May

Productivity on the Road

Monday, July 9, 2007 10:04 PM (permalink)

I think so many of the productivity pr0n sites out there (Lifehacker, 43 Folders, Web Worker Daily, etc.) are tremendously useful for the infrequent traveler, but once you hit the 50,000 mile mark and beyond for a given year, relying solely on technology starts to become an exercise in coping. One of the things I hope to do with this blog this year is to present tips and tricks from senior executives and consultant friends of mine who have insane travel schedules. If your productivity solution depends on wifi access, or even something you have to plug in, what do you do when you are stuck in an airport for a 3-hour delay, as frequently happens to me, and you can't find a plug and there are no T-Mobile Hotspots? That is why so many of the folks I work with and see on the road have paper-based solutions. They aren't luddites, certainly (and neither am I), but so far I haven't been able to find anything to replicate my paper planner that will work 100% of the time, in any situation I find myself in. As a side benefit, I get great battery life!

An Actual Joyent Workflow, Redux

Monday, July 9, 2007 10:04 PM (permalink)

I get a lot of requests about fixing my Joyent workflow post, which lost all 6 of its images when my server got fried--I hadn't saved local copies of them, and the article makes little sense without them. I keep intending to do this, but in all honesty over the past few months as my travel schedule became insane I found myself gravitating to off-line tools, and eventually back to paper. I hate PDA's, and so after a few months of trying to square my hundreds of to-dos and appointments with some kind of online productivity solution, I cut out a step and stuck with a paper planner. I still transfer notes into Tinderbox regularly, but my to-dos and next actions live in my planner, which always works (even in the wifi-less Sioux City Airport, or SUX for you aviation buffs.) So, while I feel some remorse about not recreating those graphics, I haven't been able to motivate myself to do it yet. I give anyone with such motivation full permission to make some graphics and repost this on their blog, if it helps anyone!