> you don't necessarily realize that some people do need deep work, and prioritize your quick satisfaction to other's focus
Surely there must be ways to balance these things?
When you want to ask someone a question it shouldn’t be too hard to infer whether it’s a good time to do that now or you should wait (if it is, well it’s exactly a very hard skill to learn if you put in some effort)
> Sorry for the negative take here but how it's written it feels like you don't necessarily realize that some people do need deep work, and prioritize your quick satisfaction to other's focus.
I'm always confused by people who struggle so much with being able to quickly answer a question and get back to what they were doing.
Also, here you're prioritising your work over someone else's.
> I simply can't stand incessantly being asked questions, I view it as a type of interruption
Well, you are being interrupted. But you're being paid to be interrupted.
>> The people actually doing the work don’t have time to talk about it and the people spending all their time talking about it aren’t doing the work.
I can't really agree with this. I think it's worth noting that writing about something you have just learned is a really good way to solidify that knowledge, especially if you are able to get feedback from others. So a lot of people deliberately set aside the time to do it, even if it comes at the expense of greater levels of productivity.
> even though they are “working“ it takes them hours to respond to slack.
Interesting, I feel the opposite. The longer it takes me to respond to someone’s messages, the more real work I am actually getting done because I’m deeply focused. The days where I quickly reply to everyone are usually the most unproductive.
> Clarify the expected time investment: “Please look into this for me. Do not, DO NOT, spend more than 20 minutes on this. Please come back with whatever you have after 20 minutes.”
For someone like me, this also adds a lot of stress (which over time turns into demoralization and inefficiency). I gotta watch the clock while I'm doing the thing, and maybe optimize my approach for time as I'm going. What if I'm a little distracted that day? Did I get so few results because I'm bad at this or because it was actually complicated? Do I turn it in half done or spend another ten minutes and not tell him?
> I find it impossible to procrastinate when working in pair with another person.
True. But on the flip side, I've found that it also makes it impossible to sit and think deeply about an issue at hand. The tendency is to rush, so it doesn't look like you're not participating.
> How good is your idea of wasting time to get meaningful productivity, if you are achieving someone else's goals instead of your own?
That's a great point actually - the someone else's goals part. The whole intelligence in service of madness thing stems from the fact that sane and intelligent people sometimes do not have a goal of their own.
I definitely did not mean to imply that idling is the only thing you do with your life - on the contrary I was trying to say idling is a great way of knowing who you are and coming up with general goals for yourself that you can then fulfill in the rest of the time.
The problem with busy life is you never really dream of your goals and are constantly looking for things to do - it makes it almost eventual that you'll be in service of others' goals. That's not always a bad thing but I find no fulfillment in doing just that.
> When people focus on productivity, they end up focusing on being busy.
I think this is a common behavior by inexperienced people in new spaces, but is quickly thinned out as people move up in skill. The most consistent sign of an expert seems to be a cool “smoothness” to their choices that achieves good results with the least effort possible.
> If you can answer that question, you will also be able to manage your time efficiently, because you will always be directed toward that purpose.
I have answered that question, and I still procrastinate by negotiating myself out of progressing towards that goal, and then regret doing that but do it again the next time. It may be a valid solution for some, but it's not one size fits all (same as all of the solutions proposed). The real trick is to try all the proposed solutions, and find what works for you.
I like to say I'm discovery-oriented rather than goal-oriented. Being so means I also seek to avoid being overworked because I don't know how to not prioritize discovery. I've tried joining work with pleasure but I find it doesn't lead to good things.
> What do you do to stay focused and make sure all of your priorities get the attention they need?
Here's a few things I do:
1. I have two lists. One which has things I do regardless of how I feel. Another which has things I only do when feeling my best.
2. I time-box everything and stop working either when it feels right or the time expires.
3. I focus on one big project at a time between work and personal life. No more, no less.
4. I strategically underachieve in the area that doesn't need my direct attention or focus.
Life is very seasonal, sometimes work will be the most important thing to focus on for promotion season. Sometimes school will be the most important thing during finals. Sometimes side businesses can take off and need attention at any given moment. There's no right answers here, just continue to work on your unique balance.
You can think of it like a juggler with too many balls in the air or a kitchen stove with too many burners on. There's also ancient quotes about putting more wood behind fewer arrows.
Whichever way you like to think about it, less is more.
>They can be poor for stepping back and thinking “is this really the best way to satisfy that person’s needs?”
This is something I stumbled onto recently. I've been hellbent on making sure I had no distractions and could hit that 5 hour flow state, only to find smaller chunks gave me more points to reflect on the state of the work and redirect it more effectively.
Not just technical ability, but state of mind etc. Anything needed quickly (not everyone will have such) should be straightforwardly accessible by someone who is both distracted and busy.
> Either ChatGTP can do the whole thing itself (not yet the case) or it is a minor productivity boost because the hard part is articulating the problem.
What a ridiculous dichotomy, or course there's plenty of room in between. The hard part might be articulating the problem, but the other part takes time. Make that part not take time and you can do more of the hard part.
> perhaps you just _don't want to be doing whatever you're doing_
There’s a balancing act between doing things that need to get done and doing things that you want to do. Too much of the former is miserable for you. Too much of the latter is miserable for everybody else.
I’ve had to go to bat for people to work on things that maybe aren’t the absolute most efficient short term use of our resources because working on it will make them either happy or less unhappy. But only rarely can I state it so plainly, so I often wonder what takeaways people are coming to.
>There is nothing to understand about that point. It's a linguistic distinction which makes no practical difference.
It does make a practical difference. Important tasks are higher priority under tighter time constraints and vice versa. I fail to see how this isn't a practical distinction.
>If you always lean towards Urgent things, you will neglect the Important. If you always lean towards Important things, you will neglect the Urgent.
If you do this you failed. The point is lean important when time constrained, urgent when not.
>Conversely: if you have a way to decide which task to schedule first, then (to you) they clearly have different priorities.
They have different priorities IN DIFFERENT CONTEXTS. One is higher when time constrained, the other higher when not. It is clear from reading your comments that you have not understood this.
> So if I want to succeed, I need to optimize the heck out of the free time I _do_ have
I'm kind of the opinion that there is no such thing as optimizing your time, only the way you distribute your energy and focus.
Allocating time to do something is meaningless if you've already spent all your mental energy on other tasks.
For most people, free time = a break. So if you're already using 100% of your energy on other things and also expect to be productive in your free time... I'm don't think it adds up.
> It is too easy (and satisfying) to prioritise 10 small urgent tasks, complete and check them off, and feel productive
Very true! I avoided this by doing all the unimportant tasks I could as early as possible, or by ruthless prioritisation (since the person I'm cheating by focusing on busywork is me).
If you have a constant stream of urgent tasks always pushing down the important tasks, you have a workload problem & need to address that first (i.e. by hiring an assistant or reducing your obligations).
Surely there must be ways to balance these things?
When you want to ask someone a question it shouldn’t be too hard to infer whether it’s a good time to do that now or you should wait (if it is, well it’s exactly a very hard skill to learn if you put in some effort)
reply