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How To Be Productive According To Ancient Philosophy
Busyness leads to unproductiveness
“Beware the barrenness of a busy life.” – Socrates
Don’t take on more tasks and responsibilities. You end up doing many things in a mediocre way. Instead, focus your time and energy on a few important things.
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Make small progress every day
“Better a little which is well done, than a great deal imperfectly.” – Plato
Set 3-4 important tasks that will directly contribute to what you want to achieve in life.
Marcus Aurelius
“If you seek tranquility, do less. Or do what’s essential. Do less, better. Because most of what we do or say is not essential. If you can eliminate it, you’ll have more tranquility..."
Keep the momentum going
“It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop.” – Confucius.
One unproductive day can destroy your whole momentum. And that can set you back months.
Small things lead to big outcomes
All your small actions combined, form your system for living.
And that leads to the big outcomes in life: More happiness, fulfillment, wealth—all a result of your system.
Be mindful about the work you do
“Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.” – Aristotle
No matter how hard you work today, never see it as a sacrifice. You will end up resenting yourself.
Celebrate the process, not the outcomes
“Neither blame or praise yourself.” – Plutarch
When you blame yourself often, you end up hating yourself. And when you praise yourself too much, you end up loving yourself in an unhealthy way (a form of narcissism). If you overdo it, you sacrifice the quality of your work.
Productivity has always been important
Although productivity might seem something that became important only recently, after the industrial revolution, it has been a topic of discussion ever since ancient eastern and western philosophy started.
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Excuse-making
It's a defense mechanism you use in the battle between your positive self-identity and the common challenges of everyday life.
This habit comes down to an inherent need to protect your...
The self-serving bias
It encourages you to claim your successes and to deflect your failures.
When something good happens, you take the credit, but when something bad happens, you blame it on something out of your control.
Common types of excuses
- Lies: This is one of the worst types of excuses—a straight-up lie.
- Self-handicapping excuses: Such as “I don’t have the skills to do that”, or “That’s not my job.”
- Blame-shifting excuses: Instead of putting the blame on your lack of abilities, you accuse external factors for your missteps or lack of performance.
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Productivity guilt
Productivity guilt is a mindset of feeling bad about not creating, achieving or working hard.
The Zeigarnik effect
This is the tendency to have “intrusive thoughts” about a task that we once started but didn’t finish.
It is in our human nature to finish off things that we start and we often hate having to leave a project unfinished.
Some people are very good at maintaining a detachment between their work and their outside life. For others (especially those indoctrinated in ‘life hacks’ and productivity tips), the guilt to be constantly doing something can be a real energy sucker.
Stop Comparing Yourself to Others
Before comparing yourself to that guy over there, realize what he’s sacrificing.
If you’re feeling guilty about your lack of “productivity”, then you’re not going to be truly productive at all.
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Measuring Employee Productivity
Fixing employee productivity in the industrial age, when most workers were handling machinery and it’s parts, was a tedious but doable process. The managers had to fix the people who were making mi...
The Old Productivity Formula
The basic productivity formula(productivity= output divided by input) worked well in the industrial age as the output and input were clearly defined and measurable.
Today’s leaders need innovative solutions to measure and improve productivity in a knowledge-based workplace, as the measurement of output and input is not what it was.
Quality And Quantity
While assigning value to the output of knowledge workers, we cannot simply measure the output like before.
Coders and doctors cannot be measured by the hour, as their output is not uniform or consistent every hour.
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