Genuine Curiosity

Author Dwayne Melancon is always on the lookout for new things to learn. An ecclectic collection of postings on personal productivity, travel, good books, gadgets, leadership & management, and many other things.

 

Cosmic nudging

OK, so stick with me on the following sequence:

  1. A couple of days ago, Bren (Slacker Manager) wrote about a "cosmic nudge" that caused him and me to listen to the same audio book at about the same time. 
  2. Today, I found out that my friend Gene Kim just finished reading the same book, "Leadership and Self Deception."
  3. Today, I re-read Bren's post and noticed that he also mentioned Eli Goldratt, of whom I'm a huge fan (I've read all of his books, along with related works).
  4. Even freakier: as part of some research and "evangelization" of IT best practices we're working on, the aforementioned Gene Kim talked with Goldratt a few months ago
  5. Here's where the nudge comes to fruition: I've had an article on Goldratt fermenting in my drafts folder for about 6 weeks, but haven't gotten around to finishing it up.

Consider me nudged. Here is the article, in all its obtuse glory:

Back in the 80's, I read a book called "The Goal" by Eliyahu Goldratt. It is a "business novel" used to discuss Goldratt's "Theory of Constraints" model for productivity and throughput (keep in mind, this is not about individual throughput - rather, it's about the throughput of systems and processes).

Goldratt's theory (called TOC by us fans) is very complex, and was originally written about in very sterile, technical papers. It was geared toward optimizing manufacturing processes, but Goldratt recognized that it had applicability in many other aspects of business.

Back when Goldratt began writing about this stuff, he held what were considered to be contrarian views about process optimization, inventory, and other aspects of manufacturing resource planning. I found his analysis and premises to be very intriguing and, even though I'm a software guy and not a manufacturing person, in the last 20 years or so I have found that his concepts apply to lots of other contexts if you squint just right.

For example, one of the core assertions of Goldratt is that achieving "local optima" within a system will not optimize the system's throughput. Instead, you have to find the system's constraint (or bottleneck) and elevate it by subordinating all other parts of the system to the constraint.

The premise: throughput of the system can never exceed the capacity of the bottleneck, so what's the point in optimizing the usage of non-bottleneck resources?

Goldratt's principle follows a methodical approach to resolve constraints, at which point you always uncover another bottleneck. So, the cycle repeats as each bottleneck is discovered and resolved.

You can adapt this philosophical approach to many things, such as personal workflow - at any given time, there is probably one key bottleneck preventing you from optimizing your effectiveness. Focus on it and subordinate all other activities until it's resolved, then rinse and repeat.

If you are a GTD follower, your constraint is probably one of your next actions that you've either neglected or have failed to articulate. OK, so maybe I'm stretching it a bit, but I'm one of those people who looks for patterns all over the place (which, of course, means I find them).

If you're interested in more about the Theory of Constraints, check out this link to my top 8 list of TOC books, listed in the order I recommend.

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Make it up, make it happen

Over on Steve Pavlina's blog, he writes about the movie "What The Bleep Do We Know..." and says he's "...convinced that there is definitely some kind of linkage between intention and reality that bypasses direct action."

I've often pondered that connection myself, as well as his question: where's the limit? This is, of course, not a new concept - I've always been a big believer in the power of prayer and the human spirit.

This is also embodied in "the power of positive thinking,"  force of will, and all that sort of thing, isn't it? And, it's what David Allen describes with the premise that a huge part of Getting Things Done is to "Make it Up, and Make it Happen."

All of this reminds me of a book I read recently, called "The Message of a Master" which tells a story about someone who learns a 'secret' from a guru of sorts. In the book, the secret he learns is that all the potential in their world exists for your benefit, and all you have to do is focus on your goal and your psyche becomes a force of attraction that brings all the necessary elements into your life to make the goal a reality. There are, of course, rules that this secret cannot be used for evil, etc.

All in all, a very intriguing concept. Remindes me of the notion that anything in the universe begins to exist the moment someone formulates an idea about it within their mind.

Thanks for provoking the thought, Steve.

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Being unavailable in a high availability world

This past weekend I went undercover. Well, sort of.

You see, I've been looking at how I spend my time - time diaries, workflow analysis, that sort of thing. (If you want to do a time audit on yourself, I highly recommend Steve Pavlina's article on "How To Triple Your Personal Productivity")

I've been traveling around 80% of the time for the past couple of months, and decided that this past weekend I would do home chores and things with the family for a change. So, I left my laptop in my bag, I left my Treo 600 on the cabinet connected to the charger, and I disconnected.

It was kind of odd, but I think it helped me recharge, as well. It was good in a lot of different ways. For example, I spent some relaxing, fun time with my kids. And my wife's van fits in the garage again for the first time in ages (that was an enduring fixture on my Someday/Maybe list).

I think I'll plan on "no tech weekends" more often.

P.S. The email didn't miss me, as far as I can tell.

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Want to go home early?

As promised (OK, so I decided to spend the weekend with the family without my computer, so this is later than expected) here is my take on Laura Stack's book "Leave The Office Earlier." The premise of this book is very similar to lots of others you may have read: organize and prioritize your life, and you'll get more done and have more time for fun.

What set this one apart for me was that it reads like a "best practice" collection from a bunch of other sources. I recognized tips and tricks that were similar to those found in David Allen's Getting Things Done, Steven Covey's 7 Habits of Highly Successful People, and various other books I've read. It also has some of the self-assessment and energy level awareness aspects found in online tools like ThinkTQ.

If you are like me, you like to have various perspectives on things like productivity, and end up "rolling your own" by mixing and matching the parts that work for you.

Whether Laura Stack meant to or not, her book happens to bring together a lot of the aspects I really liked from the various sources I've read. And she's added a lot of practical exercises and different, insightful twists on those things. That's why I classify this work as a best practice collection.

Why don't you give it a try? Let me know how it goes.

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Getting Things...Stuck?

I'm noticing a proliferation of blog posts (for example, Punkey alludes to it,  as does Steve Pavlina) in which people talk about how they are "stuck" with GTD (David Allen's "Getting Things Done") or have some fundamental issue with keeping it going. What's up with that?

I've had my own challenges with this. I started out loving the GTD system, then got a bit "stuck" and started to feel like I had gotten a lot of things done, but wasn't feeling all that good about them because they didn't feel focused.

I think it's partially about rigor and consistency around GTD - that's hard to maintain sometimes. I also think the Weekly Review is a big part of making it work, and that's one of the first things to go when life gets hectic.

Without a Weekly Review, items get stagnant in my lists (and they begin to repel me, so it feeds on itself).

Another aspect of this challenge: I think you have to inject the higher calling into your processing of your lists and planning of your week. I totally neglected this for a while (David Allen's "50,000 foot view" is part of this, as is the Covey Mission Statement). That's so touchy feely and introspective, I figured I'd get to it later. Trouble is, it wasn't even on my Someday / Maybe list.

The price of freedom is eternal vigilance - and that applies for GTD, too. I am not giving up - just continuing to try to learn and improve.

What's your experience been like?

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