on “doing” (faster, better) that they neglect to realize that you’re not enjoying what you’re doing. What’s the point in doing something if you don’t enjoy it?!? It’s no wonder there are so many posts on motivation and overcoming procrastination.

Based on my readings and experience I’ve boiled success down to a simple formula: Think, Do. Enjoy. The doing is important but when you think before you do and enjoy the process- it increases the potential for success exponentially.

Using this formula, I took an inventory of what I enjoy: writing and increasing my productivity/success. As a result I launched my site Success Making Machine which shares the details of my system. But a site takes time to grow so I had to think of ways to promote my site.

Think
I can just continue to post quality articles and hope someone notices to make a big splash. But that’s a long process. Then I saw inspiration: Skellie’s post Audacious Blogging. There are many ways to be audacious. The Success Making Machine principles encourages calculated risks. I wouldn’t try to be a guest poster for a New York Times blog, that’s too big of a risk (waste of time). My idea was to be audacious by trying to become a guest blogger on Skelliewag, it’s a warm site in my target and she recommends guest posting (#58),

Do
When you’re doing something do it right. I could have just sent an email inquiry to Skellie asking if she would be interested in a guest post but that would have made it too easy to brush off. So I wrote the entire post in advance. Why spend time writing the full post when an inquiry would have seen if there was interest? Audacity! I needed to prove that the post would be quality.

Enjoy
At every stage of doing and thinking you should enjoy it. I follow a simple Success Making Machine principle: Do more of what you like and less of what you don’t like. Without enjoyment people give up at the first sign of adversity. So why am I up past midnight with an early morning tomorrow writing? I could have put this off for another day. The answer is I enjoy it.

Results

So does Audacity work? This isn’t Hollywood, everything doesn’t have a perfect ending. Skellie “loved the post”, but she’s not accepting guest posts at this time. But there is a happy ending which shows it is worth it to shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars. She did offer to link to the story on my blog. So I modified the original for my blog (this makes the original post the best post you never saw). I now have a link from a popular blog and a great story. I think audacity works.

So act now and be audacious.

Update: Skellie linked to this blog at The 5 Barriers to Success Series — Part 3: The Absence of Definition

GTD, Principles

Don’t Get Things Done!

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Go. Do. Act. Do More. Everywhere you turn there are more and more demands on you. The smart people turn to a productivity system like Getting Things Done and gain control of their lives- or do they?

These systems solve can certainly help gain control over tasks but they leave open many problems:

  • Too Complex– You need to read through a 200+ page book to get started. Who has the time and effort to go through it? When you get through the last page do you remember the points from page 10? Then the setup can take days, who has the patients?
  • Don’t focus on Planning– The systems focus almost exclusively on the doing: Get it done faster, better. But they are too quick to act. Many times a little thinking in advance can save much time on the execution or eliminate it completely.
  • Don’t Focus on Enjoyment– You can be perfectly efficient doing tasks you hate but if you don’t enjoy it what’s the point? Then before you know it you’re procrastinating and what good is the system doing for you?
  • Don’t Focus on Your Life– The systems may focus on work. Some even focus on the tasks you perform at home but what about integrating your health, spouse, kids and the rest of your goals into this.

Don’t get me wrong I love Getting Things Done and use many of its principles (You’ll see them in these pages) but it doesn’t address the above problems.

In this site I’m developing (yes developing lots more content to come) a system to take the best of all systems and address the above problems and more. Here are the advantages you’ll experience:

  • Simple It uses simplicity and simple technology to do a lot of the tasks for you. No need to recopy notes and keep 43 million folders for filing.
  • Life Management There’s more to life than work. There’s family, play, community- it’s about balance and doing what you need, when you need to.
  • Get started quickly– I’ve added a Get Started section where you can get started in just a few minutes. Actually if you take away that you should enjoy whatever you do, you’re already ahead of the game.

What are your frustrations with your current system?

Invest

The Best Investment You Can Make Today- Guaranteed

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The real estate market is in a free fall. The stock market is jittery. Is there anywhere left to invest? There is one place- that is always the best investment you can make- it is in yourself. If your company has layoffs or the stock market tanks you will always have the skills and knowledge you’ve acquired and no one can take it away from you. Here are three ways to improve your chances for success.

1. Get Smarter
The simple way to get smarter everyday is to learn more. Your IQ wont change but your knowledge and perspective on the world will. Put yourself in position to learn more: read daily, be sure to talk to interesting people . So where do you start? I recommend reading the Success Making Machine Blog– it will give you something to think about each day.

2. Learn New Skills
Figure out what you want to be when you grow. Determine next steps that can get you farther. Take a course to improve your skills. Ask a friend to teach you something you want to learn. Practice your skills so that you can master them.

3. Upgrade Your Image
The first two items will help you achieve you be smarter and more competent. Now you need to upgrade your outside to match your inside. It’s time to evaluate the image your projecting. Even though people say “dont judge a book by its cover” they still do. Has the quality of your clothes kept up with your promotions? Are your clothes in good repair? Does your work bag reflect the status you want to attain? This upgrade doesn’t have to cost much. Look at yourself objectively and see if you project the success that you are.