Category: Productivity

How to Be More Personally Productive with a Trello Board

Personally, my experience in entrepreneurship has gone hand-in-hand with learning to maximize my personal productivity. For many years, being a one man show, the more I got done, the more I made.

Eventually my journey of entrepreneurship has come to involve an ever-growing team. While I’m still certainly involved, I get far more done by having my team be productive.

When I found out about Trello, I fell in love with it. Plus it’s free! Previously I ran my day off of a Planner Pad, but decided I could do better with Trello. That’s what I’m using to this day. Of course, how I’ve used it has changed up a bit.

Of course, Trello can be used in a wide variety of ways. Previously I did cover how I use it to collect writing topics. It’s also great for managing team projects. But it also can be used just by yourself to manage your time. It’s this latter category that I’m covering today.

Basic Scrum Board

The basic way to use Trello is to setup what is known as a scrum or kanban board. Why I like Trello more than other project management software is that it is visually driven and things are easily dragged-and-dropped.

With this basic board you make three columns:

To Doing – Doing – Done

Here is an example, which hasn’t been worked on in some time, though I am thinking about getting it finished now.

You’ll notice that there are six different things in the To Do column. There is nothing in Doing. And there are two finished things (from long ago!) in Done.

In essence, this is a glorified to-do list. But you can recognize better when you’re doing something and when it’s done with this format. Still, not too useful until we add in even more. That brings us to the…

Advanced Scrum Board

As you can see there are quite a few more columns going on here. This is a live and working board from which I run Legendary Strength LLC. off of.

Notice that you still have the same Doing and Done columns. Those function the same. But much else is changed.

To Do (Week)

At the end of each week, I plan out the next. That involves moving or adding cards to this column. And at the end of the week, ideally, this column should be empty.

In this format, I consider the Doing column as my To-Do list for the day. If you can squint your eyes you’ll see LC.com Resume Articles in there. Hey, I’m doing that right now!

Waiting

Remember that this is a personal productivity method covered here. Well, often these projects involve other people.

And if something is done on my end, but I’m awaiting response or something else from other people, before I can take more action, into the Waiting column it goes. It doesn’t go into Done because it is not yet done.

Backlog

Backlog is another concept that comes from the Scrum method. Everyone has an ever-growing to-do list right? Wrong! Instead new ideas should simply get put onto the backlog as you have not yet decided if they should even be done, nor figured out the timing for them.

You’ll notice that the Backlog is the longest column, except for Done in this board. Some of these ideas have been here for quite some time (which means its good to prune this list every once in a while).

During my week planning I’ll pull items from here onto the To Do (Week) column if it is the right time to start that project.

Quarter Backlog (Q4 Backlog)

This and the next piece are the newest additions to my personal scrum boards. (Yes, plural. I have one for Legendary Strength, one for Lost Empire Herbs and one for personal stuff.)

I’m always seeking to better align time. What I mean by that is that I like think of time as fractal. If what I’m doing today is aligned with what I want to get done this week, which is aligned with what I want to get aligned this month, which is the same for the quarter, the year, the decade and my lifetime, then I’m doing the right things. For the board here I feel the quarter is as far as I need to zoom out, but in other places I do have those larger time frames covered.

Thus, I started keeping a backlog for specifically what I wanted to get done this quarter in this business. This has already proven to keep better alignment for my months, weeks and days as I have better eyes on it.

Month Backlog (November Backlog)

Thus, the month backlog is the same thing just with the month time frame. It’s in between the quarter and the week. Once again, the ideal is to have everything moved off of this list by the end of the month.

Intermediate Scrum Board

Most people may be best served by an intermediate version between these two. Before I added the quarter and month backlogs I just had the following model.

Backlog – To Do – Doing – Waiting – Done

I think the extra backlogs are more powerful, but if you’re starting from scratch something simpler, until you’re use to it, is likely to serve you better.

In case you’re wondering, these Trello board methods combine very well with the ideas I shared with Eat That Frog and The Ivy Lee Method.

How to Setup a Home Office for Maximum Productivity

I’ve been working from home for over a decade now. Over the course of time, I’ve done a number of things to make my workplace ideal for my own productivity. What follows are the many things that I’ve done, some of which have stuck, some which haven’t (but might be suitable for others). While there are a few conventional things covered here, I think you’ll be surprised to find some stuff that no one else is talking about.

Note that while I’m talking about a home office specifically, pretty much everything can apply to any office or space you work from.

Home Office Desk Setup — Forgive the bad lighting, it’s much better in person. Below I’ll describe many of the things going on here.

Desktop Computer

I know more and more people are strictly using laptops, tablets and even phones for their work. That’s fine if you’re on the move. But if you have a stable place, as a home office kind of assumes, then I’d recommend using a desktop computer. Your call whether you want a PC, Mac or other option. (I’m one of those unusual people that prefers a PC.)

Or, if you use a laptop, at least getting some external options which could include a monitor, mouse and keyboards. But if you use all three of these you might as well have gotten a desktop in the first place!

In general, you’re going to pay less for more computing power and features than you would on a laptop.

Right now, it’s about time I replace my desktop as it’s starting to run slowly and crash more often. It’s been a solid run of over 10 years. That’s impressive by computer standards. I’ve looked around a bit but haven’t made any decisions.

Monitor

One of the most important aspects is your monitor. This is your visual workspace. Depending on what you’re doing you may want to have multiple windows open to do side by side work.

Previously, I had dual monitors. However, for some reason, certain files wouldn’t work in the second monitor which was aggravating. Then I saw a friend that simply had a single, but very big, monitor. I moved to that and haven’t looked back. My current monitor is 26 inches. And one other tip. The top of the monitor should be at the level of your head. This helps fight against “text neck” as you don’t need to look down, but can keep your head in a neutral alignment.

(This goes beyond home office setup, but with this, you’ll want to learn the keyboard shortcuts that allow you to move windows around to half screen, full screen, etc. rather than having to drag the windows around by mouse. Extremely useful.)

Computer monitor — Along with a new dekstop computer I am contemplating getting a new bigger monitor like this 32 inch curved screen.

Stand Up Desk

I sat on my ass for eight plus hours a day for years. At some point when the stand up desk trend began, I realized my half hour or so workout each day, didn’t make up for being sedentary the rest of the time. So I got a stand up desk and haven’t looked back since.

Specifically, I purchased a TrekDesk. It’s a bit expensive compared to most, but does give a big workspace. I know others that have even built their own.

Of course, just standing still in one place for a long time is just another form of being sedantary, with different, but still existing, side effects to it. That brings me to my next point…

Treadmill/Wobble Board

For a few years I had a treadmill desk. I used this off and on for a bit. Then it was much more off. After not actually turning the treadmill on for over a year I decided it was time for that to go.

But I still wanted to move more. Enter the wobble board. While you could easily make one of these for yourself, I bought the Uplift E7 Motion Board. This bit of movement and shifting of position allows me to be less sedentary while standing. I really like it.

Fairly expensive for what it is…but it also should last forever.

Nature

I’m reminded of one study that found that hospital patients recovered faster when they had a window that had a tree outside of it, rather than a window looking at a brick wall. (source) Nature is good for us in many ways we’ve completely forgotten about (and that science is only beginning to explore once again).

As you can see in the picture at the top of this post, my computer and desk is right next to two windows that look outside to nature. If you do not have this option at this time, a picture of nature could still give some benefit.

Essential Oils

Here is where another aspect of nature enters into your home office. Research around what is called “forest bathing” shows that it is the phytoncides, or essential oils, of trees and plants that help lower stress, make for better thinking and much more that occured when walking in nature, versus walking in a city.

While you should absolutely go for walks in nature, you can bring a piece of this indoors by using essential oils in a diffusor. Previously I used a unit called a nebulizer, but recently I upgraded to a larger unit that has a 6 hour run cycle. The thing is, I would turn on the smaller unit in the morning but then forget about it the rest of the day after it stopped running. Now I can load it once, when I start my day in the office, and it’ll continue to run throughout. I mix up the different essential oils I use. Recently I even distilled my own douglas fir.

essential oil diffusor — This runs in my office the whole time I’m in there.

Air Quality

There are other things you can do improve your air quality besides essential oils. Studies show that air quality leads to improved productivity, sometimes amazingly so. Having plants in your offer. Having an air purifier. These are all worthwhile steps.

One study looked at office workers and the air quality in different buildings. They found: “It has now been shown beyond reasonable doubt that poor indoor air quality in buildings can decrease productivity in addition to causing visitors to express dissatisfaction. The size of the effect on most aspects of office work performance appears to be as high as 6–9%. (source)

Music

I play music while I work. Mostly metal and hard rock as that is my genre of choice, but I do mix it up from time to time. This is another reason to have a desktop; higher quality speakers.

One practice that I have found particularly useful for writing is to use the same album…or even the same track on loop. There is something about the repetitive nature that helps me and many others get into the flow zone easier. If I put on headphones while doing this it further drives me into the zone as I don’t hear my fingers typing or other ambient noise.

Dedicated Space

Ideally, you want your home office to be just for that, working. When I started my business I didn’t have the luxury of a space for my home office, so it was in my bedroom, but as I became more successful this became a must.

A dedicated space, even an isolated space, keeps you anchored to being productive (assuming your productive when you use it). This helps to make the container for work. When I’m in my office I’m working. When I’m outside of my office, I’m not working…at least not in the same manner, as there are different types of work.

Anchored Space

Besides the dedicated location there are other ways you can use anchors in your space. As covered before I read a lot. My home office is also where all my books are located. Having all the books in there helps me by being a sign and symbol of my accumulated knowledge and wisdom. Plus, I can easily go and reference any of these books that I might need for my work as frequently happens.

Over the years I’ve used plenty of other things like pictures and quotes that are aspirational. There’s been vision boards and stats I’m tracking on white boards that I would look at each day. Not doing any of that currently, but it was useful in the past.

Tinctures

You’ll notice on the left side of my desk in the top picture that a number of tincture bottles are there. I love herbal tinctures because they’re easy to take (compared to powders, and even capsules in my opinion). The right tincture can help sharpen the mind or reduce stress in the moment. Thus, having them on hand helps support whatever you need in that moment for work. More information on tinctures at Lost Empire Herbs.

That is how I’ve setup my home office for maximum productivity. While I’m sure I could focus in on some finer details, that definitely is the broad strokes. Feel free to share what you do in your office in the comments below.

The Ivy Lee Method

The Ivy Lee Method is a simple, yet effective half-million dollar productivity method.

Ivy Lee (1877–1934) was an American publicity expert and worked as a consultant for a number of businesses. One of those was for Charles Schwab, then president of Bethlehem Steel Corporation.

Ivy Lee

In 1918, Schwab consulted with Lee in order to become more productive. In The Unseen Power, historian Scott M. Cutlip stated that Schwab was obsessed with efficiency. Thomas Edison himself called Schwab a “master hustler”.

The story, which from my research was first popularized by Earl Nightingale, goes like this:

Schwab: “Show me a way to get more things done.”

Lee: “Give me 15 minutes with each of your executives”

Schwab: “How much will it cost me?”

Lee: “Nothing. Unless it works. After three months, you can send me a check for whatever you feel it’s worth to you.”

Then during those 15 minutes with each executive, Lee laid out the following five step method:

At the end of each working day, write down the six most important things you need to accomplish tomorrow. Do not write down more than six tasks.
Prioritize those six items in order of their true importance.
When you arrive tomorrow, concentrate only on the first task. Work until the first task is finished before moving on to the second task.
Approach the rest of your list in the same way. Don’t worry if you’ve only finished one or two by the end of the day; the others can wait. If you can’t finish them all by this method, you could not have finished them with any other method.
Repeat this process every working day.

It’s simple right? Well, Schwab and his team starting using this method. It worked well, very well.

Schwab send a check of $25,000 to Lee. In today’s dollars that would be more than $400,000!

Do you think it would be worthy of you to follow a nearly half million dollar productivity method?

I do and that’s why I’ve been using this method, with the following tweaks, every work day for the past several years.

Essentially, this is Eat that Frog, followed by Eating the Frog, five more times in order. If you’ve finished your top priority for the day, then it makes sense to then tackle your next top priority.

I do this to the best of my ability, though I can’t same I am flawless about putting it into practice. One thing that does get in the way is scheduled time slots. I write these on my list, but I’m not going to put off a ten o’clock appointment just because I haven’t finished my priority list.

Typically, I use only five items as I find that is a more realistic number. And I’m actually aiming to bring that down to four or three items instead.

Lastly, I do this first thing in the morning, as part of my meditation and journalling routine, rather than the night before.

As you can see, something very simple can also be very effective.

Eat That Frog

I am going to do a series on Personal Productivity. This applies to work, but to things outside of work as well. Right now, I have 24 topics outlined. By the time I finish it’ll likely be 50.

I have studied this topic for many years. Why? Because, being an entrepreneur, especially early on where I was doing everything, meant that the more productive I could be, the better results I would get. Even as I advance in my entrepreneurial endeavors, the same is true, though how I aim my productivity has changed. (More on that later.)

You can set goals in all sorts of areas of life. Being productive in working towards them is ultimately what allows you to hit them.

So, in this series, we start with one of the simplest, yet most effective methods. It is to Eat That Frog.

Eat That Frog

This concept, and the name for it, comes from the late, great Brian Tracy, who wrote a book by the same name.

It’s a short book, one I’ve read a couple of times, and likely will read a few more times in the future too. Well worth reading.

From the first page of the preface, Brian grabbed me. He talked about the to-do list and how this will never get done.

“There is never enough time to do everything you have to do…The fact is that you are never going to get caught up. You will never get on top of your tasks…No matter how many personal productivity techniques you master, there will always be more to do than you can ever accomplish in the time you have available to you.”

This hit me like a ton of bricks. Previously, I was always playing catchup just trying to get it all done. Now, I realized this was a pointless endeavor.

Ideas come at a mile a minute (especially when you train yourself to come up with lots of ideas). Thus, adding new things to your to-do list happens much faster than checking them off, even if you are optimally personally productive.

The idea of eating that frog, is that if you HAD to eat a frog, the best way to do it would be to just get it done. No hemming or hawing, thinking, worrying, stressing about the fact that you had to do it. Not outlining and planning different ways you could do it. Not consulting your friends, or posting about it on Facebook. Instead, you just eat the frog, finish it off and then you are done with it.

(This presupposes that eating a frog is a bad thing, that it wouldn’t taste good, or whatever. But that’s another topic we’ll cover later.)

Chances are you’re not having to literally eat frogs. But the frog is the metaphor for the thing that is important and valuable to you. Generally, it is not an urgent task.

So many people start their days checking their email or hopping on social media. These are not frogs.

Instead it is best to start your day with a routine that sets you up for success the rest of the day. That is why I meditate and journal first thing in the morning, typically followed by working out.

When I start my workday I tackle my priority, my frog first. Ideally, I do this until it is done, before moving onto anything else.

Take toady for example (I misspelled that on accident, but isn’t that awesome considering the topic)…I had to film some Youtube videos for Lost Empire Herbs. I had meant to get this done days before but things got in my way, so it was my frog today. I got it done. Then I moved onto a couple other activities before finally writing this post for you.

Sometimes you can’t possibly finish a thing in one go, like writing a book. In this case you may just block off one or two hours or so and that is your frog. Or maybe it’s a chapter so you do have a done point.

This is very much in line with the Ivy Lee Method which I’ll be covering next time…

How to Triple Your Learning Speed

We are in the information age. At the reach of your fingertips is worldwide access to information on any topic you desire. This is a time unlike any other in history.

And this can be both a benefit and a curse.

With so much information, it is easy to fall into overwhelm. Or get paralyzed, never taking any action, because you stay in research mode. But this potential dark side of information access is manageable, though not the topic of this report.

3D How to Triple Your Learning Speed

Assuming you can manage that well, that leaves the upside even brighter. We can reap the benefits of having so much available. And when you add in the methods covered in these pages they’ll help you to accelerate your learning even more.

It is through massive learning that I have built my business, become strong and healthy, and developed a wide range of skills. Learning is the foundation on which on my success is built. And if you’d like to be successful, whatever that means to you, you’ll need to learn some things along the way.

As the saying goes, “School is never out for the pro.” Let’s just hope that your schooling didn’t beat the love of learning out of you. The process can be fun, rewarding, and as you’ll come to find, it can be done a lot more efficiently than what the average person does.

Even when you cut away the un-essentials, you may realize you still have a full plate with all that you’d like to learn and act upon.

This special report is about accelerating the rate at which that information enters your mind. The good news is that with some skills, some patience and some cool technologies you can do this with books, audios and videos; all the main means by which people learn.

So begins the introduction to this quick special report. If you’d like all the details, including the many technologies that allow this to happen, signup on the sidebar to the right or down below.

How to Generate Lots of Writing Ideas

In my previous post, I mentioned a long list of topics that I plan to write about here.

But a topic does not necessarily help you to write a blog post (or whatever else you’re writing). A topic is great for a book, but even then you’ll have to narrow it down in order to come up with a structure.

Topics need to be narrowed down. So as I set out today to write the second blog post here I had to come up with more specific ideas.

I’m a huge proponent of Trello. I use it for managing projects and my various teams…but I also use it for managing myself. A Trello board makes a great place to capture ideas.

I created a new board called LC Ideas, and I dropped that laundry list of topics into one column titled Topics.

Then I created a second column for Ideas.

Trello Writing Ideas List

Some people think that coming up with ideas is hard. I beg to differ. Anyone that can’t come up with ideas, just hasn’t practiced it enough. In fact, ideas are easy. Ideas don’t stop coming. And I don’t think you need to be particular creative in order for that to be true, just practiced.

An idea I heard about from James Altucher is to think of ten ideas about some topic, and do this as an exercise each day. Usually the first five or six ideas are easy, but you need to stretch for the final few.

It’s a really good exercise. I could go down each of my topics in turn and generate ten specific post ideas for each one.

But I didn’t do that here…at least not yet.

Just looking at the list, I started to come up with specific ideas.

Now, to be honest some of the things came up could be topics in and of themselves, or at least a multi-part series of posts. Still, some were very specific posts in my ind.

On my 12th idea I happened on this one, i.e. what became this post. Why not share exactly what I’m doing? And so I did.

Here’s the great thing about Trello. I’ll be continuing to use this board for some time now. Any time a great idea pops into my head about something to write here, I’ll save it in this spot.