Cal Newport

This hyperactive hive mind was not a plan.

It wasn't seen to be more productive.

We stumbled into it, so we really should change it.

So that was that book.

And then the most recent book, Slow Productivity from a couple of years ago.

In that book, I argued, oh, wait a second, workload matters too.

The other issue of this problem is we don't put any limits or transparency on how many things we're working on.

And if you pile too many things on your plate,

too much communication interruption becomes unavoidable because they each have little issues they need you to deal with.

So I've now, over this 10-year period, have kind of broken down this problem.

There's like training yourself to focus, fixing your communication protocols, like how do I communicate in a professional context?

How do we collaborate?

And then managing workload to be more reasonable.

All three of, and this might be why this problem's not solved.

There's no one thing to fix, right?

So all three of these things go into the issue and they're each complicated.

To me, I think the big two that give you the biggest results, and I'll tell you the one that's the hardest, and that's why this book probably sold the least.

The big two that gives you the biggest results is taking focus seriously like a skill.

That really does make a difference.

Practicing focus