what's wrong with productivity?: part ii
Post on 06-Aug-2015
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What’s Wrong with
Productivity?Part II
Tiago FortePowered by Small World Socialhttps://www.smallworldsocial.com/productivitylink/
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• Productivity has historically been so top-
down because it has its roots in executive
coaching, that high-touch, hyper-
personalized, one-on-one service that
generations of C-suite executives have
relied on.
• The lack of alternative models of
productivity instruction (insider knowledge is
passed directly from coach to client)
• The lack of alternative models of
accountability and support, like peer-to-peer
5. It is overpriced and unscalable
Most personalized services areout-of-reach for the average person
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There are many arenas dominated by
proprietary information and insider
connections, but times have changed.
Productivity is no longer only the concern
of top management. In a world of
alternative employment, of exploding
numbers of people starting businesses,
becoming freelancers, and evolving into
independent contractors, everyone needs
to be able to understand what drives
their productivity. This is what excites me
so much about Coach.me and other
mobile-based behavior change apps. productivitylink.smallworldsocial.com
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• In the Get Stuff Done Like a Boss class where I
teach people, step-by-step how to set up a GTD
workflow using specific programs, on their
computer taken by over 10,000 people, the most
common positive feedback is…
6. It ignores technology implementation
“I finally understand how
to implement this system in the real
world”productivitylink.smallworldsocial.com
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Many of these people had read and tried
numerous times to implement GTD. Many
of them, judging by their in-class
projects, are avid productivity fans. But
the fact is, most of our tools have not
approached the intuitiveness and ease of
use required for wide-scale adoption.
Developed by and for our tech-savvy
peers here in Silicon Valley, it is all too
easy to forget that even the tiniest
barrier can keep people not only from
using your app, but from implementing
an entire system because they don’t
trust their tools.
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Throughout this piece, I’ve treated productivity as an
end in itself. I’ve assumed that the benefits of
more/better/faster are self-evident. But this is
obviously the deepest, and most problematic issue
with productivity — it’s not self-evident at all.
There are real risks to an excessive focus on
improving your own performance. Over-optimizing
your life, paradoxically, makes it harder to enjoy it.
Perfectionism has now been shown to be an under-
appreciated risk factor in suicide. Stories of burnouts
with long-lasting physical and psychological
consequences are slowly becoming more
commonplace.
7. It is inhumane
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At some point we will need to redefine the
very meaning of productivity, away from
impersonal statistics and toward more holistic
ideas of wellbeing, satisfaction, and happiness.
We’ll need to acknowledge that our current
definition of the term, and therefore the
implicit assumptions of the tools we build, is
centered on a white, male, affluent worldview.
There are encouraging signs, with the upswell
in interest in mindfulness, meditation, simpler
living, and social entrepreneurship.
I’m hopeful that the increasing awareness
around the importance of diversity will
eventually reach the walled garden of
productivity, changing the very terms of the
debate.
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As Albert Einstein purportedly put it,
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“You can never solve a problem on the level on which it was created.”
I think we will find that many of the problems we are facing with our stagnating productivity and wages will not be solved by more technology, nor by improved workflows, but by a deeper reassessment of what really matters in our pursuit of success.
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Want to read more about productivity?
Visit: productivitylink.smallworldsocial.com for everything you need to know about
productivity in one place
productivitylink.smallworldsocial.com
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Want to read more about productivity?
Visit: www.productivitylink.us for everything you need to know about
productivity in one place
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