Apple is a collaborative company. They are organised like a start-up. They meet for three hours once a week and talk about everything they're doing. They don't have committees. One person is in charge of each division.  There is an incredible amount of teamwork at the top of the company, which filters down to great teamwork throughout the company.

The key to Apple's success

Teamwork is dependent on trusting the other people to come through with their part without watching over their shoulder. Apple is great at figuring out how to divide things up into great teams, and all work on the same thing, touch bases regularly and bring the product together.

Teamwork is dependent on trust

If you wanna hire great people and have them stay working for you, you have to let them make a lot of decisions and you have to be run by ideas, not hierarchy. The best ideas have to win, otherwise good people don't stay.

Stashed ideas

Steve Jobs talks about managing people

Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't used to an environment where excellence is expected.

Steve Jobs — ‘Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't used to an environment where excellence is expected.’

Essay Quotes

“Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't u...”

Bullet journals and planners aren’t for everyone. But everyone should have a way to keep themselves accountable to their health and projects.The benefit of setting up a system on your phone is that the upkeep requires very little effort, because there software tools in place to do the work for you. Simply have the patience to set up the system, and reap the benefits.

A Holistic Health and Productivity System for your Phone

The Health app is powerful. It can be integrated with a other applications and keep all your information in one place.Any water, nutrition, exercise, or sleep apps you use can and should be synced automatically with Health.

The Health App

This is the key to a useable system. The more of a hassle it is to input data, the less likely you are to keep it up.So use widgets and shortcuts! When looking for a good app, also test that they have useful widgets and shortcuts available.A water tracking app, for example, should ideally have:<ul><li>A widget with your goal and how close you are to reaching it;</li><li>A way to automatically add a certain amount of water, through shortcuts or a widget.</li></ul>Same for any habit tracker or nutrition app

Simple input methods!

It’s important not to have any superfluous apps in your system. If it’s not useful, it’s wasting your time and you’re less likely to update it.Think about your routine and your needs, and pick your apps accordingly. Here are some you might find useful:<ul><li>Water;</li><li>Nutrition;</li><li>Exercise;</li><li>Sleep;</li><li>Tasks;</li><li>Calendar.</li></ul>

What apps do you need?

Some aspects of the default apps are inconvenient. Adding water or nutrition data, for example, takes diving deep into the recesses of the Health app.But sometimes they’re fine! Better than fine, sometimes they’re well integrated and have all the features you need. It’s worth it to check first, before you pay for a more fancy app you might not need.

Is the default app enough?

Habit will not disappoint. It’s feature complete and has good widgets. The shortcuts are lacking, but it is free. It also integrates with the Health app. If you want to track sleep, steps, exercise, water, meditation… The sky is the limit, and Habit is your rocket.

So you need a habit tracker…

I’ve got you. Waterful has a friendly octopus that needs you to drink water to survive. It has useful widgets, and you can also configure shortcuts to add any amount of water you want.Remember to untick the show on run option on the shortcut and you’re one click away from logging your water.

So you need a water tracker…

The default is fine. It integrates with the sleep focus mode, and the paid ones don’t add much value.

So you need a sleep tracking app

Avoid subscription based apps, those will build up quickly and aren’t usually that special. The default reminders app is fine, but if you need a bit more Things 3 is great. It has useful widgets, of course, as well as shortcuts. It also integrates with your calendar, which is useful to better visualise your day.Todoist and TickTick are fine, but some of the best features are behind the subscription pay wall.

So you need a to-do list app…

The apple calendar is gorgeous and plenty functional. You can your google and microsoft calendars, and add events directly through it.

So you need a calendar app…

I’ve got nothing. Sorry. I could sit here and recommend you an app I don’t use, but my integrity won’t allow it. And a nutrition app is just not something I care about and I know I wouldn’t update it.Here’s an important lesson. Know what you don’t need. It’s often even better than knowing what you need. You can quote me on that.

So you need a nutrition app…

All the apps I recommend integrate with it. You can use their complications for easy access. Honestly, it becomes so easy to keep up the system even I do it.Also use the shortcuts app, you can add most of your shortcuts to the watch. I have my water shortcut and a few others to turn lights on and off.

If you have an Apple Watch:

<ul><li>Tide: I’m a hypocrite. This meditation app has a subscription. But this is worth it for me. Tide makes me meditate everyday, and it syncs with the Health app. Find your Tide, it doesn’t have to be paid.</li><li>Drafts: Useful for quick capture of notes, on your phone or apple watch. The pro version is subscription based unfortunately, and I’m looking for alternatives. Please do tell me if you know any.</li></ul>

Honourable mentions! Part 1

<ul><li>EMMO: If you look past the weird translations, this is wonderful. There are widgets for quick capture of you emotions. You can add pictures, stickers, timestamps. Just don’t try to delete any of your emotions because it breaks everything.</li><li>Stoic: Good to guide your day. It asks you a few quick questions in the morning and evening. Personally, I use Stoic in the morning and EMMO in the evening. I like that Stoic guides you, it’s just what I need when I wake up.</li></ul>

Honourable mentions! Part 2

If for some reason you would like to know what is going on in the world, you poor soul, I recommend downloading all the news apps you like and putting their notifications in scheduled summaries.I have mine during breakfast and the ride home from work, and I read all the headlines and click the articles I want to know more about.If you don’t want to know, I feel you. If it’s really important I’m sure you’ll eventually hear about it.

Honourable mentions! News apps

Set up your system to be deeply integrated and have simple input methods. Shortcuts and widgets are your friends.Don’t add apps you don’t need, they’re just clutter. When looking for the right app, make sure it has all the features you need, widgets and shortcuts, and that it integrates well into your system.Now go forth and be productive!

TL;DR

I’ve always had a productivity system in place, but this one is the most convenient. Don’t underestimate your phone. It’s not just good for instagram.

mine

Make your phone productive!

<ul>
<li>Inspiration: Thinking big ideas and imagining what might be possible</li>
<li>Collaboration: Working together well with other people.</li>
<li>Craft: Applying skill to achieve high-quality results and always striving to do better.</li>
<li>Diligence: Doing the necessary grunt work and never resorting to shortcuts or half measures.</li>
<li>Decisiveness: Making tough choices and refusing to delay or procrastinate.</li>
<li>Taste: Developing a refined sense of judgment and finding the balance that produces a pleasing and integrated whole.</li>
<li>Empathy: Trying to see the world from other people’s perspectives.</li>
</ul>

The Seven Essential Elements Of The Apple Development 
Approach

In any complex effort, communicating a well-articulated vision for what you’re trying to do is the starting point for figuring out how to do it. And though coming up with such a vision is difficult, it’s unquestionably more difficult to complete the entire circuit, to come up with an idea, a plan to realize the idea, and then actualize the plan at a high standard, all without getting bogged down, changing direction entirely, or failing outright.

A Well Articulated Design Vision

Taste is developing a refined sense of judgment and finding the balance that produces a gratifying and integrated whole. The small-scale justifications must contribute to a scheme larger than themselves. The design responsibility expands to balancing the many individual refined-like responses against the other side of the taste equation, the attempt to create a pleasing and integrated whole.

The Value Of Good Taste In Holistic Design

Persist too long in making choices without justifying them, and an entire creative effort might wander aimlessly. The results might be the sum of wishy-washy half decisions. Developing the judgment to avoid this pitfall centers on the refined-like response, evaluating in an active way and finding the self-confidence to form opinions with your heart and head.
It’s not always easy to come to grips with objects or ideas and think about them until it’s possible to express why you like them or not, yet taking part in a healthy and productive creative process requires such reflective engagement.

Killing The Creative Effort

The appearance of a product should tell you what it is and how to use it. Objects should explain themselves.

When developing Safari, the Apple team quickly ran into speed and performance issues. Steve mandated that the browser be fast, so one member of the team (Don) directed that they implement a set of automated tests that would launch the browser and have it load a bunch of web pages in succession and report back a speed. Ken wrote the code for it and soon they had their “Page Load Test” (PLT) benchmark, which enabled their development process to ensure the product became “faster by never getting slower”.

Apple Stories: Safari

To make great work, one requires a combination of people and commitment. Creative selection and the seven essential elements were our most important product development ingredients, but it took committed people to breathe life into these concepts and transform them into a culture. The culture we created is inseparable from the products we created. In my experience, this manner of culture formation works best when the groups and teams remain small, when the interpersonal interactions are habitual and rich rather than occasional and fleeting.

A Committed Team

Ken Kocienda is a software engineer who, among other things, worked on “Project Purple”: Apple’s codename for the original iPhone. Ken writes about the process behind software creation at Apple—which he dubs "creative selection"—and how he thinks that process was a significant driver in how Apple came up with its world-class products.

* WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLER * An insider's account of Apple's creative process during the golden years of Steve Jobs. Hundreds of millions of people use Apple products every day; several thousand work on Apple's campus in Cupertino, California; but only a handful sit at the drawing board. Creative Selection recounts the life of one of the few who worked behind the scenes, a highly-respected software engineer who worked in the final years of the Steve Jobs era—the Golden Age of Apple. Ken Kocienda offers an inside look at Apple’s creative process. For fifteen years, he was on the ground floor of the company as a specialist, directly responsible for experimenting with novel user interface concepts and writing powerful, easy-to-use software for products including the iPhone, the iPad, and the Safari web browser. His stories explain the symbiotic relationship between software and product development for those who have never dreamed of programming a computer, and reveal what it was like to work on the cutting edge of technology at one of the world's most admired companies. Kocienda shares moments of struggle and success, crisis and collaboration, illuminating each with lessons learned over his Apple career. He introduces the essential elements of innovation—inspiration, collaboration, craft, diligence, decisiveness, taste, and empathy—and uses these as a lens through which to understand productive work culture. An insider's tale of creativity and innovation at Apple, Creative Selection shows readers how a small group of people developed an evolutionary design model, and how they used this methodology to make groundbreaking and intuitive software which countless millions use every day.

Creative Selection

The issue: Users incorrectly used a new medical device that capture images of the human retina. Users didn't read the user manuals or watch the training videos. This could potentially cause a false diagnosis and possibly permanent blindness. The team had to re-train the medical staff but couldn't sustainably do this for every customer. The only solution was to improve the UX. Ultimately, the issue was lacking direction in designing for user understanding. Three biggest takeaways:<ul><li>Be bold</li><li>Exploit familiar analogies</li><li>Think beyond screens and wireframes.</li></ul>

Designing for user understanding

The product suffered from two key issues: <ul><li>Essential complexity: Essential complexity is directly caused by the problem you're trying to solve. It suggests removing less important functionalities.</li><li>The 80/20 rule - users only use 20% of your product 80% of the time. Anything beyond the 20% is adding to UX confusion.</li></ul>Solving the UX required dropping anything non-essential and simplifying the essential.

Preventing key issues

The complexity of a product and having a lot at stake can make it difficult to take risks. This makes it easier to fall prey to the 'focusing illusion." The focusing illusion is a bias that states that nothing in life is as important as you think while thinking about it. It can prevent you from being bold. The first step is to force yourself to err on the other extreme.

Be bold

Replace, not remove.Essential complexity can be simplified with familiar analogies. <ul><li>This can reduce the amount of learning for the user.</li><li>It eliminates any potential confusion a user may have.</li></ul> Progressive disclosure.This is the practice of only showing features that are immediately relevant to the user. Everything else is hidden from view. This is great for essential features that are rarely used.

Exploit familiar analogies, progressive disclosure

While working on a re-design, it's easy to become too focused on the UI. However, broadening your perspective and designing beyond screens or wireframes can solve a user's problem.

Think beyond screens and wireframes

This company built medical devices that captured images of the human retina. But the UX was complex, potentially causing errors. Using an iPhone helped them to tap into their network of accomplished app designers and ask for help. Apple noticed the device, and reached out and offered to help. This experience resulted in three key UX take-aways.

Bite-sized knowledge
to upgrade
your career

#apple

TOP STASHERS

IDEAS ABOUT #apple

Steve Jobs talks about managing people

“Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't u...”

It's time to

READ

LIKE

A PRO!

Make your phone productive!

Creative Selection

How Apple helped us prevent blindness through better design

Bite-sized knowledgeto upgradeyour career

#apple

TOP STASHERS

IDEAS ABOUT #apple

Steve Jobs talks about managing people

“Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't u...”

It's time to

READ

LIKE

A PRO!

Make your phone productive!

Creative Selection

How Apple helped us prevent blindness through better design

Bite-sized knowledge
to upgrade
your career