The 80/20 rule of productivity
I think a lot about maximizing productivity. John Barnette taught me the notion that stress comes from feeling like you’re on the hamster wheel… working hard, but not delivering meaningful output.
There is nothing more deflating than realizing at 5:30pm that all you did was answer email all day. Really, do I answer email for a living?!?
Think for a minute about how you spent today:
Did you get something done that you’re proud of?
Did you ship code?
Did you close a deal?
Did you find a new customer?
Did you write something meaningful?
I keep a to-do list of projects and tasks that I want to focus on or that I commit to doing for others. Answering email isn’t on the list, that’s just a chore I have to do. Things on the list are strategic and important.
My goal is to spend 80% of my time on the meaningful work that will feel fulfilling and 20% of my time on busy work that has to get done.
So, how do I classify what I do? One way to think about it is how good I feel about it at the end of my day? How does the work I’m doing impact my mood? Am I stressing myself or de-stressing?
I categorize meaningful work and busy work the following way, you may have different values.
MEANINGFUL WORK — 80%
Creating output: writing code, building wireframes, building a deck, writing a blog post
Training someone: building a process for an employee, giving candid feedback, deep dive 1-on-1 personal conversation
Talking to customers: new sales, customer feedback, learning their needs
Well-managed meetings: standups, clear agendas in advance, assigned action items, review of deliverables & milestones, taking notes, sending recaps, following up on committments, feeling energized & attentive, NO phones & email
Measuring: defining metrics, reviewing metrics
Building processes: doing something 1x to learn it, building a process for it and delegating
Time to think: taking time to be strategic, press pause & reset, analyzing deeply, recharging
Stepping outside your comfort zone: doing something you’ve never done before and growing from it
BUSY WORK — 20%
Jawing — talking shop without notes, action items or accountability. If you’re just talking about doing something, rather than doing it, you’re just jawing.
Meetings — 90% of meetings suck. If a meeting has no advance agenda, people aren’t prepped, and there’s not outcome, its a waste of time.
“Pick your brain” — Too often people reach out to meet someone (me) without a clear goal. If you don’t know how I can help you then you’re wasting both of our time.
Email — Necessary and important for moving the 80% high-value work forward, but important to manage.
Browsing — checking Facebook & Twitter when you’re bored or between everything else you do is a real time suck
Sharing — sharing short form content on Twitter & Facebook is great, but its not your content, take time to write a thoughtful blog post every once in a while
Spinning — thinking or talking something to death and not doing anything about it. see jawing. Timebox it and get started. Spend 15 minutes writing a draft instead of thinking or talking about it.
Segmenting your time into meaningful work and busy work and focusing 80% of your time doing meaningful work will help you get more done, feel more accomplished and be less stressed. That’s a win, win, win.