1 00:00:00,240 --> 00:00:03,160 Hi everyone, my name is Patrick Akil and joining me today he's 2 00:00:03,160 --> 00:00:06,480 senior product manager and Co founder Joseph Hill. 3 00:00:07,000 --> 00:00:09,800 Time is finite. What you spend you can never get 4 00:00:09,800 --> 00:00:12,040 back. And today's episode is all about 5 00:00:12,040 --> 00:00:14,360 personal productivity and self management. 6 00:00:14,760 --> 00:00:18,160 Joseph shares how to be intentional with your time and 7 00:00:18,160 --> 00:00:20,920 he shares means that will help you throughout your career. 8 00:00:21,400 --> 00:00:28,720 So enjoy, I got a new laptop recently and for me new laptop 9 00:00:28,720 --> 00:00:32,600 means fresh start and one of the things that I always disliked is 10 00:00:32,600 --> 00:00:35,520 how I take notes and kind of knowledge management and I've 11 00:00:35,520 --> 00:00:38,720 always read about settle custom. So I decided I'm going to set up 12 00:00:38,720 --> 00:00:40,840 my system and like start doing that. 13 00:00:41,280 --> 00:00:45,520 This was 2 days ago. So far I'm enjoying that, but is 14 00:00:45,520 --> 00:00:47,680 there anything you use for knowledge management with 15 00:00:47,680 --> 00:00:51,280 regards to note taking? I use Obsidian, so kind of it 16 00:00:51,280 --> 00:00:53,360 goes in that you can use it for that as well, right? 17 00:00:53,360 --> 00:00:57,440 So basically I have a, a log each each day and I bullet point 18 00:00:57,440 --> 00:01:00,400 everything I'm doing and even meetings is a bullet point. 19 00:01:00,400 --> 00:01:02,560 And I just write notes like that, like short notes. 20 00:01:03,120 --> 00:01:05,519 It enables me then to look back on the day as well and say, OK, 21 00:01:05,519 --> 00:01:08,000 I did a lot because that often you have the feeling, you know, 22 00:01:08,000 --> 00:01:09,840 where you've been in a lot of meetings and stuff and then 23 00:01:09,840 --> 00:01:13,240 suddenly you're like, I don't feel like I've done much today. 24 00:01:13,360 --> 00:01:16,800 And then you open this log file and basically, oh wow, I did a 25 00:01:16,800 --> 00:01:19,920 lot, you know, and I think that really helps the mind with that. 26 00:01:19,920 --> 00:01:23,400 So using Obsidian, I actually do, you know the book Getting 27 00:01:23,400 --> 00:01:25,800 Things Done. I've been meaning to read it. 28 00:01:25,880 --> 00:01:29,960 So I read probably 20 pages in and I got so excited I've never 29 00:01:29,960 --> 00:01:31,720 read it again. And that basically was my 30 00:01:31,720 --> 00:01:33,920 journey of like task management and stuff. 31 00:01:33,920 --> 00:01:39,040 So I'm always trying new tools out, new processes because I 32 00:01:39,040 --> 00:01:41,360 also find it's like switching to a new tool. 33 00:01:41,640 --> 00:01:44,720 I then manually move stuff over that helps me get rid of stuff. 34 00:01:44,960 --> 00:01:47,760 You know that like, why do I have this task there? 35 00:01:47,760 --> 00:01:50,760 Like, OK, throw it out. And it helps you to audit like 36 00:01:50,760 --> 00:01:53,720 your life as you go along. So I'm always happy to jump on 37 00:01:53,720 --> 00:01:55,520 new tools, see what's going on there. 38 00:01:55,520 --> 00:01:58,400 I think it really helps also to freshen the mind with that so. 39 00:01:58,520 --> 00:02:01,600 I am the polar opposite. I do not want to stick with, 40 00:02:01,640 --> 00:02:04,720 yeah, like I, I like being very effective in my tools, know my 41 00:02:04,720 --> 00:02:06,360 hot keys and like how to move around. 42 00:02:07,080 --> 00:02:09,720 And then I don't really want to do that for a new tool again. 43 00:02:10,440 --> 00:02:12,640 Yeah, Yeah. What is like the latest tool 44 00:02:12,640 --> 00:02:14,280 that you've adopted that you're really happy about? 45 00:02:14,680 --> 00:02:16,160 Yeah. I mean, I've gone back to To Do 46 00:02:16,160 --> 00:02:19,160 List actually. So I use To Do List for like my 47 00:02:19,160 --> 00:02:22,240 private life. I use Trello for projects I have 48 00:02:22,240 --> 00:02:26,120 with other people. And basically then at work I 49 00:02:26,120 --> 00:02:29,520 have my own JIRA project at work where I basically manage my work 50 00:02:29,520 --> 00:02:35,600 at JIRA work on Jira like that. And I also like for work using 51 00:02:35,600 --> 00:02:38,520 the tool that the company uses because it also gets me more 52 00:02:38,520 --> 00:02:40,920 familiar with it, gets me used to some of the tooling. 53 00:02:41,440 --> 00:02:44,440 And I think it helps them to like teach people or show people 54 00:02:44,440 --> 00:02:46,800 how they can organize themselves with that tool. 55 00:02:46,880 --> 00:02:50,360 And it helps like as a team, you're most likely using Jira 56 00:02:50,360 --> 00:02:52,480 for your sprints or Kanban process. 57 00:02:53,000 --> 00:02:55,680 And if you're using it for yourself as well, you really get 58 00:02:55,680 --> 00:02:59,720 fluent with it and it becomes less of a like admin task, but 59 00:02:59,720 --> 00:03:02,920 more of AI can see where this is going and how to improve that. 60 00:03:02,920 --> 00:03:04,920 So I think it's really cool to like do that. 61 00:03:04,920 --> 00:03:08,600 So last company I used Asana. I brought Asana into the company 62 00:03:09,040 --> 00:03:12,280 and I was also using that. I liked it a lot. 63 00:03:12,280 --> 00:03:15,520 The last company that I worked with was like Azure DevOps and 64 00:03:15,520 --> 00:03:18,400 for some reason it had a bad reputation and everyone hated it 65 00:03:18,400 --> 00:03:20,920 and it was very particular. And then I was like, OK, every 66 00:03:20,920 --> 00:03:23,920 time I thought it must be a better way, there usually was. 67 00:03:24,160 --> 00:03:26,800 It's just you have to kind of dig deep and like, figure it 68 00:03:26,800 --> 00:03:28,200 out. And then I showed people some 69 00:03:28,200 --> 00:03:30,280 stuff that we could do, and they're like, wow, I've never 70 00:03:30,440 --> 00:03:32,280 seen that before. It's actually quite nice. 71 00:03:32,360 --> 00:03:34,240 I had that recently with in Slack. 72 00:03:34,240 --> 00:03:39,360 You can have lists and instead of like in a meeting, making an 73 00:03:39,360 --> 00:03:41,160 agenda. So we have certain rounds where 74 00:03:41,160 --> 00:03:44,040 people come and then you kind of build an agenda what should talk 75 00:03:44,040 --> 00:03:46,680 about and stuff. And I started using Slack lists 76 00:03:46,720 --> 00:03:49,480 to do that asynchronously, you know, so people can 77 00:03:49,480 --> 00:03:50,840 asynchronously put stuff in there. 78 00:03:51,360 --> 00:03:54,120 And they're more used to using Slack as a conversational tool. 79 00:03:54,160 --> 00:03:57,120 So there's certain stuff you can get off the list before the 80 00:03:57,120 --> 00:03:59,800 meeting because there's already a conversation going on and 81 00:03:59,800 --> 00:04:02,080 clarified it. And it was really cool to try 82 00:04:02,080 --> 00:04:03,760 that out because I didn't see that before. 83 00:04:04,040 --> 00:04:07,240 I thought, let's try it and see. And I'm all for experiments, 84 00:04:07,240 --> 00:04:09,520 right? So you should just try it, see, 85 00:04:09,560 --> 00:04:11,240 does it work? Great, let's continue. 86 00:04:11,240 --> 00:04:14,360 If it doesn't, then move on. That's like for me what agile 87 00:04:14,360 --> 00:04:15,960 is, right? It's like that's how we should 88 00:04:15,960 --> 00:04:18,160 be moving and moving forward. I like that. 89 00:04:18,360 --> 00:04:20,920 It's just, I feel like a lot of people are hesitant with regards 90 00:04:20,920 --> 00:04:26,400 to experimenting, not just because just gathering people 91 00:04:26,400 --> 00:04:28,800 around you and making people excited about something and then 92 00:04:28,800 --> 00:04:31,440 kind of dropping it and then going on to the next might be 93 00:04:31,440 --> 00:04:33,760 perceived as you being flaky. So it's like, OK, what do you 94 00:04:33,760 --> 00:04:36,120 experiment with and what do you actually need to be searching? 95 00:04:36,120 --> 00:04:37,080 You have. To be intentional. 96 00:04:37,080 --> 00:04:39,080 Right. I mean, if you keep flipping 97 00:04:39,080 --> 00:04:41,880 tools to tools, yeah, maybe there's a commitment problem 98 00:04:41,880 --> 00:04:45,040 there, right? But I think we shouldn't also 99 00:04:45,040 --> 00:04:47,840 get too relaxed because I think when you get too relaxed with a 100 00:04:47,840 --> 00:04:50,720 certain tool set or a method, it becomes numb. 101 00:04:50,800 --> 00:04:53,920 Maybe it doesn't have that same appeal or same energy gathering 102 00:04:53,920 --> 00:04:56,320 moment, right? I think sometimes shaking it up 103 00:04:56,320 --> 00:04:59,920 a bit enables people to go, ah, OK, the way we were working was 104 00:04:59,920 --> 00:05:02,720 actually the better way. And only by experimenting. 105 00:05:02,720 --> 00:05:04,920 Do you know that, right? You know, we all get used to 106 00:05:04,920 --> 00:05:07,520 these things, right? And it all goes to the back of 107 00:05:07,520 --> 00:05:10,640 the mind and be autonomous. And then we don't challenge why, 108 00:05:10,640 --> 00:05:12,800 why do we do that? You know, like, why do we do it 109 00:05:12,800 --> 00:05:14,760 that sort of way? Oh, we've always done it that 110 00:05:14,760 --> 00:05:16,480 way. Like, OK, why don't we change 111 00:05:16,480 --> 00:05:19,360 it? Let's, you know, people change 112 00:05:19,360 --> 00:05:22,440 teams change the time, change projects change, right? 113 00:05:22,440 --> 00:05:25,880 So why not try something? I think people have that fear, 114 00:05:25,880 --> 00:05:27,240 right? I mean, I think it's about a 115 00:05:27,240 --> 00:05:29,360 human nature when it comes to that, right? 116 00:05:29,360 --> 00:05:34,360 So I heard an interesting thing that decide homicide and 117 00:05:34,360 --> 00:05:37,280 suicide, all of these sides is ending something. 118 00:05:37,280 --> 00:05:40,520 That's why people struggle with like deciding because it's 119 00:05:40,520 --> 00:05:43,000 ending something. You're killing an opportunity if 120 00:05:43,000 --> 00:05:44,440 you decide one way or the other, right? 121 00:05:45,080 --> 00:05:48,400 I think we've experiment and it kind of helps people go in a 122 00:05:48,400 --> 00:05:50,120 direction but not fully commit, right? 123 00:05:50,120 --> 00:05:52,360 Because you say, OK, let's try this for two weeks or a month 124 00:05:52,720 --> 00:05:56,080 and then let's reflect on it. And I think that enables people 125 00:05:56,080 --> 00:05:58,520 to try things out because they know it's not permanent. 126 00:05:58,720 --> 00:06:00,440 You know, I think people have that fear. 127 00:06:01,000 --> 00:06:02,880 We don't like change. We're humans, right? 128 00:06:02,960 --> 00:06:04,600 We're comfortable with the situation. 129 00:06:04,600 --> 00:06:08,040 Any change makes us unnervy. And I think that's really what's 130 00:06:08,520 --> 00:06:11,480 interesting by approaching it also with the terminology, 131 00:06:11,480 --> 00:06:13,440 right? Let's just try this for a week, 132 00:06:13,440 --> 00:06:16,680 see how it goes. I've seen people be way more 133 00:06:16,680 --> 00:06:20,320 relaxed when we call things an experiment rather than OK this 134 00:06:20,320 --> 00:06:22,400 is a change because then they're like, OK, I have to fully 135 00:06:22,400 --> 00:06:24,600 analyse this because this is exactly going to happen. 136 00:06:24,600 --> 00:06:25,720 Yeah, exactly. It's the same if you're like, 137 00:06:25,920 --> 00:06:28,560 let's push this feature live, they'll be black people. 138 00:06:28,600 --> 00:06:30,520 Oh, we can't do that. What, what, what, what, what, 139 00:06:30,520 --> 00:06:32,560 what? But if you say let's experiment, 140 00:06:32,560 --> 00:06:35,440 let's try this out, people more relaxed then, right, because it 141 00:06:35,440 --> 00:06:39,240 minimises like the impact area. I think you can approach that at 142 00:06:39,240 --> 00:06:41,160 work in your private life as well, right. 143 00:06:41,160 --> 00:06:44,320 So try to shake things up and challenge the way you're doing 144 00:06:44,320 --> 00:06:47,080 things. I think that's something that we 145 00:06:47,440 --> 00:06:49,800 all struggle with. That's just human nature, I'd 146 00:06:49,800 --> 00:06:52,800 say. Yeah, For me, I'm wondering is 147 00:06:52,800 --> 00:06:55,720 there a right time and kind of right place to challenge 148 00:06:55,720 --> 00:06:59,360 processes or kind of ways of working or how things used to be 149 00:06:59,640 --> 00:07:03,160 and start experimenting? I mean, I would say like my 150 00:07:03,160 --> 00:07:06,560 team, what the how they work this week is different from last 151 00:07:06,560 --> 00:07:08,280 week and will be different from next week. 152 00:07:08,400 --> 00:07:10,960 You know, I think it's always about right now, like 153 00:07:10,960 --> 00:07:14,240 documenting is a topic. We do like how to document and 154 00:07:14,240 --> 00:07:18,000 we currently experiment, OK, how can we reduce this like burden 155 00:07:18,000 --> 00:07:20,560 of documentation but still be effective with it, right? 156 00:07:20,560 --> 00:07:23,120 So then we try to experiment. Let's try it this way on this 157 00:07:23,120 --> 00:07:28,000 topic and see, I think it's a constant moving target, so to 158 00:07:28,000 --> 00:07:30,120 speak with that. There's never an end point, 159 00:07:30,120 --> 00:07:32,800 right? I think because you may find how 160 00:07:32,800 --> 00:07:36,160 you're working now is the right way, but Fast forward six 161 00:07:36,160 --> 00:07:39,080 months, you might need to reflect again. 162 00:07:39,080 --> 00:07:41,200 It might not work or it might not be efficient, or you've got 163 00:07:41,200 --> 00:07:45,000 a new team member changes it, or the company's priorities change 164 00:07:45,000 --> 00:07:47,000 or you have some other pressures there. 165 00:07:47,000 --> 00:07:49,880 And I think that's you should always be challenging. 166 00:07:49,880 --> 00:07:51,200 Why? You know why? 167 00:07:51,320 --> 00:07:53,280 Why am I in this meeting, for example, right? 168 00:07:53,280 --> 00:07:56,120 I see a lot of people that are in meetings and just sit there 169 00:07:56,680 --> 00:07:58,600 and don't really do much. They just sit there because they 170 00:07:58,600 --> 00:08:00,200 feel like they need to be there, right? 171 00:08:00,320 --> 00:08:03,360 But OK. But is that a good use of your 172 00:08:03,360 --> 00:08:05,120 time in that regard? So I think you should always 173 00:08:05,120 --> 00:08:07,240 challenge, OK, why? Why do you want me in this 174 00:08:07,240 --> 00:08:08,920 meeting? What value can I bring? 175 00:08:08,960 --> 00:08:11,200 Or can I just get the meeting notes afterwards? 176 00:08:11,360 --> 00:08:14,560 You know, I think that's a struggle a lot of people have. 177 00:08:14,880 --> 00:08:17,640 You know, for me, being in a meeting is not working. 178 00:08:18,280 --> 00:08:21,000 You know, it's usually you're talking around a topic, you may 179 00:08:21,000 --> 00:08:24,720 decide or move in a direction, but the real work happens after 180 00:08:24,720 --> 00:08:27,200 the meeting, right? So, and I think that's something 181 00:08:27,240 --> 00:08:29,960 we should be wary of, right? So being 8 hours a day in the 182 00:08:29,960 --> 00:08:33,360 meetings, are you really, what are you doing right? 183 00:08:33,480 --> 00:08:36,600 And I think that also hurts you mentally because you're like, 184 00:08:37,080 --> 00:08:39,120 then it's a struggle of like, how do we move these things 185 00:08:39,120 --> 00:08:40,360 forward? Where's the time? 186 00:08:41,120 --> 00:08:44,320 And the only way you can, you know, 8 hours is finite, right? 187 00:08:44,480 --> 00:08:47,640 There's only so much you can do. And so you need to be aware of, 188 00:08:47,680 --> 00:08:51,240 OK, how do we bring more time into the day, less meetings? 189 00:08:51,240 --> 00:08:53,760 OK, how do I do that challenge? What is there? 190 00:08:53,960 --> 00:08:56,040 I think that's something that you should always be 191 00:08:56,040 --> 00:08:57,840 challenging. Can everyone do that? 192 00:08:57,840 --> 00:09:01,760 I I have a few friends in especially in big tech but also 193 00:09:01,760 --> 00:09:04,960 due to them being early in career that they feel hesitant 194 00:09:05,040 --> 00:09:07,200 right? It's either their manager or or 195 00:09:07,200 --> 00:09:09,880 they get a meeting invite which is very last minute which 196 00:09:09,880 --> 00:09:12,520 overlaps with a few other things and they make they move like 197 00:09:12,640 --> 00:09:13,960 heaven and earth to make it happen. 198 00:09:13,960 --> 00:09:16,840 Basically because they have this perception that they cannot say 199 00:09:16,840 --> 00:09:19,600 no. Yeah, I think again, this goes 200 00:09:19,600 --> 00:09:23,000 bound to this decide this kind of fear of missing out, right. 201 00:09:23,680 --> 00:09:27,120 I would say you can you can ask what do you think the value I 202 00:09:27,120 --> 00:09:29,800 would bring to this meeting is? It's not saying no, right. 203 00:09:29,840 --> 00:09:33,480 I mean, and it helps them put the other person who is inviting 204 00:09:33,480 --> 00:09:37,160 you to think about, OK, what do I want you there for? 205 00:09:37,440 --> 00:09:39,600 You know what, what is the reason? 206 00:09:39,600 --> 00:09:42,080 What is the value? And they might say, actually, 207 00:09:42,080 --> 00:09:46,000 no, it's OK, you we can just give you the recap afterwards. 208 00:09:46,240 --> 00:09:48,680 Or they might say, actually, we want you there because your 209 00:09:48,680 --> 00:09:52,360 opinion on X is important. And then you're like, OK, I 210 00:09:52,360 --> 00:09:54,280 understand. And you can come in prepared, 211 00:09:54,280 --> 00:09:56,360 right? Instead of just sat there like 212 00:09:57,120 --> 00:10:00,280 consuming everything that's going on and then go after it 213 00:10:00,280 --> 00:10:01,960 going, OK, that was a waste of an hour. 214 00:10:02,280 --> 00:10:03,600 You know, how do I move forward? Right? 215 00:10:03,600 --> 00:10:07,000 So of course, it's always a struggle, right? 216 00:10:07,160 --> 00:10:08,880 Different topics are more important. 217 00:10:08,880 --> 00:10:12,520 So if the company is really in a stressful situation, maybe you 218 00:10:12,520 --> 00:10:13,880 need to be in that meeting, right? 219 00:10:14,400 --> 00:10:15,840 But I think you can always challenge. 220 00:10:16,000 --> 00:10:19,280 I think especially early in your career, if you want to move into 221 00:10:19,280 --> 00:10:22,120 a more senior role, you need to get into that mindset of 222 00:10:22,120 --> 00:10:25,720 challenging, asking why, what value can I bring, you know? 223 00:10:25,720 --> 00:10:28,880 And again, it's not saying no, it's just challenging the 224 00:10:28,880 --> 00:10:31,920 perception now. It's interesting that you ask 225 00:10:31,920 --> 00:10:34,920 the question to the other person because I feel like, especially 226 00:10:34,920 --> 00:10:38,480 early in career, I felt like I needed to answer that question. 227 00:10:38,480 --> 00:10:41,160 Why should I be in this meeting? What value do I bring? 228 00:10:41,240 --> 00:10:42,920 But you put that in the other person. 229 00:10:43,000 --> 00:10:44,840 'S how would you know you're early in your career? 230 00:10:44,840 --> 00:10:47,320 Right. Just do my best, yeah? 231 00:10:47,720 --> 00:10:49,760 Yeah, I mean, that's, that's the conception, right? 232 00:10:49,840 --> 00:10:53,840 If if you feel that if you have to ask, maybe you're not the 233 00:10:53,840 --> 00:10:56,360 right, you feel uncomfortable with the role you're in then, 234 00:10:56,360 --> 00:10:58,520 right. But isn't that a part of what 235 00:10:58,520 --> 00:11:01,480 we, you know, when we talk about seniority, we talk about that, 236 00:11:01,480 --> 00:11:04,880 we talk about challenging, we talk about, you know, making 237 00:11:04,880 --> 00:11:07,560 that awareness there. So when you get comfortable with 238 00:11:07,560 --> 00:11:10,320 that earlier on in your career, I think it makes it like brings 239 00:11:10,320 --> 00:11:12,880 a superpower later on because you can really challenge the 240 00:11:12,880 --> 00:11:16,440 status quo then because a lot of companies get numb with the 241 00:11:16,440 --> 00:11:18,440 processes and rituals they have, right? 242 00:11:19,240 --> 00:11:21,920 But if you come in fresh and challenge those things, things 243 00:11:21,920 --> 00:11:23,560 can move forward in a better way, right? 244 00:11:23,840 --> 00:11:27,440 And I think that's a fear you need to get over quickly, I 245 00:11:27,440 --> 00:11:29,280 would say. But I understand that. 246 00:11:29,360 --> 00:11:31,680 I totally get. I also was the same when I 247 00:11:31,680 --> 00:11:35,400 started, you know, So it was only later on I realized, OK, I 248 00:11:35,400 --> 00:11:37,000 should have asked why? What value? 249 00:11:37,280 --> 00:11:40,040 Because it affected my work then because when I was in such a 250 00:11:40,040 --> 00:11:43,600 meeting, I couldn't produce what I wanted to do in that day, 251 00:11:43,600 --> 00:11:45,280 right? Then that's a knock domino 252 00:11:45,280 --> 00:11:49,880 effect, which earlier on in your career, at least for me, I did 253 00:11:49,880 --> 00:11:52,680 overtime then like unpaid over time because I was like, oh, I 254 00:11:52,680 --> 00:11:55,360 need to get this done. And that's not healthy because 255 00:11:55,360 --> 00:11:57,560 then that affects your private life and not going to affect 256 00:11:57,560 --> 00:11:58,400 that, right? So. 257 00:11:58,840 --> 00:12:01,520 It's interesting that the only person that can get you out of 258 00:12:01,520 --> 00:12:03,960 that, and I recognise what you're saying, if I have a lot 259 00:12:03,960 --> 00:12:06,400 of stuff to do and then all of a sudden there's a meeting and 260 00:12:06,400 --> 00:12:08,880 there's a bunch of them, that stuff still needs to be done. 261 00:12:08,880 --> 00:12:11,280 So then you push it forward and you still have to do it. 262 00:12:11,600 --> 00:12:13,840 The only person that can get you out of that is is kind of 263 00:12:13,840 --> 00:12:16,840 yourself, by managing expectations and managing your 264 00:12:16,840 --> 00:12:19,000 own calendar. Your boss or your manager is not 265 00:12:19,000 --> 00:12:21,920 like in charge of your day and how you're working, right? 266 00:12:21,920 --> 00:12:23,440 We don't want to be micromanaged, right? 267 00:12:23,440 --> 00:12:25,680 Where your boss says, OK, from this time, from this time, 268 00:12:25,680 --> 00:12:27,000 you're working on this, from this time. 269 00:12:27,160 --> 00:12:29,160 You know, we don't want that. We want empowerment. 270 00:12:29,160 --> 00:12:32,960 We want self-control. So only you have that capability 271 00:12:32,960 --> 00:12:36,080 to bring that forward, right? And I think again, it's this 272 00:12:36,080 --> 00:12:38,560 reluctance, you know, formal is also a thing, right? 273 00:12:38,560 --> 00:12:40,120 So we want to be in that meeting, we want to know the 274 00:12:40,120 --> 00:12:42,560 outcome. And I think it's we need to get 275 00:12:42,560 --> 00:12:45,800 more comfortable with, OK, it's OK missing out because less 276 00:12:45,800 --> 00:12:49,720 information means like less cognitive load and maybe means I 277 00:12:49,720 --> 00:12:53,000 can focus more on the topics that interest me or the topics 278 00:12:53,000 --> 00:12:56,160 that are important right now. What I recently saw and I, I 279 00:12:56,160 --> 00:13:01,360 haven't experimented much with it, is you can now get, I think 280 00:13:01,360 --> 00:13:04,000 if you're in the Microsoft stack view of Microsoft team and our 281 00:13:04,000 --> 00:13:06,720 meeting is recorded. You get this transcription and 282 00:13:06,720 --> 00:13:09,240 then also an AI summary on exactly the topics that have 283 00:13:09,240 --> 00:13:12,360 been discussed, any follow-ups and who is going to take action, 284 00:13:12,760 --> 00:13:13,640 which I think is very. Cool. 285 00:13:13,760 --> 00:13:16,000 Definitely. I think that's always, I mean, 286 00:13:16,000 --> 00:13:18,840 at least for me, like meeting notes, like who takes the 287 00:13:18,840 --> 00:13:21,960 meeting notes, It determines what is in the meeting notes. 288 00:13:22,040 --> 00:13:24,000 You cannot really make a transcript, right? 289 00:13:24,000 --> 00:13:26,040 No one can write everything that's going on there. 290 00:13:26,600 --> 00:13:28,400 And I think that's what AI does, right. 291 00:13:28,840 --> 00:13:32,840 It's like it augments an aspect of our life. 292 00:13:33,000 --> 00:13:35,760 So meeting notes is perfect because it's listening to 293 00:13:35,760 --> 00:13:37,960 everything. It writes it all down and then 294 00:13:37,960 --> 00:13:40,840 no one has to then be omnipresent in the meeting 295 00:13:40,840 --> 00:13:43,440 because usually the person making the notes can't really 296 00:13:43,440 --> 00:13:46,160 participate in the meeting because they are have to be 297 00:13:46,160 --> 00:13:48,240 aware of everything when they're talking. 298 00:13:48,240 --> 00:13:50,280 They're not also making notes of what they're talking about, 299 00:13:50,280 --> 00:13:51,880 right? I think that's where the power 300 00:13:51,880 --> 00:13:54,960 of AI comes into it, right? It augments part of what we need 301 00:13:54,960 --> 00:13:58,760 to do and freezes up some of the burden there to enable us to 302 00:13:58,760 --> 00:14:01,200 have more time to do something. I think I totally agree. 303 00:14:01,200 --> 00:14:04,240 I think that's something which will bring a lot of value 304 00:14:04,240 --> 00:14:07,000 because then, you know, there's going to be meeting notes and 305 00:14:07,320 --> 00:14:10,160 it's going to be clearly defined what's there, what's the 306 00:14:10,160 --> 00:14:12,000 outcome, what decisions are there. 307 00:14:12,360 --> 00:14:15,680 And you could also use the AI to challenge what's still missing 308 00:14:15,680 --> 00:14:17,360 there, right? You know, if there is no 309 00:14:17,360 --> 00:14:21,000 outcome, it could come up and say, hey, you talked for an 310 00:14:21,000 --> 00:14:24,400 hour, but it's useless. There was no outcome, right? 311 00:14:24,400 --> 00:14:28,880 So because a lot of meetings also don't have agendas, I think 312 00:14:28,880 --> 00:14:31,160 that's also a struggle, right? So if you come to a meeting with 313 00:14:31,160 --> 00:14:33,720 no agenda, you don't know, you're not prepared because you 314 00:14:33,720 --> 00:14:35,200 don't know what's going on there, right? 315 00:14:35,200 --> 00:14:38,640 So, and I think that's also part of the side effect there, right? 316 00:14:38,680 --> 00:14:42,160 People just set meetings up because fast-paced culture, but 317 00:14:42,160 --> 00:14:44,720 people also should be present when setting up a meeting. 318 00:14:45,080 --> 00:14:46,680 What do I want? What's the outcome? 319 00:14:46,840 --> 00:14:48,240 What's the direction here? You know? 320 00:14:48,240 --> 00:14:51,120 And I think that's sometimes what's missing that leads to 321 00:14:51,400 --> 00:14:54,480 conversations with no outcome. And then after an hour and a 322 00:14:54,480 --> 00:14:57,680 half, you leave the meeting and go, OK, where, where we're 323 00:14:57,680 --> 00:14:58,840 going? What's the direction there 324 00:14:58,840 --> 00:15:00,920 right? Yeah. 325 00:15:01,160 --> 00:15:04,120 I'm not sure if kind of this remote culture that happened 326 00:15:04,120 --> 00:15:07,400 during COVID contributed towards this because I feel like 327 00:15:07,400 --> 00:15:09,520 especially if you don't see your colleagues, if you don't have a 328 00:15:09,520 --> 00:15:12,000 physical office space, if everyone's remote, those 329 00:15:12,000 --> 00:15:15,040 conversations are very valuable in kind of building 330 00:15:15,040 --> 00:15:17,200 relationships. And then that's fine as a goal. 331 00:15:17,200 --> 00:15:19,960 Like, let's come in as a call. In a call, let's have a 332 00:15:19,960 --> 00:15:23,040 conversation on status quo, what we're happy with, what we're not 333 00:15:23,040 --> 00:15:25,040 happy with. And maybe there's an outcome and 334 00:15:25,040 --> 00:15:27,160 maybe there's not. But we know kind of more where 335 00:15:27,160 --> 00:15:29,080 everyone stands. I think that's fine. 336 00:15:29,520 --> 00:15:32,680 But indeed, if you have a goal and you want to have a meeting 337 00:15:32,680 --> 00:15:35,840 as means to an end, an agenda definitely helps. 338 00:15:35,840 --> 00:15:38,160 A purpose, yeah. And again, that's like you 339 00:15:38,160 --> 00:15:40,680 mentioned the remote culture now, right, where a lot of 340 00:15:40,960 --> 00:15:44,200 remote eating meetings is easier, right, to organize. 341 00:15:44,880 --> 00:15:47,600 We're often in more meetings now, I think, in the remote 342 00:15:47,600 --> 00:15:49,560 world than we were previously, right? 343 00:15:49,560 --> 00:15:51,640 Because we have no room restrictions anymore. 344 00:15:51,760 --> 00:15:54,800 It's easier. And that brings up mental 345 00:15:54,800 --> 00:15:57,160 loading, right? So I remember when I started a 346 00:15:57,160 --> 00:16:01,000 new job during COVID, I was an agile coach and basically 347 00:16:01,560 --> 00:16:04,160 back-to-back to back meetings because everything could be 348 00:16:04,160 --> 00:16:05,640 packed next to each other, right? 349 00:16:05,640 --> 00:16:07,360 And you're exhausted at the end of it. 350 00:16:08,000 --> 00:16:10,240 I think that's also something we should be more aware of. 351 00:16:11,480 --> 00:16:15,000 Like, does it make sense to have a meeting of this or is async 352 00:16:15,160 --> 00:16:16,880 something better? You can make decisions 353 00:16:16,880 --> 00:16:20,320 asynchronously, right? So, and I think that's if you're 354 00:16:20,320 --> 00:16:21,200 aware of it. OK. 355 00:16:21,200 --> 00:16:23,480 Is this thing really critical right now? 356 00:16:23,480 --> 00:16:24,920 Do we need a synchronous meeting? 357 00:16:24,960 --> 00:16:28,040 It's expensive, you know, I'm stopping everyone doing what 358 00:16:28,040 --> 00:16:29,720 they should be doing, like bring them in. 359 00:16:30,360 --> 00:16:33,480 Is it meaningful, this topic or can we distribute it 360 00:16:33,600 --> 00:16:37,040 asynchronously, you know, and have people on their own time, 361 00:16:37,200 --> 00:16:39,320 like when they have the capacity, when they have the 362 00:16:39,320 --> 00:16:41,360 right mindset to work on that topic. 363 00:16:41,360 --> 00:16:44,120 You know, there's no like right or wrong. 364 00:16:44,120 --> 00:16:46,360 It's always hard to predict. And it also depends on the 365 00:16:46,360 --> 00:16:47,880 people. But I think asynchronous can 366 00:16:47,880 --> 00:16:50,120 solve a lot of these problems when it comes to meetings, 367 00:16:50,120 --> 00:16:51,680 right? Like status updates as well, 368 00:16:51,680 --> 00:16:53,120 right? You can also do that 369 00:16:53,120 --> 00:16:55,160 asynchronously a lot of the times. 370 00:16:55,600 --> 00:16:57,840 Yeah, I was. I was actually reading an 371 00:16:57,840 --> 00:17:01,080 article and that was a person that left recently open AI and 372 00:17:01,080 --> 00:17:04,680 he was kind of putting down his thoughts on culture and ways of 373 00:17:04,680 --> 00:17:06,960 working and everything. And one of the things you 374 00:17:06,960 --> 00:17:09,839 mentioned is that there's barely any e-mail culture. 375 00:17:10,160 --> 00:17:13,359 So everything happens on Slack. All communication when it comes 376 00:17:13,359 --> 00:17:15,079 to asynchronous communication is there. 377 00:17:15,440 --> 00:17:18,319 So it can also be overwhelming. If you follow all channels and 378 00:17:18,319 --> 00:17:21,119 you want to have no messages on unread, you're going to 379 00:17:21,119 --> 00:17:22,839 overwhelm yourself with the rest of everything. 380 00:17:23,160 --> 00:17:25,960 But I do like that I've, I mean, I've been in different 381 00:17:25,960 --> 00:17:27,480 assignments, emails always there. 382 00:17:27,480 --> 00:17:29,360 There's stuff on confidence, SharePoint, There's so many 383 00:17:29,360 --> 00:17:34,160 channels of information that I also have to familiarize myself, 384 00:17:34,160 --> 00:17:36,440 know exactly what is where and for what purpose. 385 00:17:36,760 --> 00:17:40,120 I do like this idea of most of the communication just happens 386 00:17:40,120 --> 00:17:43,160 in one place and that's it. Yeah, that's the thing I think 387 00:17:43,400 --> 00:17:45,480 you need to define like how we work. 388 00:17:45,480 --> 00:17:49,520 I call it HWW, you know, like what is the, what is Slack used 389 00:17:49,520 --> 00:17:50,880 for? What is it not used for? 390 00:17:50,920 --> 00:17:53,240 What is e-mail use for? What is it not use for, Right. 391 00:17:53,240 --> 00:17:55,280 And I think that's the thing. There's so much noise, there's 392 00:17:55,280 --> 00:17:56,920 so much going on because there's no friction. 393 00:17:56,960 --> 00:17:59,920 It's easy, right? And we're always, especially in 394 00:17:59,920 --> 00:18:01,680 the product world, right, we go, we want to make things 395 00:18:01,680 --> 00:18:04,480 frictionless, but some friction sometimes brings benefit, right? 396 00:18:04,480 --> 00:18:07,920 If it's harder to do something, we're more reluctant to do it, 397 00:18:07,920 --> 00:18:09,720 you know, like the same with meetings, right? 398 00:18:09,880 --> 00:18:12,320 It's so easy to do now we just do it. 399 00:18:12,920 --> 00:18:15,640 But we if there's a bit of friction there, you know, then 400 00:18:15,640 --> 00:18:18,200 that changes it a bit. And I think that's, I think as 401 00:18:18,200 --> 00:18:21,520 companies need to define like the communication strategy there 402 00:18:21,560 --> 00:18:24,040 because it can be overwhelmed. I know people that have like 403 00:18:24,040 --> 00:18:27,560 free monitors on their screen, Slack on one, e-mail on another 404 00:18:27,560 --> 00:18:30,560 and like the IDE or something there and they just every time 405 00:18:30,560 --> 00:18:32,600 there's a blink, they just change their focus. 406 00:18:32,600 --> 00:18:34,600 Right. You know, and they're like, OK, 407 00:18:34,600 --> 00:18:37,000 how can you do that? It's like, again, it's this 408 00:18:37,000 --> 00:18:39,040 formal, right? It's like, I need to be aware of 409 00:18:39,040 --> 00:18:41,360 that. And I'm always saying like, turn 410 00:18:41,360 --> 00:18:45,280 Slack off. Like maybe you say from 12:00 to 411 00:18:45,280 --> 00:18:48,080 this time you have Slack open or e-mail open, and then you work 412 00:18:48,080 --> 00:18:50,160 on it because if there's something really important, 413 00:18:50,280 --> 00:18:51,960 people will find a way to get to you, right? 414 00:18:51,960 --> 00:18:53,360 But of course, there's that fear. 415 00:18:53,360 --> 00:18:56,200 Then, you know, a lot of company policies also say you need to be 416 00:18:56,440 --> 00:18:59,040 available on Slack. But I think it's OK to turn it 417 00:18:59,040 --> 00:19:01,200 off from time to time to really focus, right? 418 00:19:01,280 --> 00:19:06,200 And like switching context all the time is also not good. 419 00:19:06,320 --> 00:19:08,000 You know, especially as engineers, you know, I work a 420 00:19:08,000 --> 00:19:10,760 lot with engineers, the context switching, different services, 421 00:19:10,760 --> 00:19:14,280 different tooling, they have to get back into the topic, which 422 00:19:14,760 --> 00:19:16,720 reduces like the efficiency there, right? 423 00:19:16,720 --> 00:19:19,920 So how can you do that with your own like communication stack? 424 00:19:20,040 --> 00:19:23,240 How can you figure that out? Do you challenge people if you 425 00:19:23,240 --> 00:19:25,280 work with engineers from a product sense? 426 00:19:25,280 --> 00:19:28,120 Because I I've done that and sometimes it made me feel 427 00:19:28,120 --> 00:19:30,640 uncomfortable. But then I also feel like I have 428 00:19:30,640 --> 00:19:32,760 a certain perspective because I've done engineering for so 429 00:19:32,760 --> 00:19:35,360 long that I do feel a little bit more comfortable challenging 430 00:19:35,360 --> 00:19:38,640 like switching focus and like also challenging if they need to 431 00:19:38,640 --> 00:19:41,640 be in a meeting specifically. So like for example, we use 432 00:19:41,640 --> 00:19:44,120 JIRA, we use components for all the different services and 433 00:19:44,120 --> 00:19:46,840 tools, and we're constantly keeping a track of how many 434 00:19:46,840 --> 00:19:48,960 different components we are active on. 435 00:19:49,280 --> 00:19:51,920 And we try to keep it below a certain amount. 436 00:19:51,960 --> 00:19:54,360 You know, because sometimes you cannot help it, right? 437 00:19:54,360 --> 00:19:57,880 There's an issue, you need to switch context, but being aware 438 00:19:57,880 --> 00:20:00,440 of it enables you to challenge. How do we work on that? 439 00:20:00,520 --> 00:20:04,600 So I also try to plan that the team is focused on bigger topics 440 00:20:04,600 --> 00:20:08,360 so they can just focus on a singular like context in that 441 00:20:08,360 --> 00:20:10,400 regard. But I don't think it's common 442 00:20:10,400 --> 00:20:11,880 that way. You often see it's like 443 00:20:11,880 --> 00:20:14,960 switching focus and I couldn't do it. 444 00:20:14,960 --> 00:20:18,320 Like that's a lot new than OK, I need to get into this service, 445 00:20:18,320 --> 00:20:19,800 this system, how does it work again? 446 00:20:19,800 --> 00:20:22,800 OK, I need to look over the code of documentation that time. 447 00:20:23,680 --> 00:20:25,280 It has wasted in some regards, right? 448 00:20:25,280 --> 00:20:28,680 So if you can batch these things up and again, it goes down to 449 00:20:28,680 --> 00:20:30,480 this urgency and importance topic, right? 450 00:20:30,480 --> 00:20:32,280 OK, is this topic important to do now? 451 00:20:32,280 --> 00:20:35,800 OK, can we batch it up so that we have many of these smaller 452 00:20:35,800 --> 00:20:38,760 topics for this context that we should do later on, right? 453 00:20:39,160 --> 00:20:42,160 I think that's a way we have to start approaching some of these 454 00:20:42,160 --> 00:20:45,400 things. I think with seniority, some 455 00:20:45,400 --> 00:20:49,120 people attribute more focus to personal productivity, team 456 00:20:49,120 --> 00:20:51,200 productivity, organizational productivity. 457 00:20:51,760 --> 00:20:54,560 And in the end, because I have this sense of responsibility, I 458 00:20:54,560 --> 00:20:55,960 feel like it's my responsibility, my 459 00:20:55,960 --> 00:21:00,440 productiveness, and to a certain degree also the team as well as 460 00:21:00,440 --> 00:21:03,240 the organization. But in the end, do you agree 461 00:21:03,240 --> 00:21:05,200 with that? Are people responsible for their 462 00:21:05,200 --> 00:21:08,640 own productivity or are people also there to then challenge and 463 00:21:08,640 --> 00:21:10,160 kind of increase productivity overall? 464 00:21:10,640 --> 00:21:12,360 I think you have some ownership there, right? 465 00:21:12,480 --> 00:21:16,920 So yes, you could get a like a task or a thing we need to do 466 00:21:16,920 --> 00:21:19,000 this, but I think you can challenge that, you know, you 467 00:21:19,000 --> 00:21:21,480 could say, hey, how about we do this next week because there's 468 00:21:21,480 --> 00:21:23,840 these other topics. I think everyone is in charge of 469 00:21:23,840 --> 00:21:26,680 their own destiny, like they're in charge of their own time and 470 00:21:26,680 --> 00:21:29,040 they're in focus and they can say, OK, this doesn't make 471 00:21:29,040 --> 00:21:30,960 sense. Now I challenge that, you know, 472 00:21:31,440 --> 00:21:34,080 because a lot of times these tasks come from different 473 00:21:34,080 --> 00:21:37,120 angles, whether the they don't have that perspective of your 474 00:21:37,120 --> 00:21:41,080 workload, You know, that leads to overwhelm, that leads to 475 00:21:41,320 --> 00:21:43,680 burnouts as well, right though you just have all of these 476 00:21:43,680 --> 00:21:45,200 topics coming in from different angles. 477 00:21:45,200 --> 00:21:49,160 And This is why I always kind of preach sounds too harsh of a 478 00:21:49,160 --> 00:21:51,760 word, but you should have one place where you collect all 479 00:21:51,800 --> 00:21:53,560 these things because then you see it. 480 00:21:53,800 --> 00:21:57,600 You know, if again, I use Jira, so any slack message comes in 481 00:21:57,600 --> 00:22:01,000 with task or e-mail or coffee chat or a meeting, I throw it 482 00:22:01,000 --> 00:22:02,600 into Jira and then I can clearly see. 483 00:22:02,960 --> 00:22:06,240 And I said to myself, OK, my to do pile has a WIP limit. 484 00:22:06,840 --> 00:22:09,640 And I have to consciously say, OK, if I need to work on this 485 00:22:09,640 --> 00:22:12,360 now, what do I drop? And that enables me to have a 486 00:22:12,360 --> 00:22:15,120 conversation with people like my boss, for example, where I can 487 00:22:15,120 --> 00:22:18,440 show, look, this is what's going on now, what do we need to 488 00:22:18,440 --> 00:22:20,560 reduce to be able to work on this topic? 489 00:22:20,640 --> 00:22:24,160 Or what is more important? It's about empowering them to 490 00:22:24,160 --> 00:22:26,040 have that overview. And only you have that 491 00:22:26,040 --> 00:22:28,720 capability, right? You know, if you don't do that, 492 00:22:29,280 --> 00:22:32,720 no one else will see that because how can they, You know, 493 00:22:32,720 --> 00:22:34,280 there's so much going on. Yeah. 494 00:22:34,400 --> 00:22:36,800 So I definitely think you have the ownership there on that. 495 00:22:37,120 --> 00:22:39,080 I agree. I've I've also had this 496 00:22:39,080 --> 00:22:41,760 conversation, especially with again, people in big tech and 497 00:22:41,760 --> 00:22:45,640 they're they don't want to give their boss kind of a voice in 498 00:22:45,640 --> 00:22:47,520 that because they feel like they own priorities. 499 00:22:47,520 --> 00:22:51,120 They own a lot of work and a lot of work usually means I'm good. 500 00:22:51,160 --> 00:22:53,000 I should be good. I should be working towards 501 00:22:53,000 --> 00:22:56,080 getting a promotion and a lot of work means I'm on that path and 502 00:22:56,400 --> 00:22:57,880 I deserve it because I do a lot of work. 503 00:22:57,880 --> 00:23:00,720 It's like, oh, in my head, usually from my perspective is 504 00:23:00,720 --> 00:23:03,720 like a lot output driven rather than outcome driven. 505 00:23:03,720 --> 00:23:07,120 I feel like the conversation you have with regards to the people 506 00:23:07,120 --> 00:23:10,480 that kind of guide you are responsible for a hire over road 507 00:23:10,480 --> 00:23:12,560 map helps with regards to that conversation. 508 00:23:12,560 --> 00:23:14,600 What is the most important, not just from a personal 509 00:23:14,600 --> 00:23:17,240 perspective, but also from a company overview? 510 00:23:17,240 --> 00:23:18,720 And I feel like that's missing sometimes. 511 00:23:18,720 --> 00:23:20,040 Yeah, that's, and that's the thing, right? 512 00:23:20,040 --> 00:23:22,880 Again, no one has that perspective but you. 513 00:23:22,880 --> 00:23:27,080 And again, being busy is great, but does it bring value right 514 00:23:27,080 --> 00:23:29,480 now, right. Is also, is there a topic which 515 00:23:29,480 --> 00:23:31,520 you really enjoy that brings you energy? 516 00:23:31,560 --> 00:23:33,600 Because we also shouldn't forget that, right? 517 00:23:33,600 --> 00:23:36,320 You know, if there's something you want to refactor this area 518 00:23:36,320 --> 00:23:39,160 or you see something that's really brings value, you should 519 00:23:39,160 --> 00:23:42,800 champion that, right And figure out, OK, I could say we reduced 520 00:23:42,800 --> 00:23:45,480 this thing or we delayed this week if I can do this, right? 521 00:23:45,600 --> 00:23:47,640 And I think that's the conversation we need to have 522 00:23:47,720 --> 00:23:51,080 with our leaders as well, right? And again, it's about bringing 523 00:23:51,080 --> 00:23:53,600 that seniority into it, challenging it and not just 524 00:23:53,600 --> 00:23:56,360 accepting it because at the end of the day, the To Do List 525 00:23:56,360 --> 00:23:59,920 should never be empty. No one has an empty To Do List, 526 00:23:59,920 --> 00:24:01,080 right? It's always fun. 527 00:24:01,720 --> 00:24:04,400 And so how do you manage that? And I think that's what really 528 00:24:04,400 --> 00:24:07,000 helps them bring that to the table surfacing up. 529 00:24:08,320 --> 00:24:12,840 I feel like we talked about FOMO and I feel like for tasks like 530 00:24:12,840 --> 00:24:14,800 these, especially if I like a lot of things, I have a lot of 531 00:24:14,800 --> 00:24:17,000 FOMO and then dropping things is very hard. 532 00:24:17,320 --> 00:24:20,320 That's like me personally, if I have many things and I enjoy all 533 00:24:20,320 --> 00:24:25,240 of them, I by virtue of time being finite, I will not be able 534 00:24:25,240 --> 00:24:27,760 to work on all of them. So then I learn about my own 535 00:24:27,760 --> 00:24:30,960 priorities and me saying something is different than how 536 00:24:30,960 --> 00:24:32,840 I act, right? If I really like this thing and 537 00:24:32,840 --> 00:24:35,880 I want to do this, but then in practice I prioritize everything 538 00:24:35,880 --> 00:24:40,520 else, that means for me it's the lower priority and that reality. 539 00:24:40,520 --> 00:24:42,880 Sometimes it's hard. And then making decisions on 540 00:24:42,880 --> 00:24:45,520 what to do and what to drop, I've always found that 541 00:24:45,520 --> 00:24:47,600 difficult. Yeah, I mean, that's, I would 542 00:24:47,600 --> 00:24:50,000 say that's life, right? It's really hard to do that. 543 00:24:50,000 --> 00:24:53,360 You know, you can extract it out from work to your private life, 544 00:24:53,360 --> 00:24:55,240 right? You probably want to spend more 545 00:24:55,240 --> 00:24:58,880 time at sport, but that means OK, what needs to be sacrificed 546 00:24:58,880 --> 00:25:01,080 for that? You know, I, for me, I struggle 547 00:25:01,360 --> 00:25:04,520 getting into a reading routine because I I find gaming more 548 00:25:04,520 --> 00:25:07,560 interesting, right? But it's about, OK, I need to be 549 00:25:07,560 --> 00:25:11,440 more aware of that, right? And I think it's about being 550 00:25:11,440 --> 00:25:14,640 intentional, being aware of what's going on there and also 551 00:25:14,640 --> 00:25:20,200 understanding that you should formal is something we can 552 00:25:20,200 --> 00:25:22,960 control. You know, I had this with like 553 00:25:22,960 --> 00:25:25,120 Game of Thrones back then. Everyone was watching it. 554 00:25:25,120 --> 00:25:28,200 And it's like, OK, do I really want to invest this time to 555 00:25:28,200 --> 00:25:30,080 watch this now? Because everyone's talking about 556 00:25:30,080 --> 00:25:31,560 it and stuff. And in the end, I decided, OK, 557 00:25:31,560 --> 00:25:33,160 no, I'd rather do something else. 558 00:25:33,160 --> 00:25:34,640 I'd rather focus on something else. 559 00:25:34,880 --> 00:25:38,600 And of course, you again, making a decision, you lose out on some 560 00:25:38,600 --> 00:25:41,000 aspect. But I think that's something we 561 00:25:41,000 --> 00:25:42,720 all need to understand. That's OK. 562 00:25:43,240 --> 00:25:45,920 You know, it's OK to not be in that cool group to talk about 563 00:25:45,920 --> 00:25:50,320 that topic or it's OK to miss out on a certain topic because 564 00:25:50,320 --> 00:25:52,760 we cannot do everything right. And that's something we need to 565 00:25:52,760 --> 00:25:56,720 be more comfortable with, more aware of, and that's always the 566 00:25:56,720 --> 00:25:59,400 struggle. Yeah, I feel like it's also hard 567 00:25:59,400 --> 00:26:02,680 kind of giving yourself grace because I know I, I mean, I did 568 00:26:02,680 --> 00:26:05,760 this unemy course on Seto custom because personal knowledge 569 00:26:05,760 --> 00:26:08,680 management and everything there and there the advice was also 570 00:26:09,000 --> 00:26:12,160 think of what you consume throughout the day because time 571 00:26:12,160 --> 00:26:14,080 is finite. If you want to read an article 572 00:26:14,320 --> 00:26:16,800 consumed with regards to then capturing that knowledge and 573 00:26:16,800 --> 00:26:18,680 managing that through this method. 574 00:26:19,240 --> 00:26:21,640 But also think of what you do on a daily basis. 575 00:26:21,640 --> 00:26:22,960 Do you game? Do you watch? 576 00:26:22,960 --> 00:26:25,920 For me, it's like anime, manga, gaming, also sports. 577 00:26:25,920 --> 00:26:29,480 And I feel like I could be this superhuman version of myself 578 00:26:29,480 --> 00:26:31,680 because I can cut out all the fluff that's not going to give 579 00:26:31,680 --> 00:26:35,440 me value in my career. And I see other people do that 580 00:26:35,440 --> 00:26:38,000 and I'm like, I, I don't know, I cannot do that. 581 00:26:38,320 --> 00:26:41,280 Like I, I know I can. It requires a lot of discipline, 582 00:26:41,280 --> 00:26:43,840 but do I want to? I feel like I don't, but then 583 00:26:43,840 --> 00:26:47,560 it's valuable and it's useful. So should I be doing that, that 584 00:26:47,560 --> 00:26:50,440 grace? I have to give that to myself 585 00:26:50,440 --> 00:26:52,760 and also be like, yeah, it's fine to do other things as well. 586 00:26:52,760 --> 00:26:55,520 Yeah, and I think that's OK. I mean, you know, know the rule, 587 00:26:55,520 --> 00:26:58,480 be the rule and break the rule. I think it's OK to sit down and 588 00:26:58,480 --> 00:27:01,760 doom scroll from time to time or to not be productive. 589 00:27:01,760 --> 00:27:03,760 I think it's OK. Our bodies need that. 590 00:27:03,760 --> 00:27:06,880 Our minds need that, right? And I think that's, again, it's 591 00:27:06,880 --> 00:27:11,640 about being aware of your own energy levels and realizing, OK, 592 00:27:12,000 --> 00:27:14,360 does this make sense now? And for me, it's all about 593 00:27:14,360 --> 00:27:18,000 intentionality, right? If I pick up my phone and let's 594 00:27:18,000 --> 00:27:22,360 say I open Instagram, I try to ask myself, does this make sense 595 00:27:22,360 --> 00:27:24,960 right now? Do I, do I think I'll get value 596 00:27:24,960 --> 00:27:26,600 from this? Or am I just wasting time? 597 00:27:26,880 --> 00:27:28,040 Could I be just doing something better? 598 00:27:28,400 --> 00:27:32,280 And I think when you kind of get into that flow of intentionality 599 00:27:32,280 --> 00:27:36,560 and being aware of what's going on and that helps you kind of 600 00:27:36,640 --> 00:27:40,720 structure it and focus on that because it's so easy. 601 00:27:40,720 --> 00:27:44,400 You know, we have a huge billion dollar industry that's looking 602 00:27:44,400 --> 00:27:46,720 for our engagement, our focus, right? 603 00:27:46,720 --> 00:27:50,720 That's hard to kind of beat. So again, it's about being aware 604 00:27:50,720 --> 00:27:52,360 of that. OK, does this make sense right 605 00:27:52,360 --> 00:27:54,360 now? And sometimes things don't make 606 00:27:54,360 --> 00:27:56,800 sense but make sense, if that makes sense. 607 00:27:58,000 --> 00:28:02,480 You know, like, I don't know, I always use this analogy that my 608 00:28:02,480 --> 00:28:05,880 wife got a coupon for, for a free watering can at IKEA. 609 00:28:06,280 --> 00:28:08,640 Let's go and do it. The watering can is worth €1.00. 610 00:28:08,640 --> 00:28:11,200 Takes us 4 hours to get there. Like is that worth it? 611 00:28:11,680 --> 00:28:14,040 You know, is that 4 hours worth the €1.00? 612 00:28:14,440 --> 00:28:17,400 You know, maybe they'd experience of going together to 613 00:28:17,400 --> 00:28:22,160 IKEA is that's the value, right? But when you look at it, frame 614 00:28:22,160 --> 00:28:24,720 it like that, it enables you to challenge it a bit more, right? 615 00:28:24,880 --> 00:28:27,000 OK. Is my time worth so little? 616 00:28:27,480 --> 00:28:29,280 I think that's what we also struggle as humans. 617 00:28:29,280 --> 00:28:32,240 We don't value our time so much. Only when we're older, when we 618 00:28:32,240 --> 00:28:33,960 realize there's not much time left. 619 00:28:34,480 --> 00:28:37,080 It's when we realize, oh, we need to be more valuable with 620 00:28:37,080 --> 00:28:39,400 our time. And that's something, it sounds 621 00:28:39,400 --> 00:28:42,120 a bit morbid, but again, you mentioned it earlier, like time 622 00:28:42,120 --> 00:28:44,000 is finite. I think it's being aware of 623 00:28:44,000 --> 00:28:47,600 that, challenging that and asking yourself, OK, is this the 624 00:28:47,600 --> 00:28:49,840 right time for this thing? Could I be doing this thing 625 00:28:49,840 --> 00:28:53,080 which brings me more value? What can I do right now? 626 00:28:53,280 --> 00:28:55,360 Yeah, I feel like it's very difficult. 627 00:28:55,480 --> 00:28:58,400 Like I, I just turned 30 and I'm like, well, if I want to do 628 00:28:58,400 --> 00:29:01,240 these things, it's going to take me a few years to become like an 629 00:29:01,240 --> 00:29:04,640 expert or a level where I'm comfortable at, which means I'm 630 00:29:04,640 --> 00:29:06,200 behind. Like I feel like I'm behind on 631 00:29:06,200 --> 00:29:08,720 so many topics that I would want to do and then again, the 632 00:29:08,720 --> 00:29:11,240 signing is very hard. Where to spend your time on or 633 00:29:11,240 --> 00:29:14,720 taking control of the time that you have by not picking up your 634 00:29:14,720 --> 00:29:17,880 phone and scrolling endlessly. I'd like that reasoning of being 635 00:29:17,880 --> 00:29:19,600 intentional with that. Yeah, and I think it's all 636 00:29:19,600 --> 00:29:21,680 about, you know, augmenting our time. 637 00:29:21,840 --> 00:29:24,720 You know, for example, I don't like vacuuming. 638 00:29:25,240 --> 00:29:29,120 OK, so how do I solve that? I get vacuuming robots. 639 00:29:29,120 --> 00:29:31,680 They're not fully like they don't do the best job, but it 640 00:29:31,680 --> 00:29:36,280 means I can reduce my vacuuming time by like 80%, you know, and 641 00:29:36,280 --> 00:29:39,000 that brings me more time. So I think if you look at your 642 00:29:39,000 --> 00:29:42,800 life in that way and OK, using your money or your resources to 643 00:29:42,800 --> 00:29:46,360 augment some of that, like attributes or delegating, 644 00:29:46,360 --> 00:29:49,120 especially when it comes to work, can I delegate this topic? 645 00:29:49,200 --> 00:29:52,360 Is there a junior in the team which would get benefit working 646 00:29:52,360 --> 00:29:55,680 on this hard problem, right? Looking at like that and 647 00:29:55,680 --> 00:29:58,800 augmenting because that's the only way we can make time, so to 648 00:29:58,800 --> 00:30:02,440 speak, right? Yeah, in this topic of kind of 649 00:30:02,440 --> 00:30:04,960 self management and productivity, I think we covered 650 00:30:04,960 --> 00:30:07,440 and we started with time management with regards to 651 00:30:07,440 --> 00:30:09,720 meetings and challenging do I need to be in there? 652 00:30:10,000 --> 00:30:12,560 We also talked about priorities and focus. 653 00:30:12,560 --> 00:30:15,320 Is there anything you still want to share that we didn't 654 00:30:15,320 --> 00:30:25,260 highlight yet? What makes you productive on a 655 00:30:25,260 --> 00:30:27,340 day-to-day basis? Is it the structure that you 656 00:30:27,340 --> 00:30:29,020 have? Is it the way you manage time? 657 00:30:29,020 --> 00:30:31,420 Is it the priority you bring in focus? 658 00:30:32,080 --> 00:30:33,560 For me, it's about the awareness. 659 00:30:33,560 --> 00:30:35,680 Like I said, I have this log right where I have a bullet 660 00:30:35,680 --> 00:30:39,840 point for all the topics and every time I change focus or 661 00:30:39,840 --> 00:30:43,960 intentionality, I open that log and just write like a few words 662 00:30:43,960 --> 00:30:47,000 like OK, I'm doing this now, I'm washing, or I'm going to this 663 00:30:47,000 --> 00:30:50,280 meeting and open. That brings the context of the 664 00:30:50,280 --> 00:30:54,160 day and enables me to look at it and say, OK, I don't know, we're 665 00:30:54,400 --> 00:30:57,760 3:00 PM. I still have a lot to do. 666 00:30:57,880 --> 00:30:59,920 Does it make sense for the me to do this now? 667 00:30:59,960 --> 00:31:04,040 That really helps me like focus on how do I move forward with 668 00:31:04,040 --> 00:31:06,600 this? What, what topics do I want to 669 00:31:06,600 --> 00:31:08,120 do now? It's all about my energy levels 670 00:31:08,120 --> 00:31:11,800 as well, right? So for me, I'm a morning person. 671 00:31:11,880 --> 00:31:13,560 I can get a lot of stuff done in the morning. 672 00:31:13,560 --> 00:31:16,160 So it's like, OK, how can I optimize that? 673 00:31:16,160 --> 00:31:19,080 I do all of the stuff which requires a lot of energy in the 674 00:31:19,080 --> 00:31:21,240 morning and the stuff which doesn't so much in the 675 00:31:21,240 --> 00:31:23,120 afternoons. So that's why a lot of meetings 676 00:31:23,120 --> 00:31:27,320 are in the afternoon for me because it's, it's not the same 677 00:31:27,320 --> 00:31:29,920 energy level as like working on something or working on a 678 00:31:29,920 --> 00:31:32,040 concept. So it's being aware of that and 679 00:31:32,040 --> 00:31:35,320 kind of optimizing on that. So this like log for me is the 680 00:31:35,320 --> 00:31:38,880 central point that I can open see where I am today, what I'm 681 00:31:38,880 --> 00:31:41,880 doing right now and challenges what I should be doing. 682 00:31:42,520 --> 00:31:44,960 Interesting, because I've been trying to get into journaling, 683 00:31:45,400 --> 00:31:47,640 and I usually do it at the end of the day. 684 00:31:48,120 --> 00:31:50,280 And I say usually, but I barely started. 685 00:31:50,360 --> 00:31:52,680 And it's also because, yeah, at the end of the day, I'm 686 00:31:52,680 --> 00:31:54,040 exhausted. I just want to go to bed. 687 00:31:54,040 --> 00:31:56,240 And then I don't do it for that day specifically. 688 00:31:56,400 --> 00:31:57,600 Yeah. So it's been very difficult. 689 00:31:57,600 --> 00:31:59,120 You do it throughout the day. Exactly. 690 00:31:59,120 --> 00:32:00,800 Interesting. So I just have like a text file 691 00:32:00,800 --> 00:32:04,880 with bullet points there. And basically every morning I do 692 00:32:04,880 --> 00:32:08,320 a gratitude journal and I also look back then of the previous 693 00:32:08,320 --> 00:32:10,920 day, you know, because I have the energy in the morning and it 694 00:32:10,920 --> 00:32:14,560 gives me like, what can I optimize today, which yesterday 695 00:32:14,560 --> 00:32:18,160 I didn't optimize for or that overview there because I also 696 00:32:18,160 --> 00:32:19,960 struggled with the journaling at the same thing. 697 00:32:19,960 --> 00:32:21,440 Like at the end of the day, you just going to bed. 698 00:32:21,440 --> 00:32:23,040 OK, I need to write something now. 699 00:32:23,600 --> 00:32:25,600 And also you can't remember everything, right? 700 00:32:25,600 --> 00:32:28,680 You're like, your brain is going, what did I do today? 701 00:32:28,920 --> 00:32:31,520 And then you realize you can't sleep because your brain is 702 00:32:31,520 --> 00:32:32,640 then. You're on. 703 00:32:32,800 --> 00:32:34,840 Exactly. And then it takes you longer to 704 00:32:34,840 --> 00:32:37,960 get to sleep and then again, Domino effect of that, right? 705 00:32:37,960 --> 00:32:41,480 So I find that for me, it really helps bring that intentionality, 706 00:32:41,480 --> 00:32:44,440 bring that awareness and it's a tool for reflection, right? 707 00:32:44,440 --> 00:32:47,400 So I can look back, let's say last week on Wednesday, what 708 00:32:47,400 --> 00:32:50,400 happened, what went on there? And it really helps me bring 709 00:32:50,400 --> 00:32:52,680 that focus. How long have you been doing it? 710 00:32:53,480 --> 00:32:56,000 That method for just over a year, as soon as I switched to 711 00:32:56,000 --> 00:32:57,800 Obcidian, I kind of tried it like that. 712 00:32:57,800 --> 00:33:01,240 So I'm always testing something out and moving around, but 713 00:33:01,240 --> 00:33:02,960 that's really worked really good so far. 714 00:33:03,120 --> 00:33:07,000 Yeah, I, I really, because this this intentionality that you 715 00:33:07,000 --> 00:33:10,360 speak of as well as kind of this reflecting of the day, not just 716 00:33:10,360 --> 00:33:12,520 the day, but also last week and kind of checking in with 717 00:33:12,520 --> 00:33:14,480 yourself. I feel like I don't do that 718 00:33:14,480 --> 00:33:17,080 often enough. I go really hard and I achieve 719 00:33:17,080 --> 00:33:19,640 things and then it's like on to the next, next milestones like 720 00:33:19,640 --> 00:33:23,080 always go, go, go. And then only in conversations 721 00:33:23,080 --> 00:33:26,840 where someone is has the role of like a mentor or a coach, am I 722 00:33:26,840 --> 00:33:29,880 more reflective or I really have to take myself out of it. 723 00:33:30,160 --> 00:33:32,440 Also, when asking for feedback, that's when I'm reflective. 724 00:33:32,440 --> 00:33:35,680 But if nothing triggers me, if there's no incentive, then I 725 00:33:35,680 --> 00:33:37,120 don't do that. I just keep going. 726 00:33:37,560 --> 00:33:39,800 I feel like journaling could be a really good means to an end, 727 00:33:39,800 --> 00:33:43,080 to be more intentional with my time and to also be reflective. 728 00:33:43,280 --> 00:33:45,600 And you probably do retrospectives in your job, 729 00:33:45,600 --> 00:33:48,000 right? Where you reflect back on topic 730 00:33:48,000 --> 00:33:50,040 or anything. I do that every week on a 731 00:33:50,040 --> 00:33:52,360 Sunday. I basically get a coffee, sit 732 00:33:52,360 --> 00:33:55,840 there and look over like the logs of the week and just see 733 00:33:55,840 --> 00:33:58,320 what, OK, what did I enjoy? What didn't I enjoy? 734 00:33:58,720 --> 00:34:02,160 And I do a weekly wrap wrap up. And every week I set like a 735 00:34:02,160 --> 00:34:05,800 micro goal, like, OK, this week I want to do more sport and kind 736 00:34:05,800 --> 00:34:08,360 of then I have that intentionality this week I want 737 00:34:08,360 --> 00:34:10,760 to do this. So I find that's also easier to 738 00:34:10,760 --> 00:34:14,360 do on smaller chunks and say, OK, this year I want to lose 10 739 00:34:14,360 --> 00:34:16,639 kilos. That's harder to grasp. 740 00:34:16,840 --> 00:34:19,080 But if you're doing on a week by week, you're breaking it down a 741 00:34:19,080 --> 00:34:21,440 little bit more. So this weekly reflection 742 00:34:21,679 --> 00:34:24,360 enables me then to look over the logs and since it's all bullet 743 00:34:24,360 --> 00:34:27,199 pointed it's quite easy. Easy just to run through and see 744 00:34:27,679 --> 00:34:29,480 and then go, OK, what do I need to change? 745 00:34:29,480 --> 00:34:31,480 What's important for me this week? 746 00:34:32,199 --> 00:34:36,520 Do you still do bigger goal setting in terms of years or 747 00:34:36,520 --> 00:34:39,800 months, or for your own career or for your own personal life? 748 00:34:40,159 --> 00:34:42,960 Yeah, I kind of try and set like a vision statement in some 749 00:34:42,960 --> 00:34:45,600 regards. So not something not like I want 750 00:34:45,600 --> 00:34:49,280 to be like having my own company by this time, but it's more like 751 00:34:49,800 --> 00:34:53,120 I want, I envision this freedom, this kind of thing. 752 00:34:53,120 --> 00:34:56,320 And that's what I then try to then on a weekly basis work 753 00:34:56,320 --> 00:34:59,640 towards that. Because I find if you set a big 754 00:34:59,640 --> 00:35:02,920 goal and then you like then figure out how can I get there, 755 00:35:03,280 --> 00:35:07,160 It's quite intimidating. And I think that's then stops us 756 00:35:07,160 --> 00:35:09,920 from doing something. And usually it's like, it's 757 00:35:09,920 --> 00:35:12,480 always this problem, like after the new year, people go to the 758 00:35:12,480 --> 00:35:14,920 gym, right? And after a few weeks they stop. 759 00:35:15,520 --> 00:35:17,960 I would say it's the same kind of approach that right? 760 00:35:18,280 --> 00:35:20,720 Whereas if you're doing it and checking in on a more regular 761 00:35:20,720 --> 00:35:24,320 basis, you can like reflect on it and just challenge yourself, 762 00:35:24,320 --> 00:35:28,560 OK, is this what I set out to do, really what I want to do? 763 00:35:29,200 --> 00:35:32,360 Or was it just a impulse because someone I know is doing it or I 764 00:35:32,360 --> 00:35:34,800 was inspired? I think again, it's about being 765 00:35:34,800 --> 00:35:38,240 aware of that. Yeah, I feel like big goals have 766 00:35:38,240 --> 00:35:42,360 this any positive effect that I break it down and there's a path 767 00:35:42,360 --> 00:35:44,800 to that. And I can see that it's just 768 00:35:44,840 --> 00:35:48,560 with varied interests and also with time changing my interests 769 00:35:48,560 --> 00:35:50,400 change and then that goal might be obsolete. 770 00:35:50,400 --> 00:35:51,920 And then I have to do that for another goal. 771 00:35:51,920 --> 00:35:55,680 And it's like I feel like I also anchor myself to then not want 772 00:35:55,680 --> 00:35:58,280 to change a goal because I've set that goal for myself and 773 00:35:58,280 --> 00:36:01,880 that was the focus back then. So it, it kind of reduces how 774 00:36:01,880 --> 00:36:03,760 agile I am with what I want to do. 775 00:36:04,200 --> 00:36:06,880 So therefore I don't do it. But then these micro goals on a 776 00:36:06,880 --> 00:36:09,760 weekly basis, I've, I've started trying to do them on a 777 00:36:09,760 --> 00:36:13,000 day-to-day basis, not even on a week basis, but just give me a 778 00:36:13,000 --> 00:36:15,680 few things that I need to get done today and do those. 779 00:36:15,680 --> 00:36:17,080 And that gives me a lot of fulfillment. 780 00:36:17,080 --> 00:36:19,880 Even just checking them off physically or like a check box 781 00:36:19,880 --> 00:36:22,520 in Obsidian somewhere. I really enjoy doing that and it 782 00:36:22,520 --> 00:36:25,200 gives me focus. Yeah, I mean, certainly I my 783 00:36:25,200 --> 00:36:28,120 gratitude journal that I do every morning, I always define 784 00:36:28,120 --> 00:36:31,360 what one thing that I will do today will bring me joy and 785 00:36:31,360 --> 00:36:35,640 energy. One thing simple and it's not 786 00:36:35,640 --> 00:36:38,520 like this overreaching goal that I'm going to get a huge pay rise 787 00:36:38,520 --> 00:36:40,320 or promotion. It's like today, what do I want 788 00:36:40,320 --> 00:36:42,360 to do? Like today is the podcast, for 789 00:36:42,360 --> 00:36:44,760 example, you know, that's the one thing that will give me joy 790 00:36:44,760 --> 00:36:48,280 and energy today. I think it, it helps them make 791 00:36:48,280 --> 00:36:50,560 us more aware and be present in the moment, right? 792 00:36:50,680 --> 00:36:52,880 Because it's about today. You know, I have control of 793 00:36:52,880 --> 00:36:54,680 today. I don't have control of tomorrow 794 00:36:54,800 --> 00:36:57,520 or the next week, right? Things can change and it really 795 00:36:57,520 --> 00:36:59,200 helps. You have a positive mindset, 796 00:36:59,200 --> 00:37:01,440 then you know you're because you're always achieving, you're 797 00:37:01,440 --> 00:37:04,000 always bringing things forward and always reflecting on that. 798 00:37:04,880 --> 00:37:08,080 How big is your daily log or your daily journal? 799 00:37:08,080 --> 00:37:10,800 Because I feel like it's so personal that no one shares 800 00:37:10,800 --> 00:37:13,680 actually how much they put in there, if it's a whole paragraph 801 00:37:13,680 --> 00:37:17,360 or if it's just a few sentences. I would say it's like 30 to 50 802 00:37:17,360 --> 00:37:21,840 bullet points and a bullet point is maybe one or two sentences 803 00:37:21,840 --> 00:37:24,080 Max. I really use keywords or 804 00:37:25,080 --> 00:37:29,160 something that maybe triggers that mindset on there or a link 805 00:37:29,160 --> 00:37:31,680 to something which you know, has more details there. 806 00:37:31,960 --> 00:37:36,040 So it's like meeting with the team about X and then just 807 00:37:36,040 --> 00:37:38,240 bullet points. We decided X or we need this 808 00:37:38,240 --> 00:37:40,280 information. Just quick bullet points just 809 00:37:40,280 --> 00:37:42,800 for myself and how to work on that. 810 00:37:42,800 --> 00:37:44,800 Yeah. And do you then separate because 811 00:37:44,880 --> 00:37:48,120 this is what I'm, I've, I've tried to do this 10th custom and 812 00:37:48,280 --> 00:37:52,440 where I struggle with it's a, it's a tool to organise 813 00:37:52,440 --> 00:37:54,400 knowledge, like a knowledge management system. 814 00:37:54,800 --> 00:37:58,120 But then if I have a meeting with regards to domain experts 815 00:37:58,120 --> 00:38:00,680 and stuff that we need to do, there's deadlines, there's 816 00:38:00,680 --> 00:38:04,080 context, there's a lot of stuff. And I feel like how do I have 817 00:38:04,080 --> 00:38:05,440 that? And then also this knowledge 818 00:38:05,440 --> 00:38:07,200 management system, do I combine them? 819 00:38:07,200 --> 00:38:09,520 Do I keep them separate? And also you're saying there's 820 00:38:09,520 --> 00:38:12,040 this daily log. Do you put that in there? 821 00:38:12,320 --> 00:38:14,800 And then how do you get that information back if it's needed 822 00:38:14,800 --> 00:38:15,560 again? Yeah. 823 00:38:15,560 --> 00:38:18,880 I mean, I tried to keep the deeper context like separated 824 00:38:18,880 --> 00:38:22,320 between work and private. So my, let's say personal 825 00:38:22,320 --> 00:38:26,720 knowledge system is only for like my private life and side 826 00:38:26,720 --> 00:38:29,320 projects I'm working on and businesses, that sort of thing. 827 00:38:29,480 --> 00:38:31,960 My professional thing I keep within the tools within the 828 00:38:31,960 --> 00:38:35,360 business. So I, I really, because I don't 829 00:38:35,360 --> 00:38:38,760 want to be at home on a Saturday and searching for something and 830 00:38:38,760 --> 00:38:42,280 then a work topic pops up. You know, I try to keep that 831 00:38:42,280 --> 00:38:44,720 clear boundary. And of course that brings extra 832 00:38:44,720 --> 00:38:47,200 friction, right? Because it's not one source of 833 00:38:47,200 --> 00:38:50,560 truth then, but that's when I link into my log, OK, here's a 834 00:38:50,560 --> 00:38:54,600 confidence link or here's a Jira book that or ticket that relates 835 00:38:54,600 --> 00:38:56,960 to that. That's why I try and keep it 836 00:38:56,960 --> 00:38:58,960 just to the minimal. So it doesn't replace like 837 00:38:58,960 --> 00:39:00,920 taking meeting notes or anything, but it's more about 838 00:39:01,080 --> 00:39:04,640 for your own opinion of how the meeting went or what your 839 00:39:04,640 --> 00:39:06,880 thoughts are in a meeting. So it shouldn't replace meeting 840 00:39:06,880 --> 00:39:10,080 notes or anything like that. But it's just like, how did you 841 00:39:10,080 --> 00:39:12,280 feel at the meeting? You know, was it positive or 842 00:39:12,280 --> 00:39:14,080 negative, right? Because then you can reflect on 843 00:39:14,080 --> 00:39:15,560 that as well. How interesting. 844 00:39:15,560 --> 00:39:16,920 So that's how you keep them separate. 845 00:39:17,960 --> 00:39:20,200 I'm going to experiment with this because I feel like it's 846 00:39:20,200 --> 00:39:22,080 something that I do see having value. 847 00:39:22,440 --> 00:39:23,640 What? What has journaling brought to 848 00:39:23,640 --> 00:39:25,200 you now that you've done it for a year? 849 00:39:25,200 --> 00:39:28,440 Do you see yourself different than like a couple years back in 850 00:39:28,440 --> 00:39:31,040 how you are intentional with your time or how you feel in 851 00:39:31,040 --> 00:39:32,360 general? Yeah. 852 00:39:32,360 --> 00:39:37,080 I mean, one thing it's bring up positivity for is that I 853 00:39:37,080 --> 00:39:39,880 actually do a lot. That's something that I always 854 00:39:39,880 --> 00:39:41,760 struggled. Like at the end of the day, I 855 00:39:41,760 --> 00:39:44,640 really struggled to realize, OK, what did I do today? 856 00:39:45,320 --> 00:39:48,280 And this really helped me bring awareness that I'm doing a lot 857 00:39:48,800 --> 00:39:52,520 and also enabled me to bring new processes into how to reduce a 858 00:39:52,520 --> 00:39:54,960 lot of the topics because I realized, OK, there's a lot of 859 00:39:54,960 --> 00:39:58,520 context which is there, so how? And this has really helped me 860 00:39:58,520 --> 00:40:01,400 bring awareness to that and kind of challenge that as well. 861 00:40:03,000 --> 00:40:06,400 And I've been journaling for, I don't know, eight years and 862 00:40:06,400 --> 00:40:09,160 really like gratitude journaling, really realize it 863 00:40:09,160 --> 00:40:11,760 helps my positivity and my energy, you know? 864 00:40:13,840 --> 00:40:15,480 Yeah. Do you still read back the 865 00:40:15,480 --> 00:40:18,960 journals of like years ago or are they like archive and like? 866 00:40:19,040 --> 00:40:21,880 Not yet, not yet. Maybe that's a, a weekend 867 00:40:21,880 --> 00:40:24,440 activity with like some whiskey or something like this. 868 00:40:24,440 --> 00:40:27,640 But yeah, I mean, it would be interesting to look back like, I 869 00:40:27,640 --> 00:40:31,040 don't know, one year ago, like what was, what did the week look 870 00:40:31,040 --> 00:40:33,560 like then or a few years ago, right, to see how you're 871 00:40:33,560 --> 00:40:36,080 progressing. But our lives are so fluid. 872 00:40:36,080 --> 00:40:39,440 It changes so much, right? And our priorities change. 873 00:40:39,600 --> 00:40:42,360 And I think that's always interesting to be aware of that 874 00:40:42,360 --> 00:40:45,440 and realise, like you said, your interests change as well, which 875 00:40:45,440 --> 00:40:49,400 is perfectly fine. You know, like AI is the big 876 00:40:49,400 --> 00:40:51,320 thing now. Who would have thought like 10 877 00:40:51,320 --> 00:40:53,760 years ago that it's part of our daily business? 878 00:40:53,760 --> 00:40:56,680 Like that wouldn't have been a part of your goal maybe to go 879 00:40:56,680 --> 00:40:58,720 deep on that. But nowadays it's like, OK, how 880 00:40:58,720 --> 00:41:02,520 do we focus more time on that? And that's, I think that's being 881 00:41:02,520 --> 00:41:05,160 aware it's OK to change. It's OK to stop something if you 882 00:41:05,160 --> 00:41:07,800 don't enjoy it. Don't do it just because you 883 00:41:07,800 --> 00:41:10,160 feel like you have to. But you know, work on that. 884 00:41:10,480 --> 00:41:11,720 Yeah, Yeah. Interesting. 885 00:41:12,520 --> 00:41:14,880 It's very interesting that you can take this perspective of 886 00:41:15,280 --> 00:41:18,920 kind of analysing what you do on a day-to-day and be in control 887 00:41:18,920 --> 00:41:21,440 of that, even though you're both in the driver as well as the 888 00:41:21,440 --> 00:41:24,240 person that analysis to improve your own life. 889 00:41:24,240 --> 00:41:27,640 You can take both roles because normally if you go, for example, 890 00:41:27,640 --> 00:41:30,600 to therapy, there's two people in there and one helps the other 891 00:41:30,600 --> 00:41:33,440 kind of get their own thoughts in order and realize things that 892 00:41:33,440 --> 00:41:35,920 they otherwise wouldn't have. And you can do this yourself as 893 00:41:35,920 --> 00:41:37,320 well. I think that's fascinating. 894 00:41:37,320 --> 00:41:40,120 Yeah, I mean, you need to like step back from yourself. 895 00:41:40,160 --> 00:41:43,920 You know, I think that's sounds easy, but it's, it's quite 896 00:41:43,920 --> 00:41:46,160 difficult to reflect on that. I'm being critical of what 897 00:41:46,160 --> 00:41:48,840 you're doing. And I think such tooling enables 898 00:41:48,840 --> 00:41:51,520 you then to sit with someone. Like I could sit with you and we 899 00:41:51,520 --> 00:41:53,360 go through it and you can give me your thoughts and 900 00:41:53,360 --> 00:41:55,160 perspective. And every thought and 901 00:41:55,160 --> 00:41:57,080 perspective, of course, is your own. 902 00:41:57,280 --> 00:42:00,480 There's no right or wrong. I think that system enables you 903 00:42:00,480 --> 00:42:02,080 to have that conversation as well, right? 904 00:42:02,080 --> 00:42:04,880 So I think it's also good to get some outside perspective because 905 00:42:04,880 --> 00:42:07,840 again, we don't see ourselves from the outside, right? 906 00:42:08,360 --> 00:42:10,760 So someone might say, hey, you're super organized, but 907 00:42:10,840 --> 00:42:14,040 actually inside your chaos, you know, and I think it's also a 908 00:42:14,040 --> 00:42:17,480 good tool to enable you to sit down with someone, reflect on it 909 00:42:17,480 --> 00:42:19,560 and get feedback. And then it's like a knock on 910 00:42:19,560 --> 00:42:22,400 effect because then the people are like, actually, how do I do 911 00:42:22,400 --> 00:42:23,960 it? Then like this, you know, and it 912 00:42:23,960 --> 00:42:27,560 leads to that conversation about that I've had all the time, 913 00:42:27,560 --> 00:42:30,720 especially around like meeting chaos that people have, you 914 00:42:30,720 --> 00:42:33,640 know, and you show them, OK, this is how I've done it. 915 00:42:33,800 --> 00:42:37,000 And they're like, ah, OK, I get I should think about doing that. 916 00:42:37,240 --> 00:42:39,040 It goes back to this whole impact apartment, right? 917 00:42:39,200 --> 00:42:41,680 You are in charge of your time and destiny in that regard. 918 00:42:42,120 --> 00:42:43,760 Don't get lost in the day-to-day. 919 00:42:44,160 --> 00:42:48,080 It's so easy to do that. But step back from time to time 920 00:42:48,240 --> 00:42:50,640 and look, is this the direction I want to go in? 921 00:42:50,800 --> 00:42:53,800 Just this makes sense. Does this have the outcome I 922 00:42:53,800 --> 00:42:56,880 want to achieve? And you have the power to change 923 00:42:56,880 --> 00:42:58,760 that. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. 924 00:42:58,760 --> 00:43:01,320 Have you tried that, getting feedback from an outside 925 00:43:01,320 --> 00:43:03,920 perspective on like your your notes or your system? 926 00:43:03,920 --> 00:43:06,720 Because I think if I would show you my journal, I'd be 927 00:43:06,720 --> 00:43:09,240 embarrassed a little bit. Maybe that's like my ego thing. 928 00:43:09,240 --> 00:43:12,080 Even when people say, OK, who took meetings and can everyone 929 00:43:12,080 --> 00:43:14,520 kind of centralized their meetings, their meeting notes, 930 00:43:14,760 --> 00:43:16,680 I'm like, man, I have to make these more organised because 931 00:43:16,680 --> 00:43:19,320 otherwise it looks embarrassing. Yeah, yeah. 932 00:43:19,320 --> 00:43:22,440 I mean, I think because of the log is quite short and simple. 933 00:43:22,440 --> 00:43:24,800 There's not too much emotion in there, right. 934 00:43:24,800 --> 00:43:28,480 So it's not like I'm really going into the feelings or 935 00:43:28,480 --> 00:43:31,800 emotional side of things. And I think that's, that's the 936 00:43:31,840 --> 00:43:34,240 area where we need to be more sensitive, right? 937 00:43:34,240 --> 00:43:38,160 Because it's like opening, opening up the door to my inner 938 00:43:38,160 --> 00:43:40,040 self. And that's quite intimidating, 939 00:43:40,160 --> 00:43:41,560 right? I think that's when like 940 00:43:41,560 --> 00:43:44,720 journaling becomes usually it's a private thing that you don't 941 00:43:44,720 --> 00:43:46,640 share with people. It's people are very secretive 942 00:43:46,680 --> 00:43:49,840 of that, right? But with how I do the log, it's 943 00:43:49,960 --> 00:43:52,520 more pragmatic and more straightforward. 944 00:43:53,000 --> 00:43:55,880 And I think that's OK to share. And I might say this meeting was 945 00:43:55,880 --> 00:43:57,800 not good or didn't bring me any value. 946 00:43:57,880 --> 00:43:59,440 And I think that's OK to share that. 947 00:43:59,800 --> 00:44:03,680 Again, it's not super negative, it's just my perspective of a 948 00:44:03,680 --> 00:44:07,400 topic. So I think it's totally fine and 949 00:44:08,160 --> 00:44:12,640 it enables then you to grow and to also help the person who's 950 00:44:12,640 --> 00:44:14,640 looking at it also gain more value. 951 00:44:15,560 --> 00:44:17,200 Yeah. Thank you so much for coming on, 952 00:44:17,200 --> 00:44:18,880 Joseph. This was a real fun 953 00:44:18,880 --> 00:44:22,680 conversation, self management, productivity, It really made me 954 00:44:22,680 --> 00:44:25,160 think and it really made me want to experiment with some of the 955 00:44:25,160 --> 00:44:27,640 tools that you shared. Thanks so much for coming on. 956 00:44:27,880 --> 00:44:28,880 Our pleasure. Cool. 957 00:44:28,920 --> 00:44:30,840 Then we'll round it off. If you're still here listening, 958 00:44:31,080 --> 00:44:33,000 let me know in the comments section what you thought of this 959 00:44:33,000 --> 00:44:34,120 episode. Leave a like. 960 00:44:34,360 --> 00:44:36,640 Likes are free, you don't have to pay for them and otherwise 961 00:44:36,640 --> 00:44:37,560 we'll see you on the next one.