How to Get Smarter, Faster and Better With Charles Duhigg
If anyone knows the difference between being busy and being productive, it is Charles Duhigg. The Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporter and author of The Power of Habit made a name for himself studying the science of productivity, and he joined us on a podcast this week.
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Discussion this week
Charles is a very productive person anyway – he wrote a bestseller while working full time and raising a family. And while success bred success, he began to feel like he was stomping on water and didn’t want to come home from work every day to spend another five hours answering emails.
So he started calling productivity researchers, as well as highly productive people he admired, to find out why some people get to do so much while others find it difficult to reach Promised Zero Land for inbound messages. These phone calls and conversations led to his second book, Smarter Better Faster .
In today’s show we talk about many of the key principles that Charles recounted in his book, including about how the pilots used the “ mental models’ for landing seriously damaged the aircraft, how to change the worst car factory in the country when the new owners gave workers more control and what it means to be truly productive.
Our weekly updates
Every week we like to supplement The Upgrade with the updates that we have made in our lives. This week’s updates are some handy little fun:
- Charles: Charles decided that it was okay to watch TV while flying. He usually tries to work on airplanes and says that he used to feel a little guilty about indulging in meaningless entertainment, but now he considers airplanes a safe place to take a break and watch a show. He also considered the emotional leak of responses to emails and began to think of each message as an offer rather than a team. This makes it easy to discard or ignore messages altogether.
- Melissa: Melissa wondered how much her time was literally worth, and when it should pay someone to complete a laborious task instead of doing it yourself. So she used Instacart instead of grocery shopping.
- Andy: I used my Saturdays as a sloth’s hideout. Yes, being lazy on Saturday is not reinventing the wheel, but I always feel guilty about not using my limited free time in any significant way. Fuck it. If I want to sleep, order takeout and watch Netflix for ten hours in my underwear, I’ll do it.
How can I ask a question?
There are two ways to ask a question:
- Call (347) 687-8109 and write down the question. The calls are awesome! We love them and we can play yours on the show!
- Send your question to upgrade@lifehacker.com .
Try to keep your questions as short as possible. That means 3-5 sentences for emails and 30-60 seconds for calls and videos. Your questions may be specific, but broader questions are generally better because they apply to more people. In any case, we look forward to hearing from you.