This 2-Step Process Will 10x Your Daily Performance

How To Plan Your Day At Night

Imagine you’re an actor.

It’s opening night of a Broadway play and you’re the star. You’re backstage thinking of all the praise and accolades you’ll get. The illustrious career that lies ahead.

You hear the stage manager yell, “Places in 5!”. And then you realize…

Shit — I never even looked at the script!

This is the equivalent of not planning your day at night.

Every day you have on this Earth is an opportunity. An opportunity to make something happen. Precious time that shouldn’t be wasted.

If you wait until the morning to plan your day, three things happen:

1. You’re asking for stress and anxiety.
2. You won’t be as productive as you could be.
3. You won’t be as effective as you could be.

Let’s break these down…

1. Stress & Anxiety

Take our actor scenario. The curtains go up, the lights shine on you, and…now what?

You’re in a panic. You’re not sure what to say, what to do, or where to go next. In the best case scenario you’re improvising and making up something decent as you go.

Another good example is a football player not knowing the play before the ball is hiked. It’s a recipe for disaster.

2. Less Productive

If you’re stressed and anxious, you aren’t fully present. You aren’t able to focus clearly on the task at hand. Your mind wanders, thinking about what you need to do next and wondering if you’re missing anything.

This mindset makes it difficult to a) get things done and b) handle unforeseen challenges as they arise. You’re forced to adapt, prioritize, and schedule on the fly.

If you haven’t already set priorities for yourself (see #2 here) then it’s likely you won’t get important things done that day. Emails will bury you, meetings will derail you, and by the time you finally getting a handle on things, the day is almost over.

3. Less Effective

Considering the points above, the quality of your work will obviously suffer. You’ll feel rushed, discombobulated, and unable to provide your complete attention to your work.

Perhaps a more important point here is decision fatigue. By not planning and visualizing your day, you are forcing yourself to constantly make decisions throughout. Big or small, it doesn’t matter. As the day goes on this wears on you.

Mentally exhausted at the end of each day? That’s decision fatigue at work.

Although subtle when isolated, the impact of continually using your brain’s processing power for small decisions quickly adds up over the course of a day. Not planning ahead tremendously increases the number of these decisions you have to make.

You’re so tired from the mental energy exerted to go through that day that you say, “eh, I’ll deal with this tomorrow” and the cycle repeats itself.

Here’s What To Do

It’s clear not planning your day has negative impacts. Luckily this bad habit is an easy one to break. It requires two steps and less than 20 minutes a day.Here’s how…

STEP 1: Plan Your Day At Night.

Take 10–15 minutes and do the following:

1. Look at today’s calendar. Take stock of what you did and note any needed follow ups for tomorrow.
2. Look at tomorrow’s calendar. See what calls or meetings you already have on there.
3. Look at your To-Do list. Refer to the “Post-It System” (#2 here) if you need help on this. See what your top three priorities are and block out time for them on your calendar.

I can’t tell you how important this is. One great benefit is a feeling of content as you finish your day. Reflecting on things you did and noting things that still need to be done provides a sense of closure. It becomes a ritual of sorts, signaling the day’s end.

A second benefit is that you feel more on top of your life and the important things you need to get done. Everything feels in order. You’re in control. Sure, unexpected challenges may pop up (they will) derailing your priorities — but you’ll be in a better position to handle and quickly adapt to it.

STEP 2: Stop. Breathe. Visualize.

Once you’ve planned out tomorrow, take a few minutes to visualize what your day will be like. Visualization is an incredibly powerful technique that is used by the highest performing people in the world. Try it.

Think about yourself waking up. About what your morning looks like. A morning routine is a great thing to have (a little more on mine, #3 here).

See yourself walking into that office, taking that call, crushing that meeting. Actually watch it happen as if it’s a show on Netflix.

Go through the entire day. Take a breath. And sign off.

You’ll go to bed calmer and wake up calmer. You’ll feel more confident and prepared as you start your day. And when that meeting comes up — why be nervous when you’ve already seen yourself crush it? It’s just the next thing on the list. An inevitability.

The day will be less stressful and you, as a result, will be more productive and effective. Getting the shit you need done — and well.

So go. Give it a try. Plan your day at night and report back. See what sort of impact it has on your life.

Why You Should Double Down On Strengths

Or — The Regret I No Longer Regret

Have you ever been asked…

What advice would you give your 20-year old self?

It was my answer to this question that made me realize the importance of doubling down on your strengths.

My answer was… “I would pay more attention in class.”

I said this because, as a new founder, there’s a lot you have to do that you’ve never done before. Raise money, recruit a team, split equity, acquire customers… just to name a few.

So thinking back to age 20, I realized there were a lot of classes that I missed or didn’t pay attention to, which covered topics any entrepreneur would benefit from.

This is me in ACCT 151

But the more I reflected on this “regret”, the more I realized that it shouldn’t be a regret at all.

Because — fuck that.

I was never the kid to sit in the front row, take diligent notes, and study them again that night. I know and love plenty of those people. But that’s just not me. I’m a different person with a different set of strengths.

So, my retrospective advice was essentially telling myself to not be me. To change fundamental aspects of who I am. And to focus on fixing weaknesses rather than optimizing strengths.

And that’s wrong.

Don’t try to be something you’re not.

Now I’m not saying you shouldn’t learn new things or seek to improve. That’s the opposite of my message here.

I still need to learn those things… but I don’t need to go “deep” on them. Rather, I need to go “shallow” — meaning, I need to understand enough to hang in a conversation and think strategically about it.

Why should I spend half a year of life studying the ins and outs of something that bores the shit out of me and I’ll never use again? Something that I’ll never be, or want to be, great at.

This is not me doing your taxes

This isn’t a post about what to study in college. Study anything that interests you. Learn as much as you can. A topic for another day.

No, this is a post about strengths and weaknesses.

About the difference between going wide and shallow versus narrow and deep. The difference between researching something for an hour versus studying it for 10 years.

As an entrepreneur, a leader, a manager, whatever you are — there are going to be things that you aren’t great at but need to get done. It’s the nature of the work. Does that mean you need to be an expert in all of those things?

Of course not…

That’s why you hire people. Hiring is leverage. You save time by 1) not having to learn it and 2) not having to do it. And you spend that time on things you are great at. Things you are an expert in. Things that you have gone narrow and deep on.

And consequently you find someone really talented, and way better than you, to do those other things. Things they are an expert in. Things they go narrow and deep on.

The point is — Play to your strengths. Understand what they are, focus on mastering them, and use them to your benefit.

Unnecessary image — I just like Legos

Too much is said about needing to have a wide-ranging set of knowledge. Especially in business. Academia has you go wide and shallow rather than narrow and deep.

That’s bullshit.

Wide and shallow makes you decent in all things. Narrow and deep makes you great in one.

In an interview with Jony Ive and JJ Abrams, Jony talks about how they refocused his role at Apple to eliminate managerial work. Around minute 34 he says the following:

“The most valuable contribution I can make to Apple certainly isn’t my administrative prowess.”

And you might think — duh!

You don’t turn Jony Ive into a manager. He’s an incredible designer. Let him design and bring in someone else to manage. Doing the opposite would be a disservice to Jony, the company, and because of Apple’s scope — the world.

He also mentions that now, being fully focused on design, he feels happier and more creative than ever.

This is not your manager

The “play to your strengths” strategy has profound impacts.

It allows you to focus on the things you’re great at. And subsequently creates an organization of high-performing individuals pushing happily in the same direction.

Take this concept and apply it to your own work. But keep in mind — this isstrictly for business. If you’re an asshole, this doesn’t mean you should try to be a bigger asshole.

In your personal life you need to work at your weaknesses. In business you hire for them.

Focus on getting better at what you’re good at.

Because even within your strength, there is weakness.

You can always improve. And your company is better off with you going narrow and deep on that strength and becoming an expert in that field — while everyone else does the same.

It starts with understanding yourself and being incredibly honest with what you’re good at and what you’re not.

Focus on the good and double down. Play to your strengths.

How I Reduced Stress, Increased Productivity, and Made Myself Happy Again

“His palms are sweaty, knees weak, arms are heavy.
There’s vomit on his sweater already, mom’s spaghetti.
He’s nervous, but on the surface he looks calm and ready…”
-Eminem, “Lose Yourself”

This was me.

No, I’m not Eminem. And no, I’m not walking around with spaghetti on my sweater. I don’t really even wear sweaters.

But I was dealing with constant feelings of stress and anxiety. Starting a company is fucking hard. There’s no manual for first-time founders.

On the surface I looked and acted as normal as I could. But truthfully, I was overwhelmed.

I was a swelling balloon that never popped. But rather I began to deflate gradually. You don’t recognize it at first. After a while though, you notice something isn’t right.

Me^

It was the way I worked that enabled the worst in my obsession with productivity. An OCD-like infatuation that resulted only in self-sabotage.

It had created an unhappy person obsessed with all of the wrong things about work. An unsustainable modus operandi.

And so I needed a fresh start. I began to embark on a complete reinvention of my operating model. A full reset of the mind and the creation of a new system for doing things.

Fast forward to now…

I’ve gotten more work done this week (it’s Tuesday at 4:30pm) than I would have previously in a 7-day week.

And — I’m not stressed, or anxious, or even close to burned out.

I’m happy. I’m energized. I’m fucking excited.

Here’s how I did it…

1. Start Fresh. Question Everything.

I used to read non-stop about productivity. I still read and experiment with it — only now I have a clearer picture of what it looks like.

Do this, try that. Schedule this, snooze that.

I ended up with so many productivity hacks and exercises that I spent more time on them than actually getting shit done… you know, being productive.

So I dropped it. I dropped it all.

The reminders. The apps. The tasks. The bullshit.

I looked up the definition of productivity. Here’s what I got:

And since I’m not a crop farmer, I decided to define it myself…

Getting shit done that moves things forward

That’s what productivity is.

And with that, I began to build a personalized productivity system from the ground up, with a focus on moving things forward.

For everything I was doing, I would stop and ask,

“Does this move things forward?”

It’s a healthy exercise to do, even if you aren’t struggling the way I was. Audit what you do and ask why you do it. Over time things tend to pile up. It’s important to do some housecleaning once in a while.

So I cleaned house and focused on my new system. One designed to get important things done before dealing with anything else. One designed to optimize my time and my mind.

The rest of the list are the actions that followed…

2. “The Post-it System” and The Death of Digital To-Do Lists.

By questioning everything I did, one thing became abundantly obvious: I needed to stop using Google Inbox.

The reasons are detailed here: “Why I Quit Google Inbox”. And the most common question I’ve gotten since writing that is…

“So what do you do now?”

I use a Post-it note. Just one.

My new system

Digital To-Do lists can be endless. You can put thousands of tasks and reminders in there and have room for millions more.

On a Post-it, I can fit 3.

And so I write on it the three most important things I can do that day. They are prioritized based on their impact; #1 being the most impactful.

“Impactful” meaning it move things forward for the company or for me personally.

In my situation, these two blend…
Company success = personal success
Taking care of myself personally = I perform better for the company

I’m aiming for tangible progress. For movement forward. The Post-it provides the tactics to achieve this.

And notice the list is prioritized. Something digital To-Do lists tend to fall short on. Throwing reminders and tasks into an unordered list makes them all appear equal.

Sure you can call that important client -OR- you could quickly post a photo on the company Instagram. Either way you get the gratification of crossing something off the list. So you are actually incentivized to do the thing that is quick and easy. The reward is the same.

But the results are drastically different.

This mindset compounded over time derails your goals or, at the very least, significantly delays them.

The Post-it System has you force-rank the top three things that you need to get done. It provides focus. It advances your goals. It moves shit forward.

I create it at the end of each day.

And the next morning it sits on my desk, staring judgmentally until I cross off item 1. The visual cue is powerful.

I’m happy when I get to cross something off. It’s gratifying. Pursuing that gratification hungers me to start my day.

This strategy yields incredible results. Rather than trying to “build the wall”, I stay focused on laying bricks. I feel happy and accomplished each time I do. And soon — you start to see a wall forming.

3. The Morning Routine.

The Post-it strategy frames the entire system. Now let’s backtrack to the start of each day.

The first thing I do after getting up is make tea. I switched from regular coffee. While tea doesn’t give me the immediate energy spike, I’ve found it’s a more sustained charge and doesn’t make me crash.

This, coupled with some minor physical exercise (stretching, maybe pushups or squats), wakes my body up and gets my mind going.

Next I meditate for 10 minutes.
(Don’t ignore meditation. I’ve done it for a while and it was important to keep in my routine. I recommend Headspace to start.)

And immediately after that — I write.

I don’t write long but I force myself to get those early thoughts out. Some of the clearest, most creative thinking comes first thing in the morning, when you’re waking up, getting ready, or taking a shower.

It can be a blog post draft, a journal to myself, or some new idea related to work… it doesn’t matter. I want to get these thoughts down.

After all of this, I typically have about an hour before our regular team check-in. I’ll use this time to start, and maybe finish, item 1 on the Post-it.

4. Digging Into The Work.

Now it’s time for our meeting. We try to keep it to 15 minutes or less. Perhaps I’ll have another cup of tea (hardcore, I know).

I take notes during the meeting and catalog any needed followups. If I’m blocking someone — I do that immediately.

This is an important note.
Yes, in this case I am spending time on something that isn’t on the Post-it. But it’s important to get the team mobilized before working on my own tasks. The meeting already forced my mind to switch contexts. So it’s more efficient to stay in that context, take action, and get others moving forward.

Then it’s back to the Post-it.

Now I’m caffeinated, I’m intellectually stimulated, the team is mobilized, and I’m more than ready to tackle my list, one at a time.

Notice — I haven’t checked email yet. It used to be the first thing I did.

That comes only after item 1 is complete. At that time I will check email, take a walk (coupled with scheduled calls), and eat lunch. The afternoon is dedicated to items 2 & 3.

Don’t underestimate the power of walking

After those are done, I check with the team, look at email again, and use all of those inputs to create tomorrow’s list.

This email philosophy is very “Four Hour Workweek”, of course. That book is almost 10 years old but the principles are as sound and relevant as ever.

5. General Rules.

Stop procrastinating. Make decisions and take immediate action. Don’t “snooze” things that need to get done. Force yourself to be decisive — moving important things forward and cutting ruthlessly things that are not.

Prioritize yourself. Make happiness something you work on. It’s a state you achieve, rather than one that magically comes and sustains. Work at it. Take measures to do things that you enjoy and eliminate things you don’t. Be honest with how you feel about doing certain things. Cut out the ones you dislike. Make time for the ones you love.

Get rid of the negatives. This bears repeating. Stop doing shit you hate. Especially unnecessary shit. It can be people, tasks, or activities. Get rid of any that are negative. Any that make you feel bad. Ask yourself if it moves things forward. Ask yourself if you like doing it. It should only be done if the answer to one of those questions is “yes”. And if it does move things forward but you dislike it — perhaps someone can help, or even do it for you.

Set macro goals, create micro systems. My weekly goals became the end of me. I set too many. And many I set were unimportant but existed due to my necessity to be busy. They consumed me. Instead, I now set goals for the year. I then implement systems (a chain of behaviors and actions taken daily or weekly) that further those bigger goals.

Don’t suppress yourself. If there’s something you want to do or an idea you’d love to pursue — try it. Stop any thoughts that come about saying, “you can’t do that because of XYZ.” Stop that. You can. If it’s meaningful, make time for it. Prioritize it. Don’t suppress ideas… explore them fully. Let them run their course. That’s the only way they evolve and grow.

Most of this is simple but eluded me for so long.

I’m glad I’ve made these changes. They’ve had a profound impact on my life, both personally and professionally. But it’s all a work in progress. I’ll always try to improve myself — living in “permanent beta”.

Of course not everyone has the same commitments, goals, or life circumstances. Try your own version of this and see if you have similar results. When it comes to being happy and being productive — there isn’t one true answer. Pick out things you like and ignore things you don’t. If you’re self-aware and always strive to be better… you will.

Why I Quit Google Inbox

“Google Inbox is my life…”

A cringeworthy statement I often said beaming with pride. I was an entrepreneur with “stuff” going on. “I’m busy”, I’d say. As if it was some sort of accomplishment.

How horribly wrong this was…

Earlier this year I decided to reinvent the way I operate. A full restart.

I questioned everything I did and sought to make changes that optimized my effectiveness, efficiency, and overall happiness.
(It’s made a massive difference — post on this coming soon.)

The first thing I did? Quit Google Inbox. And here’s why…

1. To-Do Lists Don’t Belong In Your Inbox.

Let’s backtrack to our world before the Internet. Would you have put your To-Do list in your mailbox? Of course not. That sounds ridiculous.

Those important items belonged on your desk, or maybe even the fridge.

Fridge real estate is important real estate

Mail was meant for a (maybe) once-a-day check to see what had come in. If important, a resulting action from that mail would then be placed on your To-Do list.

2. The Great Bundling of the 2000s.

Enter the Internet. Enter Microsoft Office and, notably, Microsoft Outlook. Soon Outlook became a one-stop stress shop.

Let’s take a tour…

“Hello and welcome! Here you’ll see a mountain of email that need replies. On the left is a calendar that shows you’re booked solid all day. And down there you can see tasks and reminders that actually are important work but, due to the former, you’ll have no time or energy to do.

Now that an overwhelming sense of stress has come over you — let’s spend the five minutes before your next meeting firing off some emotionally-driven emails. Make sure they’re rushed so your anxiety and suppressed rage show through. The resulting miscommunication and confrontation will surely lead to more meetings and email.

Thank you for visiting the Stress Shop… have a terrible day!”

Outlook User

At a glance, coupling mail with tasks and reminders made some sense. Each requires you to take action (although inherently different), and both things could technically be “snoozed” until later.

But this coupling was driven more out of feature expansion than actual productivity thought. The two were soon coupled everywhere, leading up to Google Inbox where they are treated as one in the same.

If you think about it— these two were never meant to be together.

Technology enables us to bundle everything into a screen or an app. While incredible in certain use cases, for others (read: this one), it’s detrimental.

3. Debunking the “I’m Working” Fallacy.

Let’s establish something very basic: mail is NOT work.

Work has forever consisted of certain tasks that need to be completed in order to make progress. AKA “getting shit done” or “moving things forward”.

This is productivity.

Mail, on the other hand, is a communication mechanism. And definitely not the most pressing one (we’ll get to that). Mail has the ability to create tasks for you. But mail itself is not a task.

By constantly checking email you are wasting time that should be spent on productive tasks. This makes you less efficient.

By stopping those productive tasks to check email, you are forcing your brain to switch contexts. This makes you less effective.

Email can wait. Stay focused on real work. You’ll finish in less time (efficient) and create a better result (effective). And yes, I promise— the emails will still be there.

Try unsubscribing from shit

All of this underlines the cultural fascination with constantly “working” and “being busy”. With email being the means to that end.

So an app (Google Inbox) that bundles all of these emails, tasks, and reminders into one place? Gold.

Now back to me…

Every day I would wake up, excited, ready to work. I’d open Inbox to see which tasks and reminders I needed to work on…

…of which there were hundreds.
(A topic for another day. Short version — digital To-Do lists can be harmful because there’s endless space to add things. Limit & prioritize.)

As if this weren’t enough — what do you know? Bolded next to all of those important To-Dos are… 30 new emails!

“Well that one’s from him… I should check it.”
“Oh, she wrote me back? Let’s see what she said.”

This is wrong.

And I can’t stress that enough.

THIS IS WRONG!!!

Better?

Right then and there — my morning was fucked.

I would become incredibly distracted, not focus on the tasks at hand, and get caught up in a bunch of meaningless email.

(It’s incredible how many do this. Recommended: audit the start to your day. The results can be life-changing. Seriously.)

Making things worse, I would read email and often not take action. Or my action would be to “snooze” it.

This is terrible because, when I did respond, I would have to re-read the entire thread and bring myself back into that context. A giant waste of time… since I already read it.

As a rule: Take action on emails when going through them.

You shouldn’t be browsing your inbox. Be decisive.

There are rare cases where snoozing is appropriate. Otherwise, respond or delete. That’s it.

Google Inbox is a beautifully designed product…

But having email live with, and be equal to, a To-Do list is distracting and consequently unproductive.

Luckily we live in a time with phone calls and text messages. We can chat with coworkers on Slack, Skype, or Hangouts. Use these for time-sensitive communication. Not email.

Put your To-Do’s in one place and start the day working on those. Your inbox may pile up, but it’s not going anywhere.

Let the email sit. Focus on getting shit done.

What Does “Hustle” Really Mean?

Hustle is pursuing your passion when others aren’t.

Hustle is saying no to happy hour to prepare a pitch deck.

Hustle is having support emails sent directly to your personal inbox.

Hustle is waking up early on a Saturday to write a new company blog post.

Hustle is quitting Clash of Clans because it took more than 5 minutes of your day.

Hustle is wearing jeans for a week straight to reduce cognitive load and decision fatigue.

Hustle is skipping dinner and a movie because that $50 is two months of your team’s Github plan.

Hustle is tracking and measuring everything you do to ensure you’re spending time on worthwhile activities.

Hustle is having a constant thirst for knowledge. Doing anything and everything to improve.

And, yeah, sometimes Hustle is physically running to make a meeting on time because “traffic sucked” isn’t an excuse.

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If you’re involved with the startup world, you hear “HUSTLE!” a lot.

It’s become synonymous with entrepreneurship. It’s transitioned from a verb to a mindset. This makes it tough to define.

More important is the objective behind the tactics… To create a value-adding product/service which, consequently, receives ubiquitous adoption. And doing everything you can to make it happen.

Another way of saying this…

Willing something into the world with everything you have

That’s not easy.

Taking something that doesn’t exist… and making it exist.

Making others understand it. Accept it. Adopt and embrace it.

That takes Hustle.

The actions. The mindset. Everything.

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There’s another set of (equally important) actions that people unfortunately don’t talk about as often. The ones that prepare you to Hustle…

The Hustle Prerequisites

Preparing to Hustle is meditating in the morning before checking email.

Preparing to Hustle is walking during calls to stretch your legs and get fresh air.

Preparing to Hustle is stopping work to sleep. Knowing the extra hours at 50% won’t move the needle.

Preparing to Hustle is listening to your body and your mind. And taking care of them both.

Preparing to Hustle is not being afraid to ask for help when you need it.

Preparing to Hustle is not feeling alone. Having a support network cheering you on every step of the way.

Now — stop reading. Go Hustle!