Practice This

How to attract best talent? What is my next job like? Salary is a huge factor but not the only one. Would I work for tons of money doing job I hate? For me the answer is "no". I turned down few big $$ offers, no regrets. I did so since offered job or the culture did not resonate with me enough. Values represent what I am, it represent what organizational culture is like. It must match. These are my current values.

Be on the edge – constantly learn and …

Lifehacker published motivation post that became a true hit. It is Jerry’s Seinfeld’s Productivity Secret.  Quote from the post:
He [Jerry] said for each day that I do my task of writing, I get to put a big red X over that day. "After a few days you’ll have a chain. Just keep at it and the chain will grow longer every day. You’ll like seeing that chain, especially when you get a few weeks under your belt. Your only job next is to not break the chain."
"Don’t break the chain," …

Meetings are the biggest waste of time. Lowest ROI ever. Here is what is needed to set and run the meeting:

Waste time trying to find available time slot suitable for every attendee.
Waste time coordinating the room.
Waste time traveling to the meeting place.
Waste time for unnecessary small talk at the beginning of the meeting.
Waste time during the meeting to get back on track only because somebody decided to raise another unplanned topic.
Waste time arguing who’s to summarize the meeting.
Wasting time after the meeting to clarifying …

I follow simple rules to make sure I invest my time only in most important things. These simple rules keep me from wasting my time on non-important activities. Focusing only on important activities helps me getting results in less time and with less effort. Here are the rules:

Define important categories. For example, my important categories are Family, Finance, each Customer is a category, Blogging, Personal Development, and some other. This can a be a good start to define your categories.
Define outcomes/results/achievements/deliverables in each category. For example, conduct service A …

  I removed all email notifications in my Outlook. It keeps me from being distracted when new email arrives. I am human being and I cannot suppress the basic instinct of curiosity to check what is in the Inbox when I get notified about new email. When email notifications are off, there is a better chance I will keep my work in focused uninterrupted way. Low context switching, less warm-ups, better results in less time.
To disable email notifications in MS Outlook 2007:

Tools -> Options…
In Preferences tab hit “E-mail Options…” button.
Hit …