Tiago Forte's Blog, page 47

Just-In-Time PM IX: Placeholders

In Part VIII, we looked at divergence and convergence as the two fundamental modes of all creative work.

Now let’s see what this looks like in our day to day schedules.

The main feature of the modern workday, you may have noticed, is fragmentation.

Because we can now so easily switch between activities – whether by jumping in an Uber or onto a Zoom call – it becomes feasible to rapidly switch between multiple projects in a single day.

Instead of viewing this fragmentation as a threat, we could view it as an opportunity to adopt a more agile, lighter, more mobile way of working.

What we need to make that happen is the ability to “freeze” a project in its current state, preserving its context and details in such a way that we can seamlessly pick it back up again in the future.

What we need is better placeholders.

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Just-In-Time PM #8: Divergence and Convergence

In Part VII, I argued for the importance of interacting with information, instead of just passively consuming it. Interaction results in better learning at the same time as it creates valuable deliverables.

But incorporating all these new ideas about how work is completed – flow cycles and intermediate packets, downscoping and evolving deliverables, interaction over consumption – can be a little overwhelming. You may be wondering, “how do I know which of these techniques I should be doing at any given time?”

There is a very simple model drawn from Design Thinking that is helpful when thinking about abstract work. It is called divergence and convergence.

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Early access to new online courses, ebooks, and events
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Just-In-Time PM VIII: Divergence and Convergence

In Part VII, I argued for the importance of interacting with information, instead of just passively consuming it. Interaction results in better learning at the same time as it creates valuable deliverables.

But incorporating all these new ideas about how work is completed – flow cycles and intermediate packets, downscoping and evolving deliverables, interaction over consumption – can be a little overwhelming. You may be wondering, “how do I know which of these techniques I should be doing at any given time?”

There is a very simple model drawn from Design Thinking that is helpful when thinking about abstract work. It is called divergence and convergence.

To read this story, become a Praxis member.

Praxis

You can choose to support Praxis with a subscription for $10 each month or $100 annually.

Members get access to:

1–3 exclusive articles per month, written or curated by Tiago Forte of Forte Labs
Members-only comments and responses
Early access to new online courses, ebooks, and events
A monthly Town Hall, hosted by Tiago and conducted via live videoconference, which can include open discussions, hands-on tutorials, guest interviews, or online workshops on productivity-related topics

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Just-In-Time PM #7: Interaction Over Consumption

In Part VI, I recommended treating any deliverable (whether it’s a simple email all the way to a full-fledged product) as a series of evolutionary artifacts, each one intended to test an assumption or make forward progress.

But there is a deeper reason for downscoping deliverables and then evolving them through a series of stages.

So often our attitude toward information is one of consumption. We treat information intake as a preliminary stage, where we gather research and knowledge, followed by a planning stage, where we make decisions and lay out the steps, and then an implementation stage, where we actually put that knowledge into practice.

That model doesn’t make sense in the modern world. There is so much uncertainty and things are changing so fast, it makes much more sense to dive in and take action, than try to meticulously plan everything in advance.

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Praxis

You can choose to support Praxis with a subscription for $10 each month or $100 annually.

Members get access to:

1–3 exclusive articles per month, written or curated by Tiago Forte of Forte Labs
Members-only comments and responses
Early access to new online courses, ebooks, and events
A monthly Town Hall, hosted by Tiago and conducted via live videoconference, which can include open discussions, hands-on tutorials, guest interviews, or online workshops on productivity-related topics

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Just-In-Time PM VII: Interaction Over Consumption

In Part VI, I recommended treating any deliverable (whether it’s a simple email all the way to a full-fledged product) as a series of evolutionary artifacts, each one intended to test an assumption or make forward progress.

But there is a deeper reason for downscoping deliverables and then evolving them through a series of stages.

So often our attitude toward information is one of consumption. We treat information intake as a preliminary stage, where we gather research and knowledge, followed by a planning stage, where we make decisions and lay out the steps, and then an implementation stage, where we actually put that knowledge into practice.

That model doesn’t make sense in the modern world. There is so much uncertainty and things are changing so fast, it makes much more sense to dive in and take action, than try to meticulously plan everything in advance.

To read this story, become a Praxis member.

Praxis

You can choose to support Praxis with a subscription for $10 each month or $100 annually.

Members get access to:

1–3 exclusive articles per month, written or curated by Tiago Forte of Forte Labs
Members-only comments and responses
Early access to new online courses, ebooks, and events
A monthly Town Hall, hosted by Tiago and conducted via live videoconference, which can include open discussions, hands-on tutorials, guest interviews, or online workshops on productivity-related topics

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Just-In-Time PM #6: Evolving Deliverables

In Part V, I introduced The Iron Triangle of Project Management and the idea that any given deliverable can be reduced or expanded in scope at any time.

How should you use this newfound ability? You should use it to:

Get started
Maintain momentum
Test assumptions

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Praxis

You can choose to support Praxis with a subscription for $10 each month or $100 annually.

Members get access to:

1–3 exclusive articles per month, written or curated by Tiago Forte of Forte Labs
Members-only comments and responses
Early access to new online courses, ebooks, and events
A monthly Town Hall, hosted by Tiago and conducted via live videoconference, which can include open discussions, hands-on tutorials, guest interviews, or online workshops on productivity-related topics

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Just-In-Time PM VI: Evolving Deliverables

In Part V, I introduced The Iron Triangle of Project Management and the idea that any given deliverable can be reduced or expanded in scope at any time.

How should you use this newfound ability? You should use it to:

Get started
Maintain momentum
Test assumptions

To read this story, become a Praxis member.

Praxis

You can choose to support Praxis with a subscription for $10 each month or $100 annually.

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Just-In-Time PM #5: The Iron Triangle

In Part IV, I introduced the idea of “intermediate packets.” Instead of delivering value in a big project that spans huge amounts of time, we want to deliver it in smaller chunks at more frequent intervals.

This follows a basic principle that has revolutionized many industries: small batch sizes.

The Toyota Production System (from which the term “just-in-time” is borrowed) used small batch sizes to revolutionize manufacturing, increasing the throughput of its factories far beyond what anyone thought possible. The tools and methods developed to enable small batch sizes propelled the company through 7 decades of growth, transforming a small bicycle shop into the world’s largest automaker.

To read this story, become a Praxis member.

Praxis

You can choose to support Praxis with a subscription for $10 each month or $100 annually.

Members get access to:

1–3 exclusive articles per month, written or curated by Tiago Forte of Forte Labs
Members-only comments and responses
Early access to new online courses, ebooks, and events
A monthly Town Hall, hosted by Tiago and conducted via live videoconference, which can include open discussions, hands-on tutorials, guest interviews, or online workshops on productivity-related topics

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Just-In-Time PM V: The Iron Triangle

In Part IV, I introduced the idea of “intermediate packets.” Instead of delivering value in a big project that spans huge amounts of time, we want to deliver it in smaller chunks at more frequent intervals.

This follows a basic principle that has revolutionized many industries: small batch sizes.

The Toyota Production System (from which the term “just-in-time” is borrowed) used small batch sizes to revolutionize manufacturing, increasing the throughput of its factories far beyond what anyone thought possible. The tools and methods developed to enable small batch sizes propelled the company through 7 decades of growth, transforming a small bicycle shop into the world’s largest automaker.

To read this story, become a Praxis member.

Praxis

You can choose to support Praxis with a subscription for $10 each month or $100 annually.

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Just-In-Time PM #4: Intermediate Packets

In Part III, I argued that having a personal knowledge base is the linchpin of success in a creative economy.

A knowledge base allows you to reuse past work, draw from past experiences, share your knowledge in concrete form, and eventually, build products and services out of that knowledge.

This requires strategically structuring your work in the first place, as a series of what I call intermediate packets.

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Praxis

You can choose to support Praxis with a subscription for $10 each month or $100 annually.

Members get access to:

1–3 exclusive articles per month, written or curated by Tiago Forte of Forte Labs
Members-only comments and responses
Early access to new online courses, ebooks, and events
A monthly Town Hall, hosted by Tiago and conducted via live videoconference, which can include open discussions, hands-on tutorials, guest interviews, or online workshops on productivity-related topics

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