The Deep Work Mentality

Transcript

1. The Deep Work Mentality Experiments with knowledge work

2. What, why? Rules, strategies Pitfalls

3. What, why? A primer and a pitch

4. We live in a knowledge economy

5. Knowledge work is the most value producing kind of work

   in this era

6. Knowledge work is the most rewarding kind of work in

   this era

7. Being a highly skilled worker is one way of thriving,

   amongst many.

8. Deep Work paves a path to becoming one.

9. Start here:

10. – Cal Newport, in Deep Work Professional activities performed in

    a state of distraction-free concentration that push your cognitive capabilities to their limit.

11. – Cal Newport, in Deep Work. Emphasis mine. Professional activities

    performed in a state of distraction-free concentration that push your cognitive capabilities to their limit.

12. Just focussed working is not enough

13. Just distraction-free is not enough

14. Challenging work in a deep focused mode over a long

    period of time is

15. And the result?

16. – Cal Newport, in Deep Work These efforts create new

    value, improve your skill, and are hard to replicate.

17. – Cal Newport, in Deep Work. Emphasis mine. These efforts

    create new value, improve your skill, and are hard to replicate.

18. That's your x-factor.

19. Hypothesis • Over a longer period of doing deep work,

    you develop two abilities:

20. 1. To quickly master hard things. 2. To produce at

    an elite level, in terms of both quality and speed.

21. 1. To quickly master hard things. 2. To produce at

    an elite level, in terms of both quality and speed.

22. To summarise

23. Distraction-free work that pushes limits, creates new value, and improves

    skill.

24. Process. Not result.

25. Distraction-free work that pushes limits, creates new value, and improves

    skill.

26. Rules, strategies The tenets of deep work, staying on course

27. First, some meta talk.

28. Disclaimer • This is an experience report • YMMV •

    No one true way

29. Not just about: http://calnewport.com/ books/deep-work/

30. Some more case studies* https:// www.mortenhansen.com/ book/great-at-work/ *Be very aware

    of selection bias

31. A good complimentary strategy: https://mindsetonline.com/

32. Practice. Learn from experience.

33. Rules, strategies The tenets of deep work, staying on course

34. Deep work Shallow work Draw clear boundaries

35. Errno!::ETOOMANYMEETINGS

36. Number of meetings is always more than needed $

37. Have meeting free days.

38. Have meeting free days weeks.

39. Emails, Asana, Trello, Jira, PR reviews etc. The shallows!

40. Have a fixed time-slot for them in the day towards

    the EOD.

41. 100% pairing = 100% distraction

42. Have pairing free days.

43. Have pairing free weeks.

44. On-call rotation, pager duty etc. is shallow by definition. ☎

45. Avoid deep work during that period.

46. When we know we won't be distracted, we focus better.

47. Focus on focus Work deeply, plan for depth

48. Uncertainty is a focus killer

49. Plan your day well

50. Plan your week well

51. Invest in a productivity system like GTD® – David Allen's

    Getting Things Done®

52. Leisure time is essential. Budget for it.

53. Forgive yourself for wanting to have fun.

54. Work environment is critical

55. Noise is a distraction

56. Viewport activity is a bigger distraction.

57. Workplaces suffer from tap on the shoulder disease

58. Open office plans are probably the costliest mistake since Null

59. Learn from Barbeque Nation

60. Flag is up !=> Bring food! Flag is down !=>

    Stop!

61. Establish an etiquette, stick to it.

62. Hunger is a distraction, manage it well

63. Embrace boredom. – Cal Newport, in Deep Work

64. This is a core Deep Work rule.

65. Avoid jumping on to something else when waiting on things.

66. e.g. Don't jump to Twitter when waiting for your app

    to load up

67. Dial up the verbosity on logs, ssh sessions, bundle install,

    rspec etc

68. Put your phone away, say in a different room, when

    working.

69. Train yourself by not carrying the phone to the

70. Embrace boredom.

71. This habit requires a lot of training. Possibly the hardest

    to change.

72. Why is it important?

73. Hypothesis • It (the jumping around) trains your mind to

    be distracted, and prevents long hours of focus, eventually reducing your ability to focus.

74. ?

75. Stretch your limit Pick work at the edge your skillset

76. Pick something you haven't done.

77. If Ruby is all you do, go write Haskell.

78. If you are a front-end developer, understand how minification really

    works.

79. Write a compiler

80. Design a new font

81. Pick something outside your domain

82. Pick something adjacent to your skills

83. It has to be knowledge work or craft work.

84. If work isn't offering you a stretch, pick a MOOC

    or a book

85. Side projects are overrated, because they are "side" projects $

86. If you want to work on something 'side', take a

    few days off and make it the main thing for those days.

87. Invest in and get better at writing. ✍ ✨

88. Nothing really brings out deep focus like writing. D

89. Don't fight biology Be aware of your boundaries

90. Sleep well.

91. Gift yourself regular exercise GIJ

92. Understand your biological cycle ⏰

93. Discipline is important. It brings reliability. ✌

94. Separate deep & shallow Focus on focus Stretch your limit

    Don't fight biology

95. Pitfalls Traps, false positives, gotchas.

96. Going too far down the rabbit hole Losing the big

    picture

97. Abdicate responsibility in search of focus ?

98. Ineffective collaboration

99. Ineffective communication

100. Becoming a JIRA ticket pusher

101. Over-estimating your deep work ability There is a point of

     diminishing returns

102. Missing out on leadership Deep work is a very individual

     effort

103. Losing the big picture Losing out on collaborative aspects of

     work Trying out too much deep work Missing out on leadership

104. Despair not, remember what we're working towards:

105. To quickly master hard things To produce at an elite

     level, in terms of both quality and speed

106. Thank you!

107. Swanand Pagnis R Principal Engineer at First.io meetup.com/Bangalore-Ruby-Users-Group/ info.pagnis.in U

     postgres-workshop.com