Doing less is a practice and a mindset. It means that we actively choose to balance our schedules to give space to both our obligations and our rest. It means that we also tune into the mental chaos that surrounds our times of rest and work toward releasing the dialogue that perpetuates a sense of busyness.Doing Less means prioritizing our schedules and making space for rest, play, and rejuvenation.

Do Less, Not More

However, doing less can also exist in the moments when we aren’t doing anything.If we make the conscious effort to eliminate things from our schedule and create a day where the intention is to rest, we also have to pay attention to our mindset during those times of rest. If we are doing “nothing” and internalize judgments about doing nothing, then the nothingness is no longer restful.Doing less helps because it is the antidote for what we already do but doesn’t seem to work.

Doing Nothing While Doing Nothing

If we are doing something enjoyable but our mind is fixed on the following day’s stressful meeting or presentation, then that enjoyable thing is no longer enjoyable. We must be mindful of the present and actively edit our internal dialogue so that it promotes the benefits of restfulness.Research shows that mindfulness, rest, sleep, and engaging in hobbies improve our mood and, in turn, our quality of life. It is easy to be caught up in the chaos of life.

Being Mindful

Out of the too-much-ness is birthed this unending sense of anxiety, this feeling of stress that people can’t ever seem to shake. We could blame social media, relational obligations, toxic workplaces, genetics, trauma, or the state of the world for these feelings of anxiety. However, pointing a finger at the cause of the noise isn’t enough. If we are bogged down by perpetual feelings of being, doing, or experiencing too much, then doesn’t it make sense to simply do less? But this simple concept is not so simple in practice.

Constant State Of Anxiety

Think about how this foolish-sounding idea might help reduce your stress levels and force you into a state of mindfulness. Notice how the simplest of shifts could — if you open your mind to it — have the most significant impact on your overall wellbeing.<ul><li>Schedule your hobbies</li><li>Go to bed a half hour earlier</li><li>Turn off your music in your car and just drive</li><li>Take your lunch break by yourself</li><li>Go outside</li><li>Set a reminder to breathe</li></ul>

Implementing "Doing Less"

Success doesn’t only mean the number of followers gained or the number of dollars earned. Success as a writer — or whatever profession you are pursuing — also must include the quality of your work and the inspiration gained from the topic.Doing less helps because it starts to give our minds and bodies permission to exist, to relax, to take a breath. Making space in our lives to unplug and rejuvenate. Doing less gives room in your life to do things that inspire you and make you feel at peace.

The Calculation Of Success

The average person spends between 7–9 hours on screens every day. Also, the average person only completes about 40% of the tasks on their to-do list. We are operating in this space of nothing and everything. We consume all this content and yet complete little on our list.We are filling our days in ways that leave us feeling perpetually behind. We always have things that must be done, and we never have the time to do those things. Doing less forces us to pause and gain perspective. It attends to the emotional centres of our lived experience neglected by to-do lists and screen time.

Watching Screens All Day

The inconvenient solution to stress and anxiety.

personaldevelopment

Personal Development

mentalhealth

Mental Health

Building Contentment in a Busy World

An <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/mckinsey-digital/our-insights/how-cios-can-work-with-outsourcing-providers-to-navigate-the-coronavirus">outsourcing model</a> is more apt than other analogies: the computing business issues of cloud customers are addressed by third-party providers that deliver innovative computing services on demand to a wide variety of customers, adapt those services to fit specific needs, and work to constantly improve the offering.

The Outsourcing Model

Developers use cloud services to build and run custom applications and to maintain infrastructure and networks for companies of virtually all sizes—especially large global ones. CSPs offer services, such as analytics, to handle and manipulate vast amounts of data. Time to market accelerates, speeding innovation to deliver better products and services across the world.

Benefits For Developers

The pandemic demonstrated that the digital transformation can no longer be delayed—and can happen much more quickly than previously imagined. Nothing is more critical to a corporate digital transformation than becoming a cloud-first business. The benefits are faster time to market, simplified innovation and scalability, and reduced risk when effectively managed. The cloud lets companies provide customers with novel digital experiences—in days, not months—and delivers analytics absent on legacy platforms.  Organizations must make a collective effort that starts at the top.

Reasons To Move To The Cloud

In 2020, the top-three CSPs(cloud service providers) reached <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/mckinsey-digital/our-insights/the-cloud-transformation-engine">$100 billion</a> in combined revenues—a minor share of the global $2.4 trillion market for enterprise IT services—leaving huge value to be captured. To go beyond merely realizing cost savings, companies must activate three symbiotic rings of <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/mckinsey-digital/our-insights/the-cloud-transformation-engine">cloud value creation</a>: strategy and management, business domain adoption, and foundational capabilities.

Ample Growth In Cloud Computing

With cloud computing, organizations essentially buy a range of services offered by cloud service providers (CSPs). The CSP’s servers host all the client’s applications. Organizations can enhance their computing power more quickly and cheaply via the cloud than by purchasing, installing, and maintaining their own servers.The cloud-computing model is helping organizations to scale new digital solutions with greater speed and agility—and to create value more quickly.

Cloud Computing

The cloud revolution has actually been going on for more than 15 years. Today, the next generation of cloud, including capabilities such as serverless computing, makes it easier for software developers to tweak software functions independently, accelerating the pace of release, and doing so more efficiently. Businesses can therefore serve customers and launch products in a more agile fashion.  Cost savings are commonly seen as the primary reason for moving to the cloud but managing those costs requires a different and more dynamic approach focused on OpEx rather than CapEx

Evolution Of Cloud Computing

<ul><li>A fast-casual restaurant chain’s online orders multiplied exponentially during the 2020 pandemic lockdowns, climbing to 400,000 a day, from 50,000. One pleasant surprise? The company’s online-ordering system could handle the volume—because it had already migrated to the cloud. </li><li>A biotech company harnessed cloud computing to deliver the first clinical batch of a COVID-19 vaccine candidate for Phase I trials in just 42 days—thanks in part to breakthrough innovations using scalable cloud data storage and computing to facilitate processes ensuring the drug’s safety and efficacy.</li></ul>

Examples Of Cloud Computing Uses

Three actions CEOs can take to increase the value their companies get from cloud computing:<ul><li>Establish a sustainable funding model.</li><li>Develop a new business technology operating model.</li><li>Set up policies to attract and retain the right engineering talent.</li></ul>

What A CEO Needs To Do

Fortune 500 companies adopting the cloud could <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/mckinsey-digital/our-insights/clouds-trillion-dollar-prize-is-up-for-grabs">realize more than $1 trillion in value</a> by 2030, and not from IT cost reductions alone, according to McKinsey’s analysis of 700 use cases.The cloud’s global infrastructure lets companies scale products almost instantly to reach new customers, geographies, and channels. Finally, digital-first companies use the cloud to adopt emerging technologies and innovate aggressively, using digital capabilities as a competitive differentiator to <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/mckinsey-digital/our-insights/how-to-launch-a-new-business-three-approaches-that-work">launch and build businesses</a>.

The Value Created By Cloud Computing

Some cloud services, such as server space, are leased. Leasing requires much less capital upfront than buying, offers greater flexibility to switch and expand the use of services, cuts the basic cost of buying hardware and software up front, and reduces the difficulties of upkeep and ownership. Organizations pay only for the infrastructure and computing services that meet their evolving needs.

The Costing And Procurement

When companies migrate to the cloud, the simple lift-and-shift approach doesn’t reduce costs, so companies must remediate their existing applications to take advantage of cloud services.Legacy cybersecurity architectures and operating models can also pose problems when companies shift to the cloud. The resulting problems, however, involve misconfigurations rather than inherent cloud security vulnerabilities.  <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/mckinsey-digital/our-insights/security-as-code-the-best-and-maybe-only-path-to-securing-cloud-applications-and-systems">Securing cloud workloads for speed and agility</a>: automated security architectures and processes enable workloads to be processed at a much faster tempo.

Risks Of Cloud Computing

technologyandthefuture

Technology & The Future

business

Business

computerscience

Computer Science

artificialintelligence

Artificial Intelligence

What is cloud computing?

<ul><li>People respond to two types of motivation: reward and fear.</li><li>Perfectionism keeps people from finishing their goals.</li><li>Most people quit as soon as life interferes or things get too tough.</li><li>Starting toward your goal on Day 1 isn’t the most important step. It’s getting past Day 2, “the day after perfect.”</li><li>To improve your chances of finishing, cut your goal in half or double your timeline for completion.</li><li>Choose where to fail. Failing at lesser things frees you to succeed at what’s important.</li><li>“Make it fun if you want it done.”</li><li>Don’t let “noble obstacles” hinder your goals.</li></ul>

Finish! Key Takeaways And Highlights

An alternative to saying “until” is saying “if…then.” It sets up a different form of procrastination. You procrastinate or don’t start working because you’ve set an imaginary clock or pre-goal for yourself and waiting for that to happen, you come to feel as if it’s too late to start toward your goal. It’s never too late to try. You always have time to begin.

A New Way To Procrastinate

Getting started is hard, but it’s easier than finishing. You may have a bunch of half-finished projects and other half-done stuff. Many people make New Year’s resolutions, but research says that 92% of these intentions falter and fail. More than likely, you’ve spent most of your life choosing to do more than is possible and beating yourself up for not being able to keep up.The less that people aimed for perfect, the more productive they became. Perfectionism kills momentum and keeps people from completing their goals.

Perfectionism Kills

Perfectionism will do its best to knock you down when you work on a goal.Excuses are camouflage for perfectionism. You weren’t perfect, so you threw in the towel. You’re not alone. Everyone wants to get straight As. Nobody aims for Bs and Cs. But getting straight As is challenging and intimidating. That’s why many people don’t even bother trying. To finish your goals, simply start and keep going. Even if you make mistakes, keep going. Starting toward your goal on Day 1 isn’t the most crucial step. That’s putting in Day 2, the day after perfect.

The Day After Perfect

If you want to achieve your goal, aim for 50% completion. That is, cut your goal in half. This will work for goals like losing weight, or running in the morning.Some goals are difficult to cut in half. For those, don’t cut them in half; give yourself more time.So you can apply two tactics – cutting the goal in half or doubling the timeline – to many goals. Slicing your goals in half or extending your timeline may feel like “cheating,” but either step will make you much more likely to reach your targets. Starting small may feel unnatural at first, but you will achieve big results.

Fifty-Percent Complete

If you’re like most people, you spend your life aiming too high. You don’t have to lower your standards, just stay realistic about your time frames and what you can accomplish.You have only two options right now. 1. Attempt more than is humanly possible and fail. 2. Choose what to bomb and succeed at a goal that matters.

Let Go Of Trying To Be Perfect In Everything

Many people fail to achieve their goals because they think goals must be difficult. One huge lie perfectionism tells you is that goals don’t count if they’re fun. Scientists and others who study goal setting look at various factors, including satisfaction and performance success, measurements that capture “how you felt about the process” and “what you actually got done.For example, losing weight is a worthy goal, but it’s hard. Motivating yourself to run on a treadmill every day is hard. The trick is to make it fun. Figure out how to add joy to your efforts. Fun is personal.

Have Fun and Get It Done

Be careful how you package your fun. People respond, in general, to two types of motivation: reward and fear. Some people live for the reward. When they know what they want, their instinct drives them to achieve. For example, paying off their debt gives them the freedom to go shopping without stress, or wanting to fit into their old jeans motivates them to work out. Fear also motivates people: They fear the consequences of not acting.

Reward and Fear

Noble obstacles are chores you must finish before you can attack your real goals.Noble obstacles often rely on the word “until” – as in, “I can’t do my taxes until I know what kind of business I’m really trying to build” or “Karen won’t start her blog until she’s checked in with a copyright lawyer first.” Using “until” as an excuse seems respectable. It seems as if you’re getting all your ducks in a row before taking action, but in reality, it’s just another form of perfectionism. It can lead you to throw your hands up and say meeting your goal is too hard, so you won’t try.

Your Noble Obstacles

Unlike emotions, data don’t lie. Use data to measure your progress. Data clarify where you are, but you may find them hard to use. Ignorance is bliss. It’s so much easier to avoid checking your bank account, stepping on a scale, making doctor appointments, and so forth. Data will tell you, for example, that you spend too much at coffee shops. If you buy into the lie of perfectionism, you may avoid the objectivity of data.

Data Don't Lie!

Information helps you measure any number of things related to your goals: time, products sold, pounds lost, miles run, how much money you saved, and the like. Pick one to three aspects of your life to measure. You may be tempted to measure more, but start small and win big. See how simple it is to track your progress. When you’re successful, you can add in measuring more factors. If you’re not happy with your progress, adjust your goal, timeline or actions.

Measure Your Goals And Progress

Time is your most valuable resource. To achieve your goals, pour that resource into your efforts. That means prioritizing where and how you spend your time. When you grant some of your time to one goal, of necessity you take that time from another goal. You can’t have it all no matter what you try to do. Yes, you can squeeze in a few extra things if you structure your days differently. Even so, you’re going to miss out on something. Instead of biting off more than you can chew and failing, choose what you’re going to fail at and succeed at something that counts.

Choosing Your Failures

Sometimes your hiding places – where you go to avoid work – are easy to find, such as watching your favorite show on Netflix when it’s time to clean the house. Some hiding places are sneaky; you think you’re being productive by emptying your inbox, but you’re actually avoiding writing your blog. Identify your hiding places by asking if you engage in “obvious time wasters.” Ask your friends if you spend too much time, effort or money on tasks or hobbies that don’t help you reach your goals.

Your Hiding Places

This goes against every sappy motivational statement…but if you dream too big at the start, you curse your finish.

Perfectionism has no sense of gray, things are only black or white. You do it perfectly or you don’t do it at all.

Research says that setting realistic goals leads to much better performance than setting overly aggressive targets, but what happens in the workplace where you don’t control the timeline? You may want to have a conversation with your boss about the utility of setting achievable goals.Make sure your workplace goals are the right size from the beginning.

Workplace Goals

Setting new goals is easy, but finishing them is hard. In this blockbuster bestseller, blogger and popular speaker Jon Acuff shares his plans to help you actually achieve your goals.

#1 Wall Street Journal bestseller! Jon Acuff, New York Times best-selling author of Do Over, Quitter, and Start, offers strategies for anyone who's ever wondered, "Why can't I finish what I started?" According to studies, 92 percent of New Year’s resolutions fail. You’ve practically got a better shot at getting into Juilliard to become a ballerina than you do at finishing your goals. For years, I thought my problem was that I didn’t try hard enough. So I started getting up earlier. I drank enough energy drinks to kill a horse. I hired a life coach and ate more superfoods. Nothing worked, although I did develop a pretty nice eyelid tremor from all the caffeine. It was like my eye was waving at you, very, very quickly. Then, while leading a thirty-day online course to help people work on their goals, I learned something surprising: The most effective exercises were not those that pushed people to work harder. The ones that got people to the finish line did just the opposite— they took the pressure off. Why? Because the sneakiest obstacle to meeting your goals is not laziness, but perfectionism. We’re our own worst critics, and if it looks like we’re not going to do something right, we prefer not to do it at all. That’s why we’re most likely to quit on day two, “the day after perfect”—when our results almost always underper­form our aspirations. The strategies in this book are counterintuitive and might feel like cheating. But they’re based on studies conducted by a university researcher with hundreds of participants. You might not guess that having more fun, eliminating your secret rules, and choosing something to bomb intentionally works. But the data says otherwise. People who have fun are 43 percent more successful! Imagine if your diet, guitar playing, or small business was 43 percent more suc­cessful just by following a few simple principles. If you’re tired of being a chronic starter and want to become a consistent finisher, you have two options: You can continue to beat yourself up and try harder, since this time that will work. Or you can give yourself the gift of done.

productivity

Productivity

books

Books

#1 Wall Street Journal bestseller! Jon Acuff, New York Times best-selling author of Do Over, Quitter, and Start, offers strategies for anyone who's ever wondered, "Why can't I finish what I started?" According to studies, 92 percent of New Year’s resolutions fail. You’ve practically got a better shot at getting into Juilliard to become a ballerina than you do at finishing your goals. For years, I thought my problem was that I didn’t try hard enough. So I started getting up earlier. I drank enough energy drinks to kill a horse. I hired a life coach and ate more superfoods. Nothing worked, although I did develop a pretty nice eyelid tremor from all the caffeine. It was like my eye was waving at you, very, very quickly. Then, while leading a thirty-day online course to help people work on their goals, I learned something surprising: The most effective exercises were not those that pushed people to work harder. The ones that got people to the finish line did just the opposite— they took the pressure off. Why? Because the sneakiest obstacle to meeting your goals is not laziness, but perfectionism. We’re our own worst critics, and if it looks like we’re not going to do something right, we prefer not to do it at all. That’s why we’re most likely to quit on day two, “the day after perfect”—when our results almost always underper­form our aspirations. The strategies in this book are counterintuitive and might feel like cheating. But they’re based on studies conducted by a university researcher with hundreds of participants. You might not guess that having more fun, eliminating your secret rules, and choosing something to bomb intentionally works. But the data says otherwise. People who have fun are 43 percent more successful! Imagine if your diet, guitar playing, or small business was 43 percent more suc­cessful just by following a few simple principles. If you’re tired of being a chronic starter and want to become a consistent finisher, you have two options: You can continue to beat yourself up and try harder, since this time that will work. Or you can give yourself the gift of done.

Jon Acuff is an accomplished writer whose work has resonated with readers around the world. Jon Acuff has published several books that explore a range of topics, from fiction to nonfiction, and has received critical acclaim for the ability to weave compelling narratives. Jon Acuff's writing style is known for its depth and authenticity, and has earned quite a loyal following of readers.

Jon Acuff

Finish

Finish: Give Yourself the Gift of Done

Self-service is on the rise, and individuals now consume information and data when they want and how they want it. We live during a time of increasingly decentralized information, which means that consumers can select the news they follow, the social media they engage with, and the data that they choose to trust, with the consequence that consumers of information can be subjected to the selective presentation of data to support a wide range of often diverging viewpoints.

The Three Cultural Dynamics: Individual Freedom

Becoming a data-driven organization is a journey, which unfolds over time, measured in years, and sometimes decades. Experience tells us that data-driven organizations consistently demonstrate qualities that distinguish them from their contemporaries. Data-driven companies consistently execute on these three driving principles:<ul><li>Think different. </li><li>Fail fast, learn faster.</li><li>Focus on the long-term.</li></ul>

Steps Companies Can Take

Becoming data-driven is about the ability of people and organizations to adapt to change. Long-established companies, which have been successful over generations or centuries, are unlikely to change overnight — the adoption of the internet through digital transformation efforts has played out over the course of the past quarter-century. Similarly, the effort by companies to become data-driven represents a business transformation that is playing out over the course of a generation.

The Ability To Handle Change

The pandemic — and the disruptions it caused — raised awareness of the importance of data, science, and facts. While companies may have paid lip service to the importance of data before, the case that good data is essential to making informed, prudent, and judicious business decisions have been made crystal clear over the past two years.

The Three Cultural Dynamics: The Pandemic

The amount of data that is created each day continues to proliferate at exponential rates. With greater computing power, companies can now process massive quantities of data to generate a precise answer, rather than rely on representative data samples.

The Three Cultural Dynamics: Structural Fact

Achieving data-driven leadership remains an aspiration for most organizations — just 26.5% of organizations report having established a data-driven organization. Becoming data-driven requires an organizational focus on cultural change. In this year’s survey, 91.9% of executives cite cultural obstacles as the greatest barrier to becoming data-driven. This is not a technology issue. It is a people challenge. Organizations are establishing the leadership function — in the role of the Chief Data and Analytics Officer — which will provide the foundation for becoming data-driven.

Barriers To Becoming Data-Driven: The Three Indicators Of Progress

Company culture is often a bigger hurdle than any technical problem.

Why Becoming a Data-Driven Organization Is So Hard

Verbs to use on your resume instead of ‘helped’ or ‘assisted’: Executed, overhauled, identified, produced, instituted, incorporated, achieved, delivered, partnered, spearheaded, analyzed, incorporated, completed, advocated, resolved, developed, launched, boosted, leveraged, chaired, enacted, established, outperformed, supervised, and pioneered.

Why you should use powerful action verbs

The average initial screening time for a candidate’s resume clocks in at just 7.4 seconds.  With such little time to make an impression, it’s imperative your work achievements leap off the page. Using weak or passive verbs (think: assisted, utilized, contributed, held) can undermine the strength and effectiveness of your resume and cause an HR manager to toss your resume.

Why you shouldn’t say you “helped”

It’s also important to maintain a consistent verb tense throughout your resume. Past tense is acceptable for all verbs, though you can describe your experience in a current job using present tense. Be sure not to mix and match verb tenses within a single set of bullet points—all verb tenses should agree for any given role.

Building Contentment in a Busy World

What is cloud computing?

Finish: Give Yourself the Gift of Done

It's time to
Read like a Pro.

Why Becoming a Data-Driven Organization Is So Hard

CURATED BY

Building Contentment in a Busy World

What is cloud computing?

Finish: Give Yourself the Gift of Done

It's time to Read like a Pro.

Why Becoming a Data-Driven Organization Is So Hard

CURATED BY

It's time to
Read like a Pro.