The following is a short video that explains why I created AwayFind (and touches on how to batch your email). I delivered this as a presentation to the School of Blogging Conference in Chicago (under the parameters of 20 slides presented in 5 minutes). I hope you’ll enjoy this, and will participate in the private beta. Feel free to skip to 0:42 for the meat of the presentation…

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Filed under: 4-Hour Workweek, AwayFind, Email, Productivity, SET Consulting
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Three quarters of the meetings that “merit a face-to-face” really don’t.  It’s not “telecommuting” (that’s so 1997) and it shouldn’t even be called “working remotely”–it’s just WORKING.  I’m putting my foot down and removing any distinction.  Working from home has greatly improved my business, my sanity, and my life.  So I’m opening up the kimono here on my tools.  No, you don’t need to come in, you can read this from anywhere in the world.

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Filed under: 4-Hour Workweek, Business, Productivity, SET Consulting, Technology, Tools I Use
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Actually it’s curiosity that prevented him from ever becoming one. There are formulas, many formulas for spreading your message or building a personal brand online. These formulas actually work, but not if you let curiosity be the death of you first. Here you’ll find advice on spending your time a little more wisely on the internet so that you find your formula and stick with it.

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Filed under: 4-Hour Workweek, Business, Happiness, Productivity, Social Media
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The concept of “sunk cost” is often lost outside of economics–but if we dropped more things from our lives we’d be happier and more productive with our time.

Sunk cost: When one makes a hopeless investment, one sometimes reasons: I can’t stop now, otherwise what I’ve invested so far will be lost. This is true, of course, but irrelevant to whether one should continue to invest in the project. Everything one has invested is lost regardless. If there is no hope for success in the future from the investment, then the fact that one has already lost a bundle should lead one to the conclusion that the rational thing to do is to withdraw from the project.

Skeptic’s Dictionary

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Filed under: 4-Hour Workweek, Productivity
Article Tags: 4-Hour Workweek, lifehack, Productivity
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We’re never so vulnerable than when we trust someone - but paradoxically, if we cannot trust, neither can we find love or joy

-Walter Anderson

However much you trust the people that work for you–trust them more.  If no one reports to you, trust that someone could…and find them.  The greatest barrier to getting other people to do your work is you.

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Filed under: 4-Hour Workweek, Business, Happiness, Productivity, SET Consulting
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Update 4/2/08: This is a joke.

Researching the success of internet legends like Tim Ferriss (who doesn’t even write his blog) or Darren Rowse (who recently launched a successful Pay Per Tweet program), I came to discover that their hidden weapon was a place to escape.  Tim wrote most of his book abroad in the early mornings.  Darren updates his many blogs while surrounded by the beauty of Melbourne, Australia–I hear people are nice to each other over there.  Fortunately we folks in the States have an accessible and equally effective option.

The average American spends 14 days each year (or 3 years of their life) in the bathroom.  It’s time to make the most of that time. I bring to you GTDotJ — Getting Things Done on the John.

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Filed under: 4-Hour Workweek, DC Tech Community, Outlook, Productivity, Social Media, Technology
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I recently switched applications for my personal email, and have since been on a filtering rampage to improve the quality of the stuff that makes it to my inbox.  My motivation was a change in email tools, but after just a couple weeks of creating filters (taking a grand total of 15 minutes over that time), my inbox is much better than before.  Now’s your chance to do the same thing.  I’m going to talk first about Gmail and then about Outlook–the principles are the same, and the result is a lot of saved time and easier focus.

The Problem: Email that doesn’t require action

When you get lots of email, it can be daunting to make it through it all.  But you don’t need to act on a lot of that email, or at least not right now.  Much of that email just clutters your inbox, distracts your attention, and takes time from your day.  I’m not referring to spam–that’s a whole different topic (best solved through server-based solutions like Gmail, Postini, or MX Logic).  I’m referring to newsletters, shipment notifications, friend requests, event invitations–anything that you might want to look at, but that you most likely can wait a few days for.  Read on for how to keep this from your inbox…

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Filed under: 4-Hour Workweek, AwayFind, Business, Email, Outlook, Productivity, Social Media, Technology, Tools I Use
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A big thank you to Frank Gruber of SomewhatFrank.com for posting a video interview of me, which you can find below, discussing the difficulties of staying focused at work with so much email, and how AwayFind can help. This video came at a time when the blogs are aflame with discussions of email management –I address some of the challenges of processing email below.

In his post, which you should check out, Frank describes the AwayFind product, and references an article that’s been getting a lot of attention–Michael Arrington (of TechCrunch) discusses getting too much email.

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Filed under: 4-Hour Workweek, AwayFind, Business, DC Tech Community, Email, Outlook, Productivity, Technology, Tools I Use
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Six months ago I turned off automatic email downloading on my phone; it was one of the best decisions I’ve made. Having access to email on the go is helpful (as is web access), but downloading email automatically does more harm than good.

Instead, consider checking email only when you have the time to act on it, or when you’re looking for a very specific, timely message. I list instructions below on how to disable auto-check…but first, here are ten reasons:

1. Battery life. Constantly checking email kills your talk time. Since turning off "automatic synchronizing," the battery life on my Motorola Q (Windows Mobile) has more than doubled from "I hate this worthless phone that doesn’t last a day" to "oh, I forgot the charger, no big deal"
2. Setting expectations. Anything you can do to train your contacts that you are not their slave is to your advantage. Writing back in a few hours (preferably at your desk) is perfectly reasonable (my thoughts on being responsive vs being available)–don’t let people think you’re always available for them

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Filed under: 4-Hour Workweek, AwayFind, Business, Email, Productivity, Technology
Article Tags: 4-Hour Workweek, 4HWW, activesync, iPhone, palm, Productivity, push email, synchronization
16 Comments

The last article I wrote explained how we shouldn’t make others feel that “we’re busy”–that their time is less important than ours. Being perceived as being in high demand may help to command respect, but you can accomplish that without feigning busyness or sacrificing those you care about. This post is generally in response to Skellie of skelliwag.org [great site], who commented:

If others perceive you as being in high demand, as having a full schedule and generally having a lot of work, your perceived value/talent goes up. Clients want you more. Clients want to pay you more. It’s a social proof thing — if everyone wants you, you must be good. Freelancers who never seem busy, who make themselves available all the time, tend to get treated like they’re not busy for a reason…. [M]anufacturing some of that busyness can be good for business!

I completely agree–the key is to recognize the difference between being responsive and being too available. I personally respond to every email/call I receive, but I won’t do it right away. Most problems don’t need to be solved that quickly, and most projects are not due today. Clients and coworkers may make us feel that way, but they ultimately will respect a consistent response within a reasonable amount of time. In other words, I try to be responsive but not readily available.
Responding right away may come off as eager. (more…)

Filed under: 4-Hour Workweek, Productivity, Professionalism
Article Tags: 4-Hour Workweek, 4HWW, getting things done, gtd, Productivity
6 Comments