Dear friends of the treasure chest,
I slowly recovered from the Smart City Hackathon. It was a really cool event with really exciting projects. There was a short report at the Münchner Merkur. But now let’s get to the next treasure, so that you have enough food for eyes and ears for the weekend.
In Nugget #1 you can see one of the best speakers I know. Lars Vollmer talks about one of his favourite topics: work. With the thesis “You work too little” some in the audience probably have a heartbeat of 180: “I do over 50 hours a week and the guy tells me I work too little?”. Lars Vollmer is probably right, though, and a significant proportion of these 50 hours are really just activity, also called business theatre. My children have also asked me in the home office: “Daddy, do you work too or are you just on the phone?” To be honest, one or two telephone conferences were really just business theatre. Our customers are not invited. Maybe they would pay for the entertainment? 😉
So we don’t earn a single penny with alignments, reviews and all the other artifacts of our daily business life. What does it look like for you? 100% real work? Or does the week also consist of one or the other drama or comedy? (18 min, video, German)
Video-Link: https://youtu.be/v-m9cso9CSc
Nugget #2 is also about work. Productivity expert Lars Bobach calls the figure 80%. That’s the amount of time some people spend in meetings each week. He also wonders when these people are still working. But that’s not what the podcast should be about. Lars Bobach shows us how he does timeblocking in his calendar. According to him most do not make appointments with themselves in their calendar. Also I do have room for improvement. I have recently rediscovered the Pomodoro technique. In the Pomodoro slots I then process cards from the Doing column of my Personal Kanban Board. It would be even better if I would also block time in my calendar for 2 or 4 Pomodoro slots. I already have entries in my calendar for email or the maintenance of my Kanbanboard. But it often happens that I book meetings over it or simply don’t keep doing it. Do you make appointments with yourself in the calendar? How do you keep them consistently? By the way, my personal highlight comes at the end of the podcast:
I have no time is always lied. Everybody has exactly 24 hours a day and he uses it for what is important to him. If you say no time, you mean I don’t want to.
By the way, I recently wrote an article on this subject titled I don’t have time for this . But now the link to the podcast:
Time Blocking, which tasks belong in the calendar? (25 min, audio, German)
To be productive, many flee to the home office. Nugget #3 is an article by Isabell von Viereck in Murmann Magazine and shows the pitfalls of working from home. Whether you want to sit at your desk in your suit is up to you. I’m usually dressed a bit more casually at home. However, I wouldn’t be sitting in my sleeping shirt in front of my laptop. I completely agree with the tip “Celebrate the routine”. I consider it essential to plan for fixed time windows. As already said, the Pomodoro technique helps me to keep the focus. And after a round in the fresh air or even sport and a refreshing shower at home, it’s easier to work again. However, I don’t have a clear plan for the end of the day. It sometimes happens that I do something with the boys in the afternoon and still cook together. But then I sit down in the evening again.
How does good home office work? (4 min, text, German)
Have a nice weekend!
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator