We write a lot about ideas, inspiration, and motivation when it comes to doing creative work.  The thing that I don’t see us writing a lot about is energy.

Yes, I know this is really a set of power transmission towers, but humor me, OK?  Image by octal.

What is energy?  I equate energy with feelings, generally good feelings, plus the urge and willingness to do work.

As an introvert (side note:  introversion is something I used to blog about), a lot of my energy comes from time spent in contemplation or in learning about new and interesting things.  Sometimes I get energy when I’m collaborating with someone to do interesting work.  Other times I do get energy just from spending time with friends, family, and people who share some of my interests.

We need energy to do two types of things in this world:

• Things that we enjoy doing
• Things that we do not like doing or that we are neutral about doing

I think it’s easy enough to figure out where we get the energy to do the things we like doing.  However, where do we get the energy to do the things that we don’t like to do?  I think the latter thought is just as interesting, even more interesting that where we get the energy to do what we love to do.

So, dear reader, I’m putting the following questions over to you:

• Where do you get the energy to do the things that you love to do?
• Where do you get the energy to do the things that you don’t like to do?

I think we can all learn something from this discussion, so please share your thoughts in the comments below.  Or, for bonus whuffie, write your own post on this topic and link back to this post – I’ll link back to you in return.

Ian M Rountree got me thinking with his recent blog post Amazing Things:  Writing Books.  He describes the process of writing, the desire to become published, and why you should go to so much effort to write a book.  This quote from his post got me to thinking about the nature of work:

Why write a book? Because the method of publishing is irrelevant, the work itself is an amazing thing.

The work.  Effort.  Toil.

Image by orangeacid

It seems like there’s some resistance to doing work in contemporary Western culture.  One popular book and blog promotes the value of a four hour work week. Passive income is a similar concept, whereby you make a good income by creating (mostly) automated systems to generate revenue.  Slaving away at something just doesn’t seem to be cool.

Work gets a bad rap.  We look for endless ways to become more efficient, to use fewer cycles, sweat, and fears to get things done.  Yet, if Malcolm Gladwell is right, we can’t master anything with less than 10,000 hours of work.  Or ten years, looked at from a different perspective.

The reason why we despise effort and toil (not work, per se) is when it seems pointless, contrary to what we think we want, or when the working conditions are cruel.

On the other hand, when we are “working hard” toward a goal that we chose and that we are motivated to achieve, quite often it doesn’t feel like work after all.  Or at least it doesn’t feel terrible.

A few weeks ago I asked a number of people to provide their advice on how you can do better work, right now.

Further to this, I thought I would share a few other quotations about work with you.  I’ve owned a book called What a Piece of Work is Man! for a few years now.  It’s full of quotes on various timeless topics.  Hopefully you’ll find some of these to be interesting or useful:

“Work keeps us from three great evils:  boredom, vice, and want.”  Voltaire, Candide, 1759

“No fine work can be done without concentration and self-sacrifice and toil and doubt.” Max Beerbohm, And Even Now, 1920

“I don’t like work… but I like what is in work – the chance to find yourself.  Your own reality – for yourself, not for others – which no other man can even know.”  Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness, 1902.

“What is work?  and what is not work? are questions that perplex the wisest of men.” Bhagavad-Gita

* I was going to call this post work is not a four letter word but, well, it is.

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The start of a new year is like the starting gun of a footrace:  time to start running to make changes in our lives.  The number one signifies a new start, a fresh beginning, and a chance to do things better.  Thus, many of us swear to do better this year and set goals to:

• have more fun
• treat other people better
• treat our own bodies, minds, and feelings with more respect
• do better work

The great thing about goals is that they embody purpose and motivation.  They provide a means to measure the success of our efforts.  The bad thing about goals is that we sometimes fail to establish tactics, tips, steps, or instructions to get these things done. Therefore, we sometimes fail to achieve these goals because we don’t think about good ways to achieve them.

If you’re in the frame of mind to do better work this year, I’ve compiled some tips, advice, and insights from a number of people who do great work. You’ve probably heard of a few of these people.  Some are friends or acquaintances who are not widely known.  The important thing is that they’re all smart people with important things to say.  And they’re all saying them here, especially for you, on this blog.  Each person has contributed a tip or two for you, especially for this blog post.

I’ll let them have their say, in no particular order, and then I’ll give you my thoughts at the end.

@SavvyAuntie (Melanie Notkin) (Website) Read: How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. Twice.	Seth Godin (website) #1 thing: start a blog and write every day.
@SuzeMuse (Susan Murphy) (Website) Stop talking about doing work. Start DOING.	@gapingvoid (Hugh MacLeod) (Website) “Practice”.
@StevenHodson (Steven Hodson) (Blog) “To listen and learn from those you might not always agree with”	@robdiana (Rob Diana) (Blog) Be prepared to acknowledge you don’t know something and get help. Also pay more attention to (devil is in the) details.
@mathewi (Mathew Ingram) (Website) The best way to do good work is to be passionate about it (but passion is difficult to manufacture.)	@Digidave (David Cohn) (Website) Odd enough I’m going to say: “take breaks.” Unless a project has a deadline – treat it like a marathon, not a sprint. Tortoise and the Hare!
@MarketingProfs (Ann Handley) (Website) Tap into what you love doing, and make sure that’s a part of your job (if not the whole of it). The best work comes from love for what you do.	@MenwithPens (James Chartrand) (Website) Start understanding your client’s feelings and putting them before your own.
@lizstrauss (Liz Strauss) (Website) Better work comes from listening … to whom the work reaches.	@lksugarman (Lydia Sugarman) (Website) Believe in what you are doing so you can completely commit to doing the best you possibly can. If you don’t believe, find a new occupation.
@soniasimone (Sonia Simone) (Website) My best answer would be this:  connect with one person.	@louisgray (Louis Gray) (blog) Prioritize a diversity in discovery and voices while focusing on that it is which makes you different and unique. Don’t follow the crowd.
@ColleenCoplick (Colleen Coplick) (blog) Give up on the excuses. Every single time someone thinks of some reason they can’t do something, they need to see or determine if they’re feeding themselves a reason or an excuse. If you’re not dead, have a broken bone or deathly ill, it’s an excuse.  Stop making excuses and start DOING things.	@CozyCabbage (Michael Kozakewich) (website) Feel amazing. That’s probably the one biggest thing people can do to improve their work.
@IanMRountree (Ian M. Rountree) (website) Do more of it, more often. Spread 5 hrs of work across 5 days. Add 5 min/day/week.  Conversely; expose yourself to those doing great work outside your field.	@jmorgandavis (Jessie Davis) (website) To start doing better work now, double check ALL work before considering it done!
@DoreenatDMS (Doreen Iannuzzi) (website) Take a breath then clearly figure out what you want to achieve (i.e., don’t come up with solution(s) first)	@mindfulconstrct (Melissa Karnaze) (website) Don’t let negative emotions bog you down. Transmute them into powerful tools for productivity.
@scottmarshall (Scott Marshall) (website) Stop multitasking.	@MarcoNunezJr (Marco Nunez Jr) (website) Start with the “Why” and let the “How” follow organically.
@RuudHein (Ruud Hein) (website) Get a complete system in place to process and track anything from incoming through outgoing/done. My pick is GTD but pick your own.	@remarkablogger (Michael Martine) (website) Decide what you really want. Most people have no idea, which means they don’t get anywhere.
@thepuck (Neal Jansons) (website) Meditate for at least 10-15 minutes each day. You’d be amazed the difference it makes in your overall functionality.	@rizzn (Mark ‘Rizzn’ Hopkins) (website) Identify your goals (be they short or long term) so that you may *focus* on them and how to get there.
@HiMYSYeD (HïMY SYeD) (website) Delegate.	@monicahamburg (Monica Hamburg) (Blog) Expand your mind. Sometimes we forget there’s a world outside what we do as work – which can enrich us. Read, Play and Learn.  Read about something outside of the parameters of your career.
@tamar (Tamar Weinberg) (website) Point #1: Consider what you’re doing.  Do you love it?  If not, find something you love.  You’ll find your performance increase substantially when you actually do the things you’re passionate about. Point #2: Network with like-minded people around the work that you do.  As we’re human, we’re inherently social beings (both in-person and online).  Find the online communities and face-to-face meetups that are frequented by your peers and use these opportunities to learn, to strengthen your position, and to help your friends.	@PenelopeTrunk (Penelope Trunk) (website) To start doing better at work now be more honest with yourself. You do not need to get paid to do what you love — you love sex and you don’t get paid. Why do you need to get paid for stuff like that? Stop demanding so much from work and demand more from yourself. Be kind and generous at work – with time and energy — and your work will be better. Focus on the people you love and then you’ll get happiness in life and your work can be how you challenge yourself and how you support yourself but not how you find happiness.
@sbspalding (Steve Spalding) (website) Stop thinking about it so da..darn much. If there is one eternal truth that has taken clever men and women through their lives for millennia, that truth is that it is nearly impossible to make predictions about complex outcomes with any degree of certainty. As human beings without psychic powers we are in the business of mitigating risk, not trying to see into the future, or at the very least we should be. The problem, however, is that too many of us are convinced that in order to do good work we need to be able to do perfect work. Said differently, we really, really want to mitigate the risk of our work down to 0%. Which is insane and pointless unless of course you have those psychic powers I spoke of earlier. What this insanity leads to among other things is paralysis by analysis, tunnel vision, impatience, over-reactions and all the other adrenaline fueled half-cocked behaviors that lead our work to fail in the first place. Thus, in summary and list form (for easy reading), to do better work understand: 1. There is a chance that you will fail. 2. That no matter how clever or well planned your idea, something spectacularly bad will probably happen to it. 3. If you are in the business of doing business you have the tools to overcome that bad thing. 4. Even so, you still might fail. 5. Treated the right way, that failure can be a stepping stone to more interesting and significantly more successful future work.	@jonathanfields (Jonathan Fields) (website) Align who you are with what you do. In his 2006 Stanford commencement, Steve Jobs said, “Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.” That very sentiment has never been truer or more powerful than now. We’re in a time of great upheaval, but like all such moments, along with all the anxiety and uncertainty, we’ve opened a window where the quest for reinvention is being not only forgiven, but fostered. Do not waste this moment. Search deep down, own up to who you are and what makes you come alive, then build every waking moment around those activities and people.
@MY_BIG_FAT_LIFE (Theresa Blackburn) (website) Get organized.  I am much more productive when I have a schedule and things are organized.	@katfrench (Kat French) (website) Get enough sleep! I’ve tried implementing GTD, exercise, diet, prayer, meditation, and a lot of other things to improve my attitude and performance. In my experience, not getting enough sleep sabotages everything else, and if you do that ONE thing, it makes many other choices that support doing better work and performing better in general exponentially easier.
@missrogue (Tara Hunt) (website) I just need to focus. I’ve yet to figure out a good formula.	@ViperChill (Glen Allsopp) (website) Stop waiting for things to magically align and realize you have to make things happen.  Stop caring if the audience or family will like the result. Do yourself proud, first.
@donambridge (Don Ambridge) (website) Learn to say ‘No’.	@scobleizer (Robert Scoble) (website) I do my best work when I’m loving what I’m doing. So, outsource the rest.
@ChrisBrogan (Chris Brogan) (website) To do better work, learn how to focus on what’s important to your job and cut out the distractions. That sounds simplistic. Know what we do the least? The simple things.	@jchutchins (J.C. Hutchins) (website) Execute the strategy, “Always consider your audience.” From face-to-face conversations, instant messages and tweets to formal emails, blog posts and business proposals, make every attempt to put yourself in the recipient’s shoes before ever writing (or saying) a word. You know what to say. But strategizing on how to say it dramatically improves the chances of your communication being received, successfully interpreted, and — most important — resonating with the recipient. Learning how to effectively talk the talk is the true key to proving that you can also walk the walk.

Now that you’ve seen what a lot of smart people have to say, I’ll share my thoughts on this topic.

My advice:  assume nothing until you have established solid trust in the different people that you work or partner with.

President Ronald Reagan helped to popularize the saying “Trust but verify” and I think there’s a lot of truth in that statement.  A mistake made by someone you’re depending on (or made by us when we mistakenly assume that a commitment is in place) can cost more than any productivity gains from any tips.

On the bright side, however, it’s amazing what we can establish with the help of other people.  Such as, say, helpful posts like this!

Now it’s your turn.  What one thing would you recommend to your fellow readers to help them do better work today?

Thanks to all contributors for helping to make this post a reality.  I am in your debt.

Image by totalAldo

I haven’t been writing as much about technology in recent months as I have previously.  I’m more interested in the brains, thoughts, ideas and feelings behind these things, to be honest.  Yesterday I wrote about the concept of a reasonable time Web, which doesn’t rely upon instant updates or “real-time” information.  I thought I’d add a bit more to this topic to try to clarify my thinking a bit more.

When people talk about technology, newer trends and innovations are popular discussion fodder.  We talk about “shiny new toys” or the “latest thing”:  technology which looks interesting, exciting, and sexy.  Change always creates buzz (people talking about the change, of course) and buzz captures eyeballs (i.e. the attention of readers).

One of the warmer (OK, hot) topics in technology writing is the idea of a real time Web.  In this environment, information is transmitted to the Web at large in very short periods of time:  seconds or split-seconds is an ideal amount of time between transmission and availability of information.  Twitter is the poster child of a real time Web which gives us that speed of information delivery.  Of course, as soon as you make a change to a Web page or update a website, those changes are instantly available to the viewing public.  HOWEVER, it’s useless to make a change that is instantly valuable unless:

• people are waiting expectantly for the change and refreshing their web browser every few seconds to see if something new is available
• people get a rapid notification that something new is out there for you to see

RSS (Real Simple Syndication) technology is, in many ways, a reliable and efficient means to get notification about new content on Web pages (for example, you can subscribe to this blog within a RSS reader so that you don’t have to keep checking this website directly to see if I have new blog posts; the RSS reader becomes efficient if there are lots of blogs that you want to stay on top of).

I think you can be creative, a smart thinker, and a good problem solver without needing instant updates about the news.  The real time Web wouldn’t be particularly useful for finding old, useful information unless there are people who specialize in going through digital archives and sharing the best.

The implicit advantage of a real time Web is that you can monitor the right people at the right time in the hopes that they share something useful for you when you need it.    Automated feeds could also handle the same need, I suppose.

No doubt that a real time Web is useful, but it can’t do everything, either.

Do you agree?  Why not leave a comment and discuss?

I’m of two minds about one of Merlin Mann’s latest videos (disclosure:  I’m a big fan of Merlin’s ever since he answered one of my questions on CBC’s Spark Radio show and he commented on my blog.  Well, before then, too.  But a little attention goes a long way, what can I say?)

Here’s the video.  My thoughts are below:

Makebelieve Help, Old Butchers, and Figuring Out Who You Are (For Now) from Merlin Mann on Vimeo.

SPOILERS BELOW:

On one hand, I think Merlin’s got a great message in this video and it’s well worth listening to.  The core message is the following:  people make money off your need for information and temporary loss of confidence that comes when you’re trying something new and different.  Asking for help is good, important, and worth doing when you need to but…  the best way (perhaps the only way) to get good at something is to actually do it.  And do it.  And do it.

On the other hand… it sounds like Merlin is just kind of putting his thoughts together in the video and so it rambles on a bit, with a few interesting diversions, before he really hits home with the point.  Either that or it’s a presentation style that he uses.

Nonetheless, even though most of the internet marketing industry will probably despise his video and the message behind it, it’s still a valid point.  Or not in spite of, but because of.  After all, there are plenty of unscrupulous leeches that will prey on your emotional desires in order to sell you crap that won’t replace the need for effort, time, patience, and the drive for self-improvement.

It may take some patience, but I think this video is definitely worth watching.  Go ahead.  What are you waiting for?  Tell me what you thought of his video.

Hat tip once again to Jay at Tape Noise Diary for scouting this one out.  You were right, Jay.

Image by StuSeeger

Today I have a question for you about practicing.  By practicing, I mean exercising a skill or technique over and over again.

Musicians, athletes, soldiers, and public speakers are examples of people who practice skills on a regular basis, particularly when they are trying to master those skills.  Practice can involve both the body and the mind.

The purpose of practice, IMHO, is two fold:

• To master the use of a skill or technique under “normal” conditions when there are no distractions.
• To master the use of a skill or technique so that it is used without conscious thought, which becomes very important when distractions are present.

By contrast, we generally don’t practice very simple tasks like opening doors, entering telephone numbers on a keypad, changing a lightbulb, or Continue reading ‘Rehearsal or redundant practice – where is the value?’ »