I like to think I know a decent amount about email, having sent over 5 million of them in the course of doing this newsletter, but I learned something from this post, particularly on better use of alias and multiple accounts. Lot of us struggle with this, the inbox is a busy place. Useful post for anyone looking to make it less busy

We all likely have too many meetings so this excellent post from HBR breaks down 6 psychological reasons why it happens. ‘Meeting Amnesia’ is my favourite, also can confirm recent experience with ‘Pluralistic Ignorance’. Fun and likely very useful post - have a read

Behaviour science behind habits - why we get stuck into bad ones and why they are - seemingly - so difficult to change. One for all of us to learn from I’d say - have a listen. H/T to brainfooder Bas van de Haterd for the share

If you’re going to have a meeting in virtual reality or reality reality then I think these tips are still going to apply. Best piece of advice? Don’t record the debates, record the agreed outcomes. Must read for anyone who wants to have better meeting notes

Some new terminology for us: ‘focus towers’, ‘context decay’, ‘interruption load’. One key idea in particular resonated with me: interruptions aren’t free. Written for developers by developers but I think applicable to any job role where focus and deep work are constantly undermined by interrupts. Interesting to see how all this plays out when the call to go back to the office is made….

PS: includes some handy productivity tips at the end, so have a read

If there is one management lesson we can take from pandemic is that it is possible to over optimise for efficiency. We need slack (not the app) in our day, in order to respond effectively to unpredictable challenges and unexpected opportunities. Excellent post on why we need this, though it needs a part II on how to ensure it we get it.

If the IT folks in the asian tech firm referred to in the report earlier did this, I suspect they might arrest some percentage of the productivity slide. Simple productivity hack we all to got to learn, especially in era of remote - consolidate your time and box it off. Have a read here

‘Just leave it’ - I imagine Napoleon saying to his Marshalls when responding to yet another unnecessary demand on his time. In this example, his advice to his aides to leave all letters unopened for 3 weeks, with the view that the vast majority of issues will be resolved by the sender themselves in that time. If Bonaparte can apply it to matters of war, surely we can apply it to the corporate in tray. Fascinating, fun and maybe useful read

So starts this outstanding article on how to energize, focus & recover. Includes quotes from Daniel Kahnemann as a bonus. H/T to brainfooder Heidi Wassini for the share.

Important truism in this post from productivity coach Nir Eyal. Thankfully, he supports his lecture with a practical framework on how to do what he advised - to become ‘indistractable’. Have a read here

In an era of permanent distraction, the ability to do consistently do ‘deep work’ might be one of the most important skills we can cultivate. Fadeke Adegbuyi has put together this comprehensive guide on how to do it. I’m thinking this is an essential read.

Call to action to employees at Tesla this week - Electrek got a copy of the all hands email from Elon Musk, which you can read unabridged here. Lots of interesting points from Musk, especially his recommendations on productivity - walk out of bad meetings he says, as they are a waste of time.

Forget fancy stuff folks, nothing is more important to a recruiter than micro optimisations of your time. OH subscriber James Lesner @Catawiki tells us about some of his techniques to get a little faster, a little bit better. This should be a series

Once you have the network to crowdsource effectively you can consistently create value by collecting the ideas in one place. No - I’m not talking about brainfood - I’m talking about recruiters best frenemy, LinkedIn. This e-book contains both the obvious and the genius, so well worth a download. Do it here.

The interaction between biology and productivity is going to be one of those near future correlations which will seem obvious those living in that time. Box’s VP Engineering Tomas Barreto will undoubtedly by amongst them, as he shares with us his personal ‘biohack’ routines. It’s fascinating and not entirely comfortable read

This rant against Microsoft Teams is mainly interesting for how it unpacks the core features of 1-2-many messaging apps which all of us are using for company or community communications these days. The first step toward preventing these tools from becoming another noisy time sink is to understand some basic rules onhow to use them. Have a read if you’re starting to get tired of Slack, or indeed, Microsoft Teams