Articles tagged with Productivity

The Genius of Imperfection

Imperfect Beauty
Imperfect Beauty by Toni Verdú Carbó

On why it’s all right for Desmond to stay at home and do his pretty face

There’s a scene in Kill Bill: Volume 2 in which Budd’s boss says to a young, lady employee, “take a hit, be somebody, baby.” I love that scene.

Many a doubtful souls among us may find the idea of being somebody, whatever that means, enticing, so I’d like to start with the obvious public service announcement: a line of cocaine isn’t the way to go. That’s just Tarantino messing with the weaklings.

So which way then? Why, of course, be the best at whatever you do, right? That’s a fair assumption—be the smartest and be the fastest, because only by being perfect and creating perfection you’ll guarantee success. Right again, aren’t I? (And I expect you to be high-fiving the screen by now.)

The end? See you in the next article?

Hold it there.

I have my doubts about this perfection business; in fact, I…admire imperfection.

I’m not going to get into the topic of success today—I’ll get back to it in future pieces—but I’d like to talk about the relationship between perfection and the road to expertise. And to help me illustrate my point, ladies and gentlemen, the Beatles.

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Published in productivity, learning and music

The Era of Automation and the Lone Orchestrator Has Begun

From the conductor’s stand
From the conductor’s stand by Radek Grzybowski

How to run websites, for mortals who value their time and sanity

Let me tell you how I did this website thing in the old days—that’s the mid-1990s, kids.

I cooked a bunch of HTML files, with plenty of hard-coded URLs sprinkled in, and seasoned the mix with a bloated style sheet; launched an FTP client, preferably one with buttons to click on; and then uploaded my beautiful goop to a directory on a web server—that was all I needed and could afford.

Then the web hosting company performed some black magic rituals and the universe—OK, just me—marveled at my creation.

You can still play that game, that is, if your name is Timmy and the website belongs to your cat, Lassie, but if you intend to run a website where other adults do, you know, important stuff, as loyal Tank would say: “Timmy, that is loco.”

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Published in productivity, open source, django and software

New York City’s Summer of Hell: Time for a Revolution

New York
Lic2 by HobsonNY

Why isn’t the most populous city in America embracing remote work?

On Monday, July 10, 2017, New York City woke up to what Governor Andrew Cuomo had described as “summer of hell.” An eight-week period of train track repairs at Penn Station in Manhattan, expected to cause reduced service across the Tri-State Area.

I couldn’t think of a worse way to start the season or a better excuse to discuss remote work so I turned to the New York Times to have a better gauge of the situation.

Let’s see.

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Published in productivity, business, society and opinion

Procrastination and the Art of Getting Things Done

Bitwa pod Grunwaldem
Bitwa pod Grunwaldem by Bartosz Kiełbaszewski

Go ahead, wander around: It will be fine

Procrastination is commonly perceived as wasting time on useless activities. I don’t see it that way. The Latin origin of the word and its modern definition agree—procrastination is moving something forward from one day until the next. There’s no mention of what you do today.

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Published in productivity and creativity