Productivity is a spectrum from day dreamer to achiever. What if we named these various flavors of productivity? Then when you recognize you have the wrong hat on for the job, you can switch hats. For example, maybe you’re thinking “details” when it’s really time for “big picture.” I’m calling these personas, but they’re really just behavior or thinking patterns. I’m highlighting some of the more common personality personas that you’ll easily recognize.

I’ll use personas as a simple way name the different types of behaviors. Anybody can be a mix of some or all of the various personas. No persona is good or bad. Some are more effective than others depending on the situation. The key is to use the personas as a lens on behavior.

The 20 percent spike is a distinctive strength. It’s unusually powerful. Using your 20 percent spike generates exponential results. It’s a way to amplify your impact and maximize results. My 20 percent spike is information artistry. I use this skill to create, organize, and share complex information in a simple way. At work, it helps me write more effective books. At home, it helps me learn faster and turn insights into action. From a service standpoint, it helps me unleash the best in others.

I’m always on the prowl for useful insights.  A colleague, Dustin Andrew, has a useful post, Learn to Get Traction in Your Team.  I like his collection of tips, and I found myself using the phrase, “iterate more, plan less” a few times.  When I joined Microsoft, one of my rules was “avoid analysis paralysis.”  I avoid analysis paralysis by taking action, producing results, and changing the approach as I learn.  I’ve learned to improve by versioning perfection over time.  I find it’s easier to settle for “good enough’ for …

You can use the 80/20 Rule to improve your life. The 80/20 rule simply means that you focus on the 20 percent of the activities that produce 80 percent of the value. This means letting go of the activities that bog you down, in favor of the activities that lift you up. To do this well means first knowing what you do well and then being able to let the rest go. Once you’re willing to let things go, you open up a lot of options.

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This post is an index of my book nuggets from the book Overachievement: The New Science of Working Less to Accomplish More , by John Eliot, Ph.D .  Book nuggets are simply my key take aways from the book, including key principles, patterns, and practices.  Overachievement is a book focused on exceptional performance in work and life.  It’s based on lessons learned from cutting-edge research in cognitive neuroscience and Dr. Eilot’s real-world coaching of Olympic athletes, surgeons, actors, salespeople, and superstars in other fields. 
My Book Nuggets
Here’s my book …

Knowledge workers can change the game. Knowledge can be used as an asset to improve the effectiveness of your business. Exponentially. You can use knowledge to improve your process or product. You can gain efficiencies or create differentiates. It’s not about having people just spend time in their jobs during the week. It’s about creating enough space where knowledge workers can think of new ways to do things. It’s about harvesting those ideas and turning them into results.

This is the heart of my results system. It’s a pattern I call Monday Vision, Daily Outcomes, Friday Reflection. It’s probably the single most important thing I teach everyone I mentor. It’s the same approach I use to lead myself and my teams. It’s a way to help set yourself up for success each day. It’s also a way to keep learning and growing. It’s simple, but it’s powerful. In fact, it’s power is its simplicity

This is a follow up to my post, Manage Energy, Not Time. A few folks have asked me how I figure out energy drains and catalysts. Some people jazz you. Some people don’t. Some tasks jazz you. Some tasks don’t. Just paying attention to this fact can help you start to get a handle on your energy. Energy is your premium resource in today’s world. You need to know where your passions come from, just as much as you need to know what gets in the way. Simply noticing this will help you start to see patterns of things you do or who you spend your time with.

This a practice I learned long ago and it’s actually helpful whether it’s day to day or building software. It’s doing worst things first. Rather than save a hurdle to the end, do it up front when you’re you’re strongest.

There are 4 key time wasters that show up from management and organizational ineffectiveness. One time waster is a recurring crisis. This means there’s a lack of system foresight to anticipate and respond effectively. Another time waster is friction and feuding among teams. This is usually a sign of overstaffing. Another time waster is too many meetings. Too many meetings are often a sign of the wrong organizational structure. Another significant time waster is bad information. People need accurate, relevant, timely information to do do their jobs well.

Time is all you’ve got. Spend it wisely. It’s a limited resource. It’s also a unique resource. There’s nothing like it. You can’t buy more of it. The best you can do is make the most of the time you have. When you value your time, it forces you to prioritize more effectively. You’re always making trade-offs. When you value your time, you enjoy the time you spend. The moment is all you have. When you realize that time is a limiting factor, you find ways to save time. Rather than throw more time at problems, you find better techniques.

Paving a path forward is a skill. The more you do it, the better you get. If there’s one place where your ability to pave a path forward gets tested, it’s driving projects. On sizable projects, the gap between your project vision and current reality can be overwhelming. Somehow you have to get from point A to point B and there’s not always a map. Sometimes you’re the map maker. This is especially true when your heading into uncharted territory. Even when you have a map, it doesn’t mean it’s going to be easy. What you need is a way to pave a path forward.

It’s one thing to predict your downstream results. It’s another to test it. I’m a fan of scrimmaging against results to find my strengths and weaknesses as early in the project as possible. I encourage others to do the same. In sports, a scrimmage is when you play another team informally. Playing teams in scrimmages before the season starts, helps reveal strengths and weaknesses before it counts.

Here’s a technique I learned back in Microsoft Developer Support. It’s called sweeping. The idea is simple. You periodically “sweep” the mess. You schedule a focused batch of time and sweep your mess. In our case, it was the knowledge base (KB). What happens with content is it erodes over time. You also end up with a bunch of stuff that either doesn’t belong or can be improved. Each sweep was like a breath of fresh air.

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Do you have a favorite set of forcing functions?   A forcing function is any task, activity or event that forces you to take action and produce a result.   If you have areas in your life that you’re finding inertia, try adding some forcing functions to get results.
Slides as Forcing Functions
At Microsoft patterns & practices, one of our forcing functions is building a slide deck.  Building a deck is a forcing function because it forces us to distill the points, close down on issues, identify what …

The rule of 3 is a very simple way to get results. Rather than get overwhelmed by your tasks, you bite off 3 things you can accomplish. This puts you in control. If nothing else, it gives you a very simple frame for the day. I’ve been using the rule of 3 for a few years to drive results both for myself and for my teams. It’s the simplest way to go from running around like a chicken with your head cut off to a peaceful calm. It’s one of the first skills I teach my mentees at Microsoft to help them get on track and learn the art of ruthless prioritization.

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If you’re backlogged and you want to get out, here’s a quick, low tech, brute force approach.   I’ve used it on my teams many times to help people get unstuck and to feel like they’re getting results.
Map It OutHere’s the steps:

Queue.  On your whiteboard, first write your key backlog items.   This is your queue.   If you don’t have a whiteboard, substitute a sheet of paper.  The point is keep it visible and simple.
To Do. Next to it, write down To Do. 
Rule of 3.  Under …

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Have you ever wondered why some things you can do on “auto-pilot” or without thinking, while other tasks are mentally draining? Your thoughtful tasks are using your working memory (prefrontal context), while your repetitive, familiar and routine activities are using your basal ganglia, which doesn’t require conscious thought.
Working Memory vs. Routine ActivityDavid Rock and Jeffrey Schwartz summarize the prefrontal cortex and basal ganglia in their article, “The Neuroscience of Leadership”, in “strategy+business” magazine:

Working Memory (Prefrontal Cortex) – Your prefrontal cortex is your working memory.  It’s …

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Manage energy, not time, to get more things done …  This concept really resonates with me.  I also like it because it can be counter intuitive or non-obvious.  One way to try and get more things done is to, jam more in your schedule.  Yuck!  Unfortunately, that’s a fairly common practice.
It’s Not About More Time Management PracticesI actually have lots of practices for managing time (outcome-based work breakdown structures, managing outcomes vs. activities, prioritizing outcomes based on usage and value, avoiding over-managing minutia, using outcome-based …

I find chunking my notes from lectures and training helps me turn insights into action. I chunk them into three categories: actions, insights, and notes. This simple refactoring helps me quickly find the actions or my “ah has” without having to fish through a laundry list of reference points. I bubble these to the top so I can find them at a glance. The act of refactoring my notes also helps remind me of the most valuable parts, which is usually the new distinctions …