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There are 2 things that have a strong influence on personal productivity, but rarely get attention: self-confidence and pride. By 'pride' I'm not referring to cockiness or a boastful attitude and inflated ego. I'm talking about the feeling you get when you've accomplished something, or when you've been of service and created value. That feeling. That pride. The more you…

The Task Categories Every day, you have decisions to make. Which tasks are going to get your time, attention, and energy today? With the limited resource that is you today—which tasks get a piece of you? How big a piece of you do they get? Answering this question is not something that should be done too quickly. Otherwise, you have…

There was a period not long after I started using this system when my career score dipped significantly. I found myself ending days with scores well below the .750 mark. And I wasn't sure what more I could do to get back to getting better scores. But then I began to observe how I began my day, once I had…

Regardless of what form it takes a personal productivity system is really meant to be two things: a funnel and a filter. Life is full of stuff coming at you. It’s an ongoing stream of information, questions, demands, problems, opportunities, emails, calls, conversations, and various other things. There are always other things. Hence the need for the funnel and the…

One of my favorite quotes about priorities comes by way of Merlin Mann: “priorities are like arms; if you think you have more than a couple, you’re either lying or crazy.[1]” When you think about it, this makes a lot of sense. Mann has a little more to say in terms of an explanation: …priorities can only be observed. In…

You're ready for the day. You've filled out your card. You've got all of your items on it. The top ones serve your goals, the rest are things that you'll feel great when you get them done today. You're confident you can get all your points today. You're about to get going. And then...you get a phone call. Or you…

The Today Card is tactical by nature. But because it gets you to focus on things at a tactical level each day, it allows you to eventually be more strategic. The better you get at filling out the card, the better you'll get at getting the stuff on it done. And vice versa. In his books Turn The Ship Around…

We humans have all sorts of quirks. From moment to moment, our desires can change. Our interests can change. We can get distracted, and trick ourselves into diverting away from serving our goals and values. And like any habit, the more it happens, the harder it is to get yourself free from it. Now that I’ve been filling out a…