Marc Andreessen on Productivity
Marc Andreessen on Productivity from 2007
Don't keep a schedule, so you can always work on whatever is most important or most interesting at any given time.
Keep three and only three lists: a Todo List, a Watch List, and a Later List. Into the Todo List goes all the stuff you "must" do—commitments, obligations, things that have to be done. Into the Watch List goes all the stuff in your life that you have to follow up on, wait for someone else to get back to you on, remind yourself of in the future, or otherwise remember. Into the Later List goes everything else—everything you might want to do or will do when you have time or wish you could do. If it doesn't go on one of those three lists, it goes away.
Each night before you go to bed, prepare a 3x5 index card with a short list of 3 to 5 things that you will do the next day. And then, the next day, do those things.
Then, throughout the rest of the day, use the back of the 3x5 card as your Anti-Todo List. Each time you do something, you get to write it down and you get that little rush of endorphins. And then at the end of the day, before you prepare tomorrow's 3x5 card, take a look at today's card and its Anti-Todo list and marvel at all the things you actually got done that day.
Structured Procrastination. You should never fight the tendency to procrastinate—instead, you should use it to your advantage in order to get other things done. While you're procrastinating, just do lots of other stuff instead.
Strategic Incompetence. The best way to make sure that you are never asked to do something again is to royally screw it up the first time you are asked to do it. Or, better yet, just say you know you will royally screw it up—maintain a strong voice and a clear gaze, and you'll probably get off the hook.
Do email exactly twice a day—say, once first thing in the morning, and once at the end of the workday. When you do process email, do it like this:
• First, always finish each of your two daily email sessions with a completely empty inbox.
• Second, when doing email, either answer or file every single message until you get to that empty inbox state of grace.
• Third, emails relating to topics that are current working projects or pressing issues go into temporary subfolders of a folder called Action.
• Fourth, aside from those temporary Action subfolders, only keep three standing email folders: Pending, Review, and Vault.
Don't answer the phone.
Hide in an iPod. People, for some reason, feel much worse interrupting you if you are wearing headphones than if you're not.
Start the day with a real, sit-down breakfast. This serves two purposes. First, it fuels you up. Second, it gives you a chance to calmly, peacefully collect your thoughts and prepare mentally and emotionally for the day ahead.
Only agree to new commitments when both your head and your heart say yes.
Do something you love. If you're not doing something you love with the majority of your time, and you have any personal freedom and flexibility whatsoever, it's time for a change.