# Productivity tips - Gain [[Clarity (MoC)|Clarity]] first - Find your [[What is your Ikigai|Ikigai]] - Know what your goals are - Build solid habits - Make a [[Productivity commitment]] - Focus on outcomes rather than on details - Get and stay organized. Design a system that works for you - Structure your work and tasks (create yourself a system to be super organized & efficient); Read about GTD - Work in a structured manner - Focus (for real!) - Manage your knowledge - Capture your thoughts, ideas & tasks - Estimate tasks using relative weights to better compare them - Prioritize work regularly (focus on urgent & important) - Plan ahead (day, week, month, year, life) - [[In your quest for free productive time, preparation is your secret weapon]] - Schedule your days instead of letting others do it for you - [[Weekly planning helps you plan for success by determining your highest priorities for the week ahead]] - [[Have a maximum of 3 to 5 tasks a day, and start with the most important task]] - [[Human beings have a limited amount of decision-making ability each day]] - Make decisions in advance and make life easier of yourself - Identify a [[Highlight of the day]] - Make time! - Focus on what matters most. - [[How to decide on the most important thing]] - [[The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing]] - [[Doing something well does not make it important]] - Become a morning person & focus on the most important task as soon as you can (highlight for the day – miracle morning & Make time techniques) - Manage your time - Use the [[Pomodoro technique]] - Use a time timer to visualize time - [[Track time used for tasks using paper]] - Use [[Time blocking]] - [[Productive and uninterrupted work requires us to take early measures against distractions]] - Perform [[Periodic reviews]] - Reflect on work regularly (identify your weaknesses) - Look back - Look forward - (may soon be obsolete) Learn to type FAST (80+ WPM) - Use mind mapping, diagrams & problem structuring techniques to analyze problems & tasks - Create mental models to better understand what you’re doing - Practice practice practice! - Leverage AI to learn faster - Learn to search efficiently - Take advantage of downtime to improve (learn new things, help others, etc) - Use design thinking (i.e., the [[Design Thinking Process]]), 6 thinking hats, and similar techniques to increase your creativity - Ask for help - Ask questions - Have fun - Master your Operating System: its shortcuts, how to manage processes, how to navigate the file systems, etc ## Bonus ones for software developers 1. Learn IDE shortcuts (create/rename files, extract methods, classes, functions, implement/override/refactor methods, etc) 2. Automate code formatting, and anything else that wastes time and brain cycles 3. Write tests 4. Use the Terminal and master aliases to automate repetitive tasks and type less 5. Contribute to open source to learn from great developers and improve 6. Broaden your horizons and learn about architecture, software design, back-end, front-end, infrastructure, etc 7. Master all the general concerns (e.g., error handling, code quality, logging, performance, i18n, l10n, encoding, caching, how to fix bugs, source control management, security, etc) ## Related - [[Ivy Lee's advice for productivity]] - [[Tim Ferris advice for productivity]] ## References - https://x.com/dSebastien/status/1421496000859054080