Tiago Forte's Blog, page 6

Organize Your Bookmarks with the PARA Method for Lightning Fast Web Browsing

I don’t know about you but I spend a BIG chunk of my workday in my browser (I use Chrome).

It’s where I draft landing pages in Google Docs, send emails in ConvertKit, publish blog posts in WordPress and check sales numbers in SamCart.

Everything I create becomes ultimately a link, a URL that needs safekeeping somewhere.

That means having the right links readily accessible is crucial for moving smoothly through my day.

The problem: My bookmark bar looked like a junk drawer! It was an indistinguishable jumble of links, without hope of finding the one I truly needed in the moment. 

Sounds familiar?

The solution seemed stupidly simple once Rodney Daut, one of our BASB Facilitators, pointed it out.

Organize your bookmarks just like you organize any other information: according to the PARA Method.

What’s PARA? A Brief Introduction

PARA stands for Projects, Areas, Resources, and Archives. It’s a simple system for organizing virtually any information in your life.

Projects are what you’re currently working on that has a concrete outcome and timeframe. For example, some of my current projects are The PARA Method book launch, a trip to ConvertKits Craft + Commerce conference, and the Ultraspeaking cohort I’m part of.Areas are your responsibilities that don’t have an end date. For example, my areas include my apartment, my Muay Thai practice, and my Course Creator Lab website.Resources are your interests and curiosities. For example, I continuously gather resources around copywriting, minimalism, and remote living.Archives are all items from the previous three categories that are no longer relevant. For example, my Archive is full of trips I’ve taken in the past.

The key principle is organizing by actionability. PARA helps you keep the information you need the most right now front and center (while keeping everything else accessible but out of sight).

Want to learn more about PARA? Check out this intro.

Implementing PARA in Your Browser

I’ve had my notetaking app Evernote and my Google Drive organized according to PARA since 2020.

But it never occurred to me that I can apply the same structure to my browser. (Duh!)

Here’s what my bookmarks bar looks like after I re-organized it:

On the left side are all sites that I’m visiting multiple times per day. On the right side are my PARA folders plus the bookmark search. Finally, I have the links I need readily accessible.

Let’s look at how to implement this for yourself in a few simple steps:

Step #1: Create your Archive folder and move all your bookmarks in there

If you don’t currently have a bookmarks bar in Chrome, go to “View,” then click “Always Show Bookmarks Bar.”

Create a folder by right-clicking on the bookmarks bar and selecting “Add Folder…” Then drag and drop all your current bookmarks into your new Archive folder.

Now, you can start from a clean slate.

Step #2: Create your Projects folder and add links to your active projects

Your Projects folder should contain the links that you need the most at this moment because they’re associated with concrete outcomes you want to achieve.

Here’s an example of my Projects folder with a sub-folder for each active project.

Each of these folders contains at least one link. There are no empty folders as these would just clutter the view.

Once a project is complete, I’ll move the associated folder simply to Archive.

Step #3: Create your Areas folder

Your Areas are everything that needs continuous attention from you, without a specific end date.

For me, that includes maintaining our websites, feeding our social media channels, and creating our weekly newsletter, among others.

Here’s what my Areas folder and sub-folders look like:

Step #5: Create your Resource folder

Your Resource folders contains everything else that’s useful and handy to keep around. This is a great place to save links to templates, tools, and learning resources.

This is what my Resource folder and sub-folders look like:

Optional: Add shortcuts to your most visited websites

I already know that I’ll visit a few websites multiple times per day, so I want to get to them with one click.

Here’s how you can add these icons to your bookmarks bar.

Visit the website you want to bookmark.Right click on the bookmarks bar and select “Add Page…”Delete the “Name” and hit save.

Now, only the favicon shows up in your bookmarks bar.

Optional: Add a bookmark search

If you reach a point where you have A LOT of bookmarks stored, having a shortcut to search comes in handy.

Right click your bookmarks bar and select “Bookmark Manager.” Now, add a bookmark to the Bookmark Manager as described above.

You may want to rename it “Search”, too. It’s easy to forget that it’s your method of searching your bookmarks without that label.

(Not using the Chrome browser? The same principles can be applied to any browser you might use.)

After testing PARA in my browser for a month, I can say it has helped me create a more productive, friction-less work environment. And I hope it can do the same for you, too.

This blog post was written by Julia Saxena , Director of Marketing at Forte Labs, and inspired by BASB Facilitator Rodney Daut .

Follow us for the latest updates and insights around productivity and Building a Second Brain on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube. And if you’re ready to start building your Second Brain, get the book and learn the proven method to organize your digital life and unlock your creative potential.

The post Organize Your Bookmarks with the PARA Method for Lightning Fast Web Browsing appeared first on Forte Labs.

How to Create an AI Style Guide: Write With ChatGPT in Your Own Voice

I recently came across an interesting guide on how to train ChatGPT to write in your own voice and style. It is part of the Substack publication Write With AI, by Nicolas Cole and Dickie Bush.

I decided to give it a try because if I succeeded, this would solve one of the biggest problems I’ve noticed with ChatGPT: the writing it generates is almost always boring, vague, and lifeless.

Here are the three steps the article suggested I follow:

Step 1: Grab a “signature” piece of writingStep 2: Prompt ChatGPT to analyze the writingStep 3: Give ChatGPT the sample writing

Here’s how I did it, step by step.

Step 1: Grab a “signature” piece of writing

I started by using Google Analytics to find the most popular pieces of writing I’ve published:

The PARA Method: The Simple System for Organizing Your Digital Life in Seconds (2,000 words)Building a Second Brain: The Definitive Introductory Guide (4,500 words)Progressive Summarization: A Practical Technique for Designing Discoverable Notes (2,900 words)How To Take Smart Notes: 10 Principles to Revolutionize Your Note-Taking and Writing (7,000 words)12 Steps to Build a Second Brain (700 words)One-Touch to Inbox Zero: How I Spend 17 Minutes Per Day on Email (3,800 words)The One-Touch Guide to Doing a Weekly Review: How I Go From Chaos to Clarity in 30 Minutes (3,900 words)The 4 Notetaking Styles: How to Choose a Digital Notes App as Your Second Brain (1,600 words)How to Summarize Books Using ChatGPT: 7 Experiments in AI Distillation (2,700 words)What I Learned From The Bullet Journal Method (2,000 words)

My ultimate goal is to be able to replicate the success of these pieces, “mass producing” articles at the same standard of quality and in my same voice without me having to personally compose every single word.

A quick Google search reveals that the current “context window size” (i.e. how many words ChatGPT can process and understand at once) is now about 4,000 words. I used the Google Chrome plugin Word Counter to determine how many words each of the above pieces was and added that number in parentheses after each one. 

Good news! It looks like nearly all of them can fit in their entirety within a single ChatGPT prompt.

Step 2: Prompt ChatGPT to analyze the writing

Here’s the prompt I used from the Write With AI guide:

You have expertise in linguistics, natural language processing, and prompt engineering.

Your task is to convert the provided text into an elaborate style guide. 

This guide will serve as a blueprint for creating fresh content on a distinct topic while maintaining the original style demonstrated in the text.

Pay special attention to aspects like:

The voice and tone: How formal or casual is the language? Is it authoritative, friendly, neutral, or something else? Mood: What emotional atmosphere is created? Does the text seem cheerful, melancholic, mysterious, etc.? Sentence structure: Are the sentences simple, compound, complex, or a mixture? How long are they typically? Transition style: How does the writer navigate from one idea to another? What types of transition words or phrases are used? Rhythm and pacing: Is the writing fast-paced with lots of short sentences, or is it slow and deliberate with longer sentences? Signature styles: Are there any recurring phrases or unique punctuation usage that stands out? Any patterns or repetitions?

I am particularly interested in the stylistic nuances that set this author’s writing apart. 

Identify those elements that could serve as indicators of this author’s distinctive writing style.

Let me know when you are ready for the text.

Within a few seconds, ChatGPT responded:

It’s go time!

Step 3: Give ChatGPT the sample writing

Next, I copied and pasted the entire text of my first piece, The PARA Method blog post, into the chat window. Here’s what it looked like:

And here’s how ChatGPT replied:

After reading the text thoroughly, I will outline the key stylistic elements that can be used to create a similar style of content in the future.

Voice and Tone : The voice is authoritative, informed, and experienced. The tone maintains a balanced blend of formality and conversational approachability, making it authoritative yet relatable. The writer frequently uses inclusive language (“you,” “we,” “us”) to foster a sense of connection with the reader. Mood : The mood is largely optimistic, motivational, and encouraging, creating a sense of potential and progress for the reader. Sentence Structure : The sentences are a mixture of simple, compound, and complex structures. The writer employs a variety of sentence lengths to maintain reader interest and pace. Short sentences are often used for emphasis or to make important points. Transition Style : The writer transitions smoothly between ideas, often using connective phrases like “in other words,” “but most of all,” “instead of,” and “after more than.” This helps the reader to follow the flow of ideas and see their interconnections. Rhythm and Pacing : The writing maintains a deliberate pace, giving the reader time to absorb and understand each point. Shorter, punchier sentences are used to maintain rhythm and punctuate key points. Signature Styles :The writer frequently employs the technique of introducing an idea, followed by further explanation and then real-world examples. This lends credibility and aids understanding.Questions are regularly posed to engage the reader and encourage reflection.The writer uses personal anecdotes and experiences to provide real-world context and authority.The use of lists and bullet points is common to highlight multiple examples or steps.The writer often directly addresses potential doubts or concerns the reader might have, and then offers solutions.

Using these stylistic elements as guidelines, you can create content that maintains the distinctive style of this text. The ability to balance an authoritative tone with approachability, provide clear examples, and directly address the reader’s potential concerns are key elements in recreating the style demonstrated in the text.

Wow! There’s a lot to unpack here, but I could tell right away that these were useful guidelines for creating writing in my style.

I decided to try it again with a different piece, to see if ChatGPT’s evaluation of my style varies much from one piece to another. I typed:

“Next, I will ask you to perform the same evaluation on a different piece by the same author. Please let me know when you’re ready,” and then pasted in the full text of The 4 Notetaking Styles.

Here’s what ChatGPT replied with:

This piece, like the previous one, also follows a discursive and pedagogical style. Here are some key stylistic features:

Direct Address to the Reader : The author communicates directly to the reader, guiding them through a personal journey of understanding. It creates a friendly, conversational tone that draws the reader in and keeps them engaged. Use of Analogies and Metaphors : The author uses archetypal roles (e.g., the Architect, the Gardener, the Librarian, and the Student) as metaphors to describe different types of note-takers, making abstract concepts more concrete and understandable. These are enriched with specific examples and descriptions, giving each metaphor a solid characterization. Balanced Exposition : The author offers a balanced discussion of each note-taking style, detailing its strengths, potential pitfalls, and suited note-taking applications. This makes the content feel fair, objective, and comprehensive. Empowerment : The article emphasizes the individual’s ability to understand their unique style and adapt accordingly. It promotes self-efficacy, encouraging readers to determine their unique way of working and choose the tools that best serve their needs. Use of Rhetorical Questions : The author uses rhetorical questions (e.g., “How do you pick the right app?”) to engage readers, provoke thought, and prepare them for upcoming answers or discussions. Interdisciplinary Approach : The piece draws on concepts from various fields, such as architecture, gardening, library science, and education, showcasing the author’s broad knowledge base and the interdisciplinary nature of their approach. Signposting : The author uses clear headings to structure the piece, allowing the reader to follow the progression of ideas easily. Invitation to Interact : The author invites the reader to engage with additional resources (a YouTube series), extending the conversation beyond the written piece. This further strengthens the pedagogical nature of the work.

The author’s style, again, is clear, engaging, and approachable, with a strong focus on empowering readers to understand their personal styles and needs. This work demonstrates a deep understanding of the subject matter and a strong commitment to helping readers navigate their individual paths through the terrain of knowledge management.

Fascinating! 

Despite the topic being quite similar, ChatGPT identified a number of new stylistic elements. For example, it picked up on my “Use of Analogies and Metaphors,” which wasn’t mentioned anywhere in the first analysis despite being something I tend to rely heavily on. It also named “Signposting” as a wonderfully specific way of structuring articles, which wasn’t mentioned in the first analysis either.

In other cases, ChatGPT identified the same element but described it in a more precise way that will be easier for me to apply to future output. For example: 

“Direct Address to the Reader” (from the second analysis) is much more specific than “The writer frequently uses inclusive language (‘you,’ ‘we,’ ‘us’) to foster a sense of connection with the reader” (from the first analysis)“Use of Rhetorical Questions” is much more accurate and succinct than “Questions are regularly posed to engage the reader and encourage reflection”“Interdisciplinary Approach” is much more useful than “provides real-world context and authority” because it explains why it has authority – by drawing on multiple disciplines

This significantly better result made me wonder if ChatGPT benefited from seeing multiple examples of writing by the same author. 

I decided to do a third round and typed “Thank you, that second analysis was better because it used more specific and concrete terminology and examples. I’d like to give you a third piece by the same author to analyze in the same way. Let me know when you’re ready.”

After pasting in the full text of One-Touch to Inbox Zero, here is the result (I’ve underlined the parts we haven’t seen before):

Based on the provided text, here’s a breakdown of the key stylistic elements and the subsequent style guide:

Voice and Tone : The text’s voice is authoritative and instructional. It provides clear directions on how to manage emails efficiently and doesn’t leave much room for interpretation, showing the writer’s expertise on the subject matter. The tone, however, is conversational and engaging, with an emphasis on addressing the reader directly (“you”) to create a sense of intimacy and personal relevance.

Style Guide: Maintain an authoritative yet conversational tone. Use the second person pronoun ‘you’ frequently to keep the text engaging and personalized. 

Mood : The mood of the text is empowering and encouraging. It aims to provide solutions, motivate the reader to take control of their email management, and thus their time and productivity.

Style Guide: Ensure the mood remains empowering and solution-focused. The aim is to instill a sense of confidence and control in the reader.

Sentence Structure : The sentences are a mix of simple, compound, and complex structures. The author uses longer sentences to explain concepts or processes and shorter sentences to emphasize key points or actions.

Style Guide: Use a mix of sentence structures. Use longer sentences for explanations and shorter ones for emphasis and action points.

Transition Style : The author uses a mixture of numbers, line breaks, and transition words (such as ‘then’, ‘but’, ‘also’) to navigate from one idea to another. This helps in breaking down the information into digestible chunks.

Style Guide: Use a combination of numeric points, transition words, and paragraphs to guide the reader from one idea to the next. Break down complex ideas into simpler, digestible parts.

Rhythm and Pacing: The pacing of the text is steady, and the rhythm is dictated by the transition between different ideas and steps. The author carefully balances detail with progression to maintain reader interest and comprehension.

Style Guide: Maintain a steady pace. Provide enough detail to fully inform the reader without overwhelming or slowing down the flow of information.

Signature Styles : The author has a habit of using all-caps for emphasis (e.g., “WITHOUT ACTUALLY DOING IT,” “YOU”). Quotations are used strategically to reinforce points. Repetition is used for emphasis and to ingrain crucial points in the reader’s mind (e.g., the various references to archiving each email).

Style Guide: Use capital letters for emphasis sparingly. Incorporate relevant quotes to support points. Use repetition strategically to reinforce important concepts. 

Distinctive Element : One distinctive aspect of the author’s style is the use of numbered points to present a clear step-by-step guide. Another is the use of direct commands to guide the reader’s actions (e.g., “Turn on Auto-advance,” “Open Gmail”).

Style Guide: Use numbered points for step-by-step instructions. Use direct commands to guide the reader’s actions. 

This style guide should help maintain the original style while creating new content on different topics. The key is to balance the authoritative tone with a conversational approach, using clear instructions, strategic repetition, and a mixture of sentence structures.

And finally, a fourth round, on the piece 12 Steps to Build a Second Brain (novel parts underlined):

Having analyzed both text samples, here’s the comprehensive style guide that reflects the author’s writing:

Voice and Tone : The voice in these texts is authoritative, yet friendly and approachable. The author is clearly knowledgeable and experienced in the subject matter and provides guidance with confidence. However, the language is quite informal and conversational, making the content accessible and engaging. Mood : The mood of the texts is upbeat, positive, and encouraging. The author empowers the reader to take steps and implement the suggestions offered, promoting a can-do attitude. Sentence Structure : The sentence structures are quite varied. There is a good mix of simple, compound, and complex sentences. The author seems to prefer shorter sentences for making specific points or giving instructions, while longer sentences are used to explain concepts or provide context. Transition Style : Transitions are clear and organized, typically with the use of numbered or bulleted lists to guide the reader through sequential steps or related points. The use of informal, conversational transitions (e.g., “Believe me,” “But I know”) are also common, making the text more relatable. Rhythm and Pacing : The rhythm is generally consistent, using a mix of sentence lengths to maintain reader engagement. Pacing varies according to the content – instructions or steps are delivered in a brisk, direct style, while explanations or conceptual content take a more measured pace. Signature Styles : The author regularly employs the technique of Direct Address , speaking directly to the reader using “you,” which helps in creating an engaging, interactive feel to the writing.The author frequently uses Imperative Sentences for instructions or recommendations, which conveys authority.The texts feature several External References , directing the reader to other resources (e.g., workshops, blog posts, videos) to provide additional context or detail.There is a noticeable trend of the author using Phrases of Assurance (e.g., “Believe me,” “I invite you,” “I recommend”), which help build trust and rapport with the reader.The author often uses Colloquial Language and Informal Phrasing (e.g., “get your Second Brain started,” “saving any article or other piece of online content you’re interested in for later consumption”) to keep the tone light and relatable.

In sum, when crafting content in this author’s style, strive for a friendly yet authoritative tone, use a mix of sentence structures, clear and organized transitions, and maintain an upbeat mood. Remember to address the reader directly, give clear instructions, make external references, use phrases of assurance, and use informal language when appropriate.

I’m surprised that we’re still seeing many new patterns that ChatGPT has identified in my writing. Presumably I could keep feeding it new pieces, but I think this is enough for now.

Next, I combined all four analyses produced so far, and asked it to synthesize them into a single, unified style guide. I adapted the initial prompt, instructing ChatGPT to analyze and integrate its previous four analyses into a style guide:

You have an expertise in linguistics, natural language processing, non-fiction writing, and prompt engineering.

Your task is to convert the following analyses of an author’s writing into an elaborate, detailed style guide. 

This guide will serve as a blueprint for creating fresh content on a distinct topic while maintaining the original style demonstrated in the analyzed texts.

Let me know when you are ready for the analyses.

Here’s what ChatGPT came up with:

Author’s Writing Style Guide

 

1. Voice and Tone

The voice of the author should come across as knowledgeable and authoritative yet approachable. In other words, the writing should carry a sense of expertise without sounding overly academic or detached. The language should strike a balance between formality and conversationality. The author should be seen as a guide, providing valuable insights while fostering a strong sense of connection with the reader.

Guideline: Write in a manner that comes across as informed and experienced without being intimidating. Use an approachable tone that is conversational yet professional, fostering a sense of connection with the reader.

2. Mood

The mood of the writing should be largely optimistic, motivational, and encouraging. The goal is to foster a sense of potential and progress, urging the reader to aspire and strive for better.

Guideline: Keep the mood uplifting and positive. The writing should inspire the reader and encourage them to take action.

3. Sentence Structure

The author employs a mix of simple, compound, and complex sentences. A variety of sentence lengths should be used to maintain reader interest and control the pacing of the narrative. Short sentences should be used for emphasis or to highlight important points.

Guideline: Craft sentences of varying structures and lengths. Utilize short sentences for emphasis and longer sentences for detailed explanations or descriptions.

4. Transition Style

Transitions should be smooth and seamless, using connective phrases and words to link ideas. This helps guide the reader through the text, allowing them to follow the narrative and see the interconnections between different points.

Guideline: Use transition words and phrases such as “in other words,” “but most of all,” “instead of,” and “after more than” to ensure smooth transitions between ideas.

5. Rhythm and Pacing

The writing should maintain a deliberate pace, allowing readers time to absorb each point. Shorter, punchier sentences can be used to maintain rhythm and accentuate key points.

Guideline: Maintain a steady rhythm throughout the text by controlling the pace with the use of sentence length. 

6. Signature Styles

The author uses several distinct techniques and patterns in their writing. These include the use of:

Introduction of an idea followed by further explanation and real-world examplesRegular use of questions to engage the reader and encourage reflectionPersonal anecdotes and experiences to provide context and authorityLists and bullet points to highlight multiple examples or stepsDirectly addressing potential doubts or concerns the reader might have, and offering solutions

Guideline: Implement these signature styles in your writing. Introduce ideas and follow them up with explanations and examples. Pose questions, share personal experiences, use lists and bullet points, and directly address the reader’s concerns.

7. Use of Analogies and Metaphors

The author is known for the use of archetypal roles as metaphors to make abstract concepts more concrete and relatable. They draw from various fields to provide enriching and characterizing examples.

Guideline: Utilize appropriate analogies and metaphors in your writing, drawing from various disciplines to make your points more understandable and relatable.

8. Empowerment

A significant theme across the author’s work is the empowerment of the reader. The author encourages the reader to understand their unique style and adapt accordingly.

Guideline: Write in a way that promotes self-efficacy and encourages readers to recognize and harness their unique potential.

9. Use of Rhetorical Questions

The author frequently uses rhetorical questions to engage the reader, provoke thought, and pave the way for discussions or answers.

Guideline: Incorporate rhetorical questions in your writing to stimulate the reader’s thinking and to introduce new ideas or discussions.

10. Interdisciplinary Approach

The author draws from various fields in their writing, showing their broad knowledge base and the interdisciplinarity of their approach.

Guideline: Use an interdisciplinary approach in your writing, linking concepts from various fields to provide a rich and diverse perspective.

11. Direct Commands and Use of Numbers

The author is known for using direct commands and numbering to guide the reader’s actions and structure information.

Guideline: Use direct commands to guide the reader’s actions and numbering to provide a clear structure to your writing.

Following this style guide will help you create content that reflects the author’s distinctive style, while being adaptable to various topics. It offers a balance of authority and approachability, promotes reader engagement, and encourages personal growth, which are key elements in replicating the style demonstrated in the analyzed texts.

This looks great! It’s always a bit dangerous to perform an “analysis of an analysis” when it comes to writing, as that can quickly turn into talking “about” things rather than just saying them directly. For example, the instruction “Write in a way that promotes self-efficacy” strikes me as unhelpful, as it’s not actually saying how to do that.

Still, this is without a doubt the most detailed and thorough analysis of my writing style I’ve ever seen. If it can be used to produce even a rough draft in my voice, that will represent a huge leap forward in our editorial process.

If you’re looking for advice on how to leverage AI tools like ChatGPT for writing, I can highly recommend subscribing to Write With AI. They have both free and paid options, and it’s been one of my favorite educational resources on this topic.

In a future piece, I’ll take you through the steps I followed to utilize this style guide to generate a new piece of writing.

Follow us for the latest updates and insights around productivity and Building a Second Brain on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube. And if you’re ready to start building your Second Brain, get the book and learn the proven method to organize your digital life and unlock your creative potential.

The post How to Create an AI Style Guide: Write With ChatGPT in Your Own Voice appeared first on Forte Labs.

Bring Building a Second Brain to Your Organization

We’re looking for organizations that want to teach their people how to build their own “Second Brain” – a system of knowledge management that empowers them to capitalize on the value of what they know and use it to advance their organization’s goals.

We now offer a complete portfolio of products and services on this theme, including a bestselling book available in multiple languages and formats and our new self-paced course BASB Foundation. Together they provide learners with an accessible, flexible, and impactful training experience at their own pace and on any device.

Over the years we’ve heard countless times from people within companies and organizations who desperately need a Second Brain for the work they do. We’ve heard the stories of rampant Information Overwhelm, crushing volumes of email and other communication, not to mention the constant need to innovate and solve complex new problems in an uncertain economy.

After a decade of working with individuals to develop the BASB methodology, and testing it with a small group of influential organizations (like Toyota, the World Bank, and Genentech), we are opening the doors for the first time to new organizations who want to partner with us.

We are seeking deployments of at least 100 employees to receive BASB training. You will work closely with our expert team to assess your organization’s training needs, set learning goals for participants, and track the impact of this educational experience on your organization.

Here are some of the top benefits we’ve found professionals receive from this kind of training:

1. Enhanced Productivity & Job Satisfaction

Rapid improvements in productivity and effectiveness due to an enhanced ability to move initiatives forward on multiple fronts simultaneouslyRelief from Information Overload and the burden of high volumes of incoming information through the use of digital organization methodsMajor reductions in stress levels, overwhelm, and burnout as people organize their digital environment to promote clarity and peace of mind

2. Improved Communication & Collaboration

Improvement in people’s ability to handle communication across multiple channels, and respond effectively in a timely wayBetter participation in meetings due to a reliable method for taking notes on and following through on action itemsSurfacing tacit knowledge hidden within the organization, allowing people to learn from each other and double down on what’s working

3. Advanced Learning & Skill Development

Enhanced learning and development abilities due to better notetaking and retrieval skillsHigher fluency with the latest digital platforms, including learning how to rely on external tools to manage and push forward their responsibilitiesRapid skill acquisition from being able to independently pursue and complete skills-focused training

4. Streamlined Project Management & Decision Making

More effective project management, especially in projects that require tracking large volumes of informationGreater capacity to document, reference, and resurface organizational knowledge to improve products, services, and internal processesEnhanced decision-making as past insights and lessons can be easily revisited via digital notes

If you’re interested, please click the button below to complete a short form. We’ll be in touch.

I'm interested in corporate training!

The post Bring Building a Second Brain to Your Organization appeared first on Forte Labs.

The 6 Pillars of Our Book Promotion Strategy

There’s something book publishers don’t tell you when you sign their offer on the dotted line: almost all the responsibility for promoting your book will fall on your shoulders. 

A lot of authors complain about this fact as if it represents publishers shirking their duty or being lazy. I see it quite differently: authors are responsible for selling their books because they are by far the best positioned to do so. 

No one else has the direct relationship with potential readers, an abundance of behind-the-scenes and “making of” material, the voice and point of view that the book embodies, and of course, the motivation to give it everything they got.

Expecting any publisher to simply forget these facts and valiantly sell your book on your behalf is a denial of reality. No one is going to put in a fraction of the time, effort, and care into promoting your book as you.

Keeping that in mind, our promotion strategy for Building a Second Brain rested on six pillars, each one representing a powerful leverage point in its trajectory:

The proposalThe brand identity design and media kitThe pre-order campaignThe email listThe YouTube channelSharing regular updates on my journeyPillar #1: The Proposal

Launching a book into mainstream awareness is like starting a business from scratch. 

You will eventually need to recruit an entire ecosystem of people, companies, communities, funding sources, distribution channels, wholesale and retail outlets, online platforms, promotional partners, and digital and physical supply chains, and then coordinate them all to gracefully deliver an impactful message on a global scale.

Sounds easy right?

Most of the advice out there says to make your proposal as good as it can be, but I don’t think most aspiring authors put nearly enough emphasis on it. Your proposal is everything – a step-by-step business plan that lays out everything you will make happen over a period of years. 

It’s impossible to invest too much time and attention on the proposal, not only because it determines whether your book gets sold in the first place, and for how much, but because the decisions you make there will bias every subsequent decision made by everyone connected to the book.

This is why it took me 9 months to finish my proposal (which you can read in its 61-page entirety). It was some of the best time I spent. I hired a highly experienced developmental editor Janet Goldstein to help me with it, and it was a major project within itself. (If you’re looking for an expert opinion on your book idea, I suggest booking one of her Laser Intensives).

Many authors don’t work with a developmental editor, but I think that’s a big mistake. No agent or friend can give you anywhere close to the level of attention and experience you’ll receive from someone who has worked on multiple successful book proposals in the past. I went on to hire the same editor to work with me on the manuscript itself, which gave me a long-term thought partner who provided continuity through this long process.

In the proposal we tried to make as many important decisions as possible, including:

The main problems we were proposing to solveThe main historical analogy we would use to frame our solutionThe dysfunctional approach we would compare our solution with most directlyWhich tangible benefits of building a Second Brain to highlightHow to tell my origin story and why it led me to want to write this bookWhich main audiences we thought would be interested in the bookWhich competing and complementary titles to use as modelsA selection of marketing and promotion opportunities we envisionedThe topics of each chapter

For me, the most important outcome from this entire proposal-writing process was the decision to pivot the BASB message to a much more mainstream, “beginner” audience. 

It was necessary and important to appeal to hardcore PKM nerds in the early days, as they were at the forefront of this emerging field and had the motivation to wade through the messy details. But now that the core ideas and method had been established, I didn’t want to remain limited to that niche. I didn’t want to write a book preaching to the same choir: I wanted this idea to spread to wider circles of people who hadn’t previously even heard of the concept of a second brain, and if it wasn’t for this book, might never be exposed to it.

In retrospect, this seems like the obviously right decision, but it wasn’t an easy one. I had to endure a lot of dissatisfaction and outright criticism from the audience I had built up to that point. Many people felt like I’d “dumbed down” the ideas and diluted their power. Some even felt like I’d abandoned or betrayed them. 

What kept me going was the thought of the many new kinds of people we’d be able to reach with a broader, more accessible voice, including:

The Creator Economy and content creators in generalFreelancers and entrepreneurs of all kindsGig workers who need a way to take information from one job to anotherMillennials, who are quickly rising into positions of leadership across the economyRemote workers needing better self-management skills (which exploded in numbers during the pandemic)Notion users (Notion raised major funding the same week as my proposal was sold, with a featured article in the New York Times, which I believe positively impacted our prospects)Fans of organizing and decluttering (such as Marie Kondo)People who like to take online courses and need a way to take notes on themPeople with ADHD and other neurodivergent conditions, looking for a way to alleviate their symptoms

The early decision to “go mainstream” gave me the clarity and courage to break away from the insider language of the “PKM clique” that predominates online, and to instead seek language that anyone – older and younger generations, people in non-digital professions, people without formal education, people living in other countries, and the non-tech savvy – could not only understand but put to use in their own lives.

The proposal was extremely well-received, attracting four imprints from three publishers in a two-round auction that ended with a multi-six-figure deal. Once we had that in hand, it was off to the races.

Pillar #2: The Brand Identity Design and Media Kit

I decided early on to create a full-fledged visual brand identity for my book. I already had a BASB ecosystem with multiple products and services and knew that in the future we’d likely have multiple books, other titles like journals or workbooks, physical products, and eventually, even other media like films, TV shows, board games, and apparel.

To make sure all of these elements fit together as a cohesive brand, I hired an experienced designer to deeply research our content and audience and develop a comprehensive BASB brand identity made up of:

Core brand attributesA beautiful logo that works across platforms and different media typesUsage guidelines for ourselves and external partiesAn official typeface and typography samplesColor palette and how colors should be usedAccessibility improvementsAn entire graphic language we call “circuits”Photography examples and guidelinesA creative gallery envisioning what future touchpoints could look like

Those brand guidelines became part of a broader BASB media kit, which was unbelievably helpful to share with anyone who wanted to talk about or promote the book, providing everything they might possibly need with just a link. The media kit additionally includes:

Important linksKey messagesHigh-quality book photosPress kit materialsMy bio and headshotsDownloadable brand assetsLogos in various shapes, colors, and sizesFair use guide encouraging people to share the BASB message within certain limitsContact info in case they needed something else Pillar #3: The Pre-Order Campaign

I didn’t have a large audience back in 2019 when I wrote the proposal – only 6,000 email subscribers and 10,000 Twitter followers. I knew the pre-order campaign was going to be our single best chance of breaking through the media noise, and I needed to do everything possible to create a groundswell of support on release day.

Our publisher set a very early date for opening pre-orders so we had as much time as possible to collect them: November 16, 2021. There would be 210 days, or 7 months, of pre-orders before the official release date on June 14, 2022. I set a goal of reaching 10,000 pre-orders in that time (based on reports from other authors of reaching bestseller lists with similar numbers), which would require about 1,400 pre-orders per month, 357 per week, or 50 per day.

We ended up with 12,875 pre-orders, exceeding my goal and putting the book on the Wall Street Journal bestseller list the week of its release. Comparing that number to the size of my email list by the time the book was released, it was about 20% the size of our subscriber base. Using this as a rule of thumb, if you want to reach 10,000 pre-orders, you should have at least 50,000 email subscribers to give yourself a fair shot.

We thought of the absolute best bonuses we could offer, in five tiers from 5 to 500 books. They drove 1,870 of those pre-orders or about 15% of them. Here’s the distribution of how many people ordered at each tier:

My advice: it’s worth offering special bonuses for pre-orders since every pre-order is so valuable. All the pre-orders are combined with the first week of sales to determine whether the book qualifies for bestseller status. Which means you essentially get to “save up” many months’ worth of sales, all of which are counted in a single week, instead of having them come in in a trickle.

A 15% increase (of nearly 2,000 books) is a significant uplift. But I would recommend offering only digital bonuses since fulfillment (especially internationally) is such a nightmare. And it’s probably a better idea to only offer 2-3 tiers such as 2, 3, and 10 books to keep the tracking simple. If someone wants to order in larger quantities than that you can always create a special bonus for them suited to their specific needs.

Besides the bonuses, we promoted the book incessantly through every one of our channels for the full 7 months pre-orders were available. We included a header image promoting the book in every week’s email newsletter. I wrote dozens of blog posts on various aspects of the methodology and updates on key milestones. My team posted quotes and other key ideas across our social media channels. I asked every author and creator I knew to promote it to their followers. I even went on a two-week trip to London and New York to film a series of YouTube collabs, which were released in the months following the book launch.

In other words, I left no stone unturned and didn’t hesitate to make an ask of any person I met, any group I spoke to, or any organization I had contact with. It truly took a vast interconnected network of people stepping up to take decisive action to launch this book to the top of the bestseller rankings.

Pillar #4: The Email List

Our email list has always been the single, central fulcrum of the entire business. From the earliest days, I never wanted to be held hostage to any platform or channel. I took the risk of self-employment to be able to have more freedom: why would I entrust my relationship with my customers to some company somewhere?

As a result, all roads in our entire online ecosystem always lead back to the email list. Every blog post has a subscription form. Every social media profile links back to a signup page. Everyone who buys anything from us gets their email address added to the list. I see my job largely as finding dozens of ways to get people to subscribe to the email list, and then maintaining that relationship by sending out our weekly newsletter packed with valuable, free content.

I had moved from Mailchimp to ConvertKit in August 2019, partly to start preparing for the influx of subscribers I knew the book would bring. It took a few months to figure out all the details of signup forms, landing pages, automations, broadcasts and sequences, templates and integrations, including taking Brennan Dunn’s excellent course Mastering ConvertKit. But we were ready for the tidal wave, which you can see in the graph below. The vertical line is the release date of the book, where you can clearly see an inflection point in our subscriber growth rate.

The main reason the email list is so important, besides the independence and autonomy it provides from the whims of any platform, is that it gives us many chances to build a relationship and make a sale to any given person. You might be able to reach someone one time on Twitter, Facebook, or some other platform, but what are the chances they will be ready and willing and able at that exact moment to buy a book?

With an email address, we have the chance to start a conversation. To prove that we are generous and capable and willing to deliver a huge amount of value upfront for a sale down the line. As I’ve shared before, the average expected revenue from a subscriber to our email list is about $50 from our courses and products. That is 16x the approximately $3 I make per book sold. Which means that 1 free subscriber to my email list generates on average 16 times as much revenue as a book buyer! Without the email list, there is no business model in publishing, regardless of how successful the book becomes.

Pillar #5: The YouTube Channel

The fifth pillar wasn’t about the initial buildup and launch of the book – it was about what happens afterward. As important as that first wave of promotion is, it is only the beginning.

Looking farther into the future, I knew that I needed an ongoing engine of promotion to prolong the life of this book long after the early enthusiasm had died down. I asked myself, “How can I continue to capture the attention of an ever-growing number of people for years into the future?”

As I looked at the various possibilities, a clear answer jumped out at me: YouTube. I’d been eyeing the platform for years during its meteoric growth and had published a menagerie of videos on my channel, attracting a respectable 20,000 subscribers. But I had no strategy, no goal, and no clear value proposition or consistent theme for viewers. I also saw in the enrollment data for our online course that a growing number of people were already finding out about us from YouTube, primarily through other people’s channels.

I decided to step back and think carefully about what would be needed for us to make YouTube a central priority. I started by remodeling our garage into a full-fledged recording studio. We had already planned to do that when we moved to Long Beach, CA at the start of the pandemic, but gaining more clarity about how the space would be used gave me the confidence to invest more time, energy, and money.

The total cost of the project was about $80,000, including $40,000 for the basic remodel (tile floors, drywall with a brick facade, built-in custom cabinets covering one entire wall, and beautiful tongue-and-groove white wood ceilings with original beams, etc.), another $20,000 in equipment (lights, cameras, audio interfaces, adjustable height standing desk, teleprompter, special cabling, etc.), and $20,000 for a consultant who helped us design all the shooting angles, optimize the equipment to work together seamlessly and make sure we could shoot top-quality footage. You can see a timelapse of the whole project here. 

As we built out the studio, it quickly became apparent to me that I wouldn’t be able to manage all the equipment, video shoots, and post-production myself. Around this time we welcomed our son, and the little time I had for side projects dwindled even further. 

I decided to look for someone to lead our YouTube efforts, and after putting out a job description and conducting interviews hired Marc Koenig. He went on to develop our YouTube strategy, including the main topics we’d address and the style and tone of our videos, as well as building a team of three dedicated editors and producers to sustain our pipeline.

The typical YouTuber’s journey is about starting very small, with a smartphone or handheld camera, and then slowly improving their skills and production levels over a period of years, through relentless iteration. I had already walked that path with blogging and Twitter and knew I needed a faster, more direct one this time. With the boom in the online course business during the pandemic, we were lucky to have a surplus of funds to invest. 

I ultimately invested several hundred thousand dollars in YouTube in the first couple of years, and it’s paid off handsomely. We now have a channel with over 175,000 subscribers, which generates four figures per month in ad revenue, regularly books five-figure sponsorships, and contributes about 50% of our course sales totaling seven figures per year. And of course, it is by far our single most powerful channel for spreading the Second Brain message to the world and driving book sales in the 20+ languages it will soon be available in.

In general, I think video is a great way to promote book sales. You might think video-watchers only want to watch more videos, whereas text-readers only want to read more text, but I don’t think that’s the case. Opposite kinds of content can actually complement each other. Video is great for getting a quick introduction to something in a fun, engaging way, whereas text is better once you’ve decided to go down the rabbit hole and you want all the precise details.

Pillar #6: Sharing Regular Updates on My Journey

I benefited so much from in-depth blog posts by authors like Tim Ferriss and wanted to pay forward that gift of knowledge to future writers.

In total, I’ve published many tens of thousands of words about every stage of my book publishing journey, all compiled together in my Ultimate Guide to Traditional Book Publishing. This wasn’t just an act of generosity: the insights I’ve gained into my own thinking and the extent to which all this writing helped me integrate what I was learning would have made it all worth it even if no one had ever read it.

I highly recommend any author share all the behind-the-scenes details that go into the creation of their book. It may seem like a niche subject that few people will be interested in, especially if your audience isn’t inherently interested in writing, but I think you’ll be surprised. Your journey isn’t only about book-writing. It is also about personal growth and what you’re discovering about yourself. It is about the challenges and breakthroughs anyone has as they tackle a big goal. 

People will take away lessons for themselves and their own goals that you would never imagine. And if anyone decides to follow in your footsteps, you’ll be able to support them by simply sharing a link.

Follow us for the latest updates and insights around productivity and Building a Second Brain on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube. And if you’re ready to start building your Second Brain, get the book and learn the proven method to organize your digital life and unlock your creative potential.

The post The 6 Pillars of Our Book Promotion Strategy appeared first on Forte Labs.

The Last 100 Exercise: How I’m Delegating 85% of My Work

I recently completed one of the most powerful exercises I’ve ever invented for delegating aspects of my work to others.

After hosting an insightful weekend retreat with other founders last month, some of whom had significantly larger businesses than mine, I realized I was ready to take a major step I’d been contemplating for some time: asking our COO Monica to take over the day-to-day running of the business.

We had been moving in this direction for quite a while, turning over one part of the company after another to her oversight. Now it was time to make the final leap, moving my last two direct reports to her and stepping back from the operational details to focus on new creative projects.

I’ve always struggled with delegation. Seeing myself mainly as a “doer” and “executor,” it has always felt like I could complete any given task twice as fast as it would take to explain to anyone else. It has always felt strange asking someone else to do something I’m unwilling or unable to do, even if I’m paying them to do exactly that!

Delegation might seem like a narrow topic relevant only to founders and CEOs with the benefit of teams reporting to them, but I don’t think that’s the case. We all have to delegate responsibilities to others, though we might not always call it that. 

If you’re a leader of any kind – a people manager, product manager, team lead, or community leader – you need to understand how to organize the work of others. At home, you’ll need to ask your spouse or kids or a housekeeper to handle some things if you don’t want to spend all your time doing chores. 

Even individual contributors at work subtly assign follow-up tasks to their colleagues, both junior and senior to them, in order to get what they need. And even AI can be seen as a personal assistant who, despite being very enthusiastic and quick, is also tone-deaf and needs quite a bit of guidance to get it right.

Delegation to all these third parties is a skill and not one that is taught in any school. It requires you to take a moment and think about why something is being done in the first place, what success looks like, what context or details are needed, and who is the best person to handle it. 

It’s so much easier to just individualistically plow through another batch of tasks rather than face the challenging question, “Is there someone else who could handle this instead of me?”

Unless you learn to ask and answer this question effectively, you’ll never get the chance to elevate your perspective to higher, more long-term, and more transformational frontiers. You’ll always be stuck at the task level, which isn’t where your vision of the future resides. 

The Last 100 is an exercise in learning to leverage other people’s skills, knowledge, and experience to accomplish what you can’t do alone.

The Last 100 Exercise

I woke up one morning with the idea for this exercise in mind and completed it in about 30 minutes. By the time I was finished, I had incredible clarity about what was important for me to do, what wasn’t, and how to tangibly delegate responsibilities that no longer made sense for me.

Here are the four steps I followed.

Step 1: List the last 100 tasks and meetings you completed

The Last 100 is based on a simple observation: it is much easier and more concrete to consider how to delegate tasks you’ve already done in the past, versus speculating on tasks you may do in the future. 

Often our recurring duties and habits are so ingrained and invisible, we don’t even fully realize we’re doing them. Rather than try to imagine or guess what tasks I might be able to delegate in the future, I found it much more helpful to look at what I’d already done.

I looked in two places: my task manager (I use an app called Things, which has a “logbook” where every task I’ve checked off is recorded) and my calendar (I use Busycal, an app on my computer and smartphone that connects to Google Calendar). These two software programs are the most comprehensive record of to-do’s I’ve completed, meetings I’ve attended, and calls I’ve made.

My logbook in Things The month view in Busycal

Starting with the present day, I moved backward through time in each of these apps, writing down everything I had done in my notes app, Evernote. I had to go back about 3-4 months to find 100 unique items (there’s not much point in writing down duplicates of the same kind of task).

Often when considering delegating something, it’s easy to tell ourselves “Oh but that doesn’t take much time” or “I’ll just make an exception this time and do it myself.” Once I saw the cumulative toll of all these “exceptions” I could no longer deny that a huge proportion of my time was being taken up by minutiae that someone else could easily handle.

Here’s the initial list I came up with (and a link to view the full note):

Step 2: Assign items to others

The next step was to sort these 100 items into buckets based on who I thought was best suited to taking them over. In all, 60 of the last 100 tasks I’d completed myself could easily be delegated to someone else on the team (view full note):

Here’s the breakdown:

4 tasks to our YouTube GM and his team9 tasks to our COO and Operations team23 tasks to our Marketing/Content Director and her team

This exercise also revealed several new roles that we could recruit:

3 tasks to a volunteer from our alumni student community8 tasks to a freelance writer-editor17 tasks to a part-time personal assistant

There were another 8 tasks that were duplicates and could be deleted. Which left 35 tasks that I didn’t think someone else could do on my behalf.

Step 3: Divide the remaining tasks into 3 groups

Next, I subdivided this remaining list of 35 items into three groups:

Things I shouldn’t do at allThings I think I should doThings I want to do

For six items, I realized that if no one could do them for me, then they shouldn’t be done at all. Most of these involved meeting with people to see a demo of a product, learn about their app or startup, or have them “pick my brain.”

I put them all on a “Do not do” list as a reminder that I regretted doing them after the fact, which meant I’d probably regret committing to them in the future:

Coffee chat with influential personDemo call with app builderCall with interesting entrepreneurShare AI-generated BASB images with team and solicit ideas for how to use themCall with KM manager for info on organizational KMCall with app founder

I identified another 18 items as “shoulds,” not wants. They are “necessary evils” that don’t give me energy or joy, but that seem to be essential for unblocking or enabling other things that do give me joy. In the future I’ll do my best to avoid or minimize them as much as possible:

Fix Readwise syncingRead and provide feedback on book proposal from a fellow creatorWrite captions for BASB 1-year anniversary slideshowHost marketing expert at the houseMeet with publisher on book launch plansMeet with team from tech company on collaboration ideasOff-site interview in LAGoing on podcasts to promote bookMeeting with Brazilian publisherDeliver session at SB SummitPractice SB Summit presentationEmail course creator proposing video collabCall with notetaking app PMMeet with tech company PMTry new AI feature in PhotoshopWrite up details needed by lawyer in legal disputeCall with lawyer to discuss legal disputeReview agenda for retreat and make adjustments/ask questions

And finally, as the final result of this experiment, I was left with 15 items that only I can do, and that I want to do. These items fall within my “zone of genius” – I am both uniquely capable of doing them, and they also give me a lot of satisfaction and pleasure. These are the frontiers where my time and attention are best utilized and have the best chance of transforming the business:

Writing book manuscriptBusiness coaching session with MinaWrite blog postRecord audiobook in the studioHost a retreat with other entrepreneursProduct launch kickoff meetingSpeaking coaching sessionFilm YouTube videosRecord audio for voiceovers for YT videosRun Q&A with cohort facilitatorsRecord video selfie for cohort CTADeliver AI WorkshopConduct Monthly Q&A with membersRead books for ideasEdit/refine Foundation sales email series

Interestingly, they seem to fall within 4 main categories:

Creating new things (writing, recording, filming, teaching)Working with experts and peers (my business coach, fellow entrepreneurs, speaking coach, cohort facilitators)Inspiring and guiding the team (for product launches and retrospectives for example)Sales (making direct calls to action, drafting sales emails with personal stories)Step 4: Share what you’ve discovered

None of this is of any use if you don’t share it with anyone. The entire point of this exercise is to change your working relationships, and that begins with transparently communicating to colleagues what you’ve learned from taking the steps above.

I shared my lists with the team and asked them to support me in delegating the 85% of my current duties that are not the best use of my talents and that don’t advance our business or our mission.

To my surprise, they were more than happy to do so! We have some work to do to give everyone the context, autonomy, and feedback they need to be able to move these kinds of responsibilities forward. But I’m confident we’ll do so, as it is in all our interest for me to spend the maximum percentage of my time fully utilizing my skills, exploring new creative frontiers, and uncovering new opportunities that might very well become the future of our work.

Follow us for the latest updates and insights around productivity and Building a Second Brain on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube. And if you’re ready to start building your Second Brain, get the book and learn the proven method to organize your digital life and unlock your creative potential.

The post The Last 100 Exercise: How I’m Delegating 85% of My Work appeared first on Forte Labs.

5 Surprising Insights From My First Mastermind

I recently hosted our first-ever in-person mastermind, unanimously dubbed “The Wholesome Mastermind,” at a retreat center in Ojai just north of Los Angeles.

I’ve been interested in masterminds for years, but the ones available never seemed quite right for me – whether because of the travel requirements, the format, or the kind of people who joined.

I thought: Why not create my own? So in January 2023, I put out a call for other online course creators to join me for a long weekend. To my surprise, eight of them said yes, and we came together in June to see what we could learn from each other.

I’ve always noticed that it’s quite difficult to summarize what exactly one gains from an experience like this one. People will rant and rave about how valuable and meaningful it was, yet when you press them for details, all they can talk about is “a new sense of perspective,” “renewed clarity” and other such ambiguous concepts.

In the spirit of transparency and accountability, I’ve distilled the 5 most important takeaways I walked away with to share with you…

1. The difference between being nice and being kind

As we took turns sharing our goals and challenges, one of the other entrepreneurs quickly identified that I had “people-pleasing tendencies.”

I had never thought of it this way, but he was absolutely right. I’ve always been the type of person who bends over backward to please people, accommodate them, and come off as a “nice guy.” Sometimes in a healthy way, but often in a dysfunctional way, by ignoring or minimizing my own needs in order to satisfy the needs of others.

I can trace this tendency far back into my past and could see in how many ways it had limited me. The trouble with repressing your own needs is that they don’t go away – they fester. Sooner or later, it all boils over in the form of angry outbursts or passive-aggressive resentment.

My entrepreneur friend pointed out a subtle but incredibly powerful distinction for us people-pleasers: sometimes when you’re trying to be nice, you’re not being kind. 

It’s kind to tell people how you truly feel. It’s kind to surface what doesn’t work for you, early and often. It’s kind to assume people can hear the truth (or at least your truth). But this isn’t necessarily going to mean you come off as nice. Sometimes you have to choose.

Usually, by the time I finally reveal a longstanding blindspot, there are multiple areas of my life where it is manifesting itself. And this was true in this case: several areas of the business that had seen lingering, chronic problems suddenly snapped into focus. I knew I needed to have some frank conversations that I’d been avoiding or downplaying for too long. It was time to choose being kind over being nice. 

2. Creative collaboration isn’t the same as people management

Another helpful distinction for me was to realize that there are two sides to my relationship with the people on my team: a creatively collaborative side – all about ideas, insights, experiments, and imaginative breakthroughs – and a people management side, which is about evaluating performance, measuring progress toward goals, and navigating conflicts.

I had assumed that as the CEO, I was supposed to have all the hard conversations. That’s what a leader does, isn’t it? The problem is, I’m not good at having hard conversations, nor any of the other responsibilities involved in management. They leave me incredibly drained even when they go well. Basically, I was running around the business doing all the stuff I’m not good at, leaving no time for the areas where I excel! Not exactly the formula for a thriving business.

I had assumed that I had to master both the creative collaboration aspect and the people management aspect, but a friend disabused me of that notion. Why spend years trying to master something I have no natural affinity for, while the business suffers and flounders in the meantime? 

I could instead separate these two aspects, giving all the people management duties to our new COO, Monica Rysavy. We’d already been moving in this direction for some time, but on my first day back, I made it official: she would run the business day to day, leaving me free to explore new creative frontiers, which is not only what makes me happy, but is also best for the business.

We moved all my direct reports to her, which frees me up to have a purely creative and collaborative relationship with each person on the team. Rather than holding back my feedback for fear of damaging the creative flow of ideas, I can step fully into my role as the thought leader and visionary creator that I fulfill best.

3. My dissatisfaction is the true north of the company

As a creator-led business, Forte Labs is designed to enable my personal creative and intellectual pursuits. It’s not like other companies that are product-centric or process-centric. We are idea-centric, and specifically, the ideas that I am currently pursuing and enlivened by.

As a result, I have to be very clear about what I want: the ideas I want to study, the projects I want to pursue, the learning I am being drawn to, and the investments that allow all those things to be monetized. This is why practices like journaling, meditation, retreats, coaching, and writing are so crucial – I literally cannot afford to lose touch with my burning passions.

Surprisingly, the conversations at our retreat revealed the opposite side of that coin: that my dissatisfaction is an even more powerful compass for the company. Since Forte Labs is an extension of me, I can feel problems brewing in any aspect of the business at an almost visceral level. I can sense things going wrong long before they become obvious, which means that being in touch with my dissatisfaction is like a superpower allowing me to see into the future.

Combining the three insights above, I’m beginning to realize that my effectiveness as a leader depends more on being able to sense problems brewing underneath the surface and raise them as quickly and loudly as possible, rather than trying to precisely diagnose and fix every problem myself. 

It’s far faster and more effective to hand off the resolution of a problem to someone else once it’s been identified, so I can focus on the next one. It’s like a never-ending conveyer belt of problems, each of which has the potential to become a new innovation or breakthrough. I am only the initial station on that conveyor belt, not the entire factory.

4. A product is defined by the consciousness that created it

Another attendee mentioned this phrase in passing, but it explained so many things I’d noticed over the years about the content and courses we’ve created.

The idea is that the maker of something – whether a piece of writing, a slide presentation, a website, or a physical product – inevitably leaves an impression of their consciousness on the thing they’ve created. No need to get metaphysical about it: this can simply mean that the state of mind one is in indelibly shapes the decision-making that goes into a new creation.

When I am in a deep flow state and all parts of myself are aligned and working in harmony, I produce things that flow logically, are internally aligned, and function harmoniously. However, when I am in a chaotic state, internally conflicted, or aggravated, the writing or designs, or emails I produce reflect that.

I’m not saying we should only create things when we’re in a perfectly balanced, zen-like trance. All states of mind have their use. In fact, many of my best inventions happened when I was feeling manic, depressed, nervous, angry, or in inner turmoil. This isn’t a moral imperative, but a functional one: to be aware of how your internal consciousness is influencing everything around you, especially anything you create out of that consciousness.

Speaking practically, this insight was the final confirmation I needed to feel confident in giving outside facilitators full control over our cohorts. My consciousness had shaped the nature of the Building a Second Brain course and how it was taught since its inception. That had given it a coherence and a personal style crucial to allowing it to break through the noise. But now we needed more kinds of consciousness to contribute their own ideas, and to allow BASB to evolve in ways that aren’t possible when I am in the driver’s seat.

5. It’s time to curate people, not ideas

My fifth and final insight wasn’t something anyone said directly. It emerged in my mind like a prophecy, fully formed, like it had been waiting in plain sight to be found. It was the phrase, “It’s time to curate people, not ideas.”

As the intensity of my book launch has wound down over the past six months, I’ve started looking to new horizons for the “next big thing.” After years of extreme convergence, I’ve been feeling the hunger to swing back to divergence and indulge my curiosity without a specific outcome in mind.

I’ve spent time trying out a new generation of second brain apps like Obsidian, Tana, and Mem. I’ve immersed myself in the AI revolution, experimenting with various generative AI tools. I’ve started getting back into personal growth again, after a long hiatus focused on raising our two young kids.

All this learning has been wonderful, but there has been something nagging at the edges of my mind the whole time that I can now see clearly: the way I explored new things in the past isn’t going to work anymore. In the past, my default approach to learning was obsession – eating and breathing the “new thing,” staying up late into the night tinkering, spending all my time on it, even changing my social circles and my environment to feed my hunger for new information. 

That was exhilarating and gratifying, not to mention being a fantastically effective approach to accelerated learning. But I can’t do it anymore, and wouldn’t want to even if I could. I have a beautiful family and a healthy, grounded daily routine. I have a profitable business and a world-class team I can rely on. That’s a lot of people I have affection and responsibility for, and I’m not interested in neglecting them in order to throw myself at something new.

My typical obsessive approach to learning, as exciting as it can be, also has a major flaw: it is tremendously wasteful. You have to spend hundreds of hours pursuing leads that don’t pan out. You have to get into the weeds, since there is usually no curriculum or map to follow. And let me tell you, the weeds can consume vast amounts of time with little to show for it.

One afternoon at our retreat, I was in the “hot seat” with a question: How can I explore the emerging generative AI landscape without taking my usual obsessive approach? The answer my friends and fellow entrepreneurs came to almost immediately was obvious in retrospect: lean on the people around you. 

The major difference between me today and me 10 years ago is I now have a network of people aligned with my mission and eager to contribute to it. I’ve built an audience of people who are already at the frontier, already doing the work, already learning and innovating, and discovering the important lessons of this new AI landscape. 

I don’t have to strike out toward that frontier, by myself with a pickaxe in hand, to mine for gold nuggets at some random stream. I can call up an army of intrepid explorers who aren’t just willing to join this adventure, but eager to do so. I can step into a new role, providing the infrastructure, leadership, and resources to fund this grand expedition. I don’t have to go it alone anymore.

I spent the first decade of my career curating individual ideas, carefully noting them down in my notetaking system and then systematically reviewing and synthesizing them into new creative works. That has been such a gratifying experience. But now it’s time for a new chapter – to go up a level, and become a curator of people. 

Perhaps my greatest takeaway from our first mastermind is uncovering an unexpected desire within myself: to serve creators and entrepreneurs who are doing important work in the world. 

I discovered that such people are out there, and they need help, and I have a unique ability to offer that help. I learned that I do know how to create environments and experiences that provide profound value to them. Environments that evoke vulnerability and authenticity, where people can show up as their full selves while also taking away transformational business and strategic insights. 

I want to spend the next chapter of my life contributing to a community of creators, entrepreneurs, writers, teachers, artists, and experts who share a common vision of serving humanity to their fullest potential. I want to connect them to each other so they can see that they’re not in this alone. 

It’s time for me to learn the subtle art of gathering people together, and showing up naturally and fluidly in such spaces so I can express myself without fear. It’s time for the last remnants of that shy, introverted, socially awkward identity to dissolve away. 

I have no idea what that’s going to look like exactly, but I also know that figuring that out is not my job alone. My job is to curate the right people in the room and watch the answer emerge.

Follow us for the latest updates and insights around productivity and Building a Second Brain on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube. And if you’re ready to start building your Second Brain, get the book and learn the proven method to organize your digital life and unlock your creative potential.

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What’s in Your Meaning Portfolio?

I don’t pay much attention to my investment portfolio, but I watch my meaning portfolio like a hawk.

A meaning portfolio is your collection of “meaning assets” – the reasons you get out of bed in the morning. They are the sources from which you derive your sense of purpose, fulfillment, self-worth, and ultimately, happiness. They are what make life worth living.

Meaning assets can include your family, friends, spouse, kids, or community. You could derive meaning from your job, business, achievements, money, or recognition from others. Culture, religion, tradition, or any higher purpose greater than yourself can make up part of your meaning portfolio. For many people, personal growth and lifelong learning are a wellspring of meaning. And simple everyday activities such as personal hobbies, gardening, cooking, or journaling often contribute as well. 

What should you include in your meaning portfolio?

Here are two criteria:

First, it has to be something that is an end in itself, not merely a means to something else more important. It is inherently valuable, requiring no utilitarian or instrumental value to justify its existence. A helpful way to check is to ask yourself, “Would I still do this if I won the lottery?”

Second, it takes ongoing investment and care. Unlike shares of stock, it’s not enough to make a one-time, upfront investment and then let it sit untouched for years. Meaning assets need to be cultivated and nurtured consistently or else they will wither. 

How my meaning portfolio shifted over the years

There was a period of a few years when I was getting my business off the ground that about 90% of my meaning portfolio was invested in my work. I was a single, childless 20-something living on my own in San Francisco. Each day, I’d wake up in my bare, furniture-less apartment, sit down to work on my tiny IKEA desk, and grind through tasks until dark.

But as long as 90% of my meaning came from my work, I was hypersensitive to any criticism directed at it. 

I launched my first productivity course in 2013 and posted it on Reddit in breathless anticipation, only to have an anonymous Internet stranger look up my resume and comment, “This guy is telling other people how to work when he’s only been working a couple of years himself.” I was in turmoil for days as it felt like everything I stood for came into question.

The first customer refund requests I received were devastating. They felt like missiles landing a direct hit on my ego since that ego relied on the success of my business as its sole source of support. I needed a constant supply of accomplishments to reassure myself that my life was going in the right direction since it was all riding on one thing.

There’s nothing wrong with investing everything you have in one source of meaning for a time. As with money, it’s hard to grow your investments if they’re too diversified and spread across too many places. Sometimes you have to concentrate your attention on one or two opportunities, making a bet that they will flower and grow into something even more meaningful. 

The problem with remaining overinvested in just one source of meaning for too long is that it’s risky. Just as with financial assets, having all your eggs in one basket makes you vulnerable to a “market crash” in that area of your life.

I began to realize that putting all my attention and energy into just one predominant source of meaning was like constructing a building with just one central pillar holding it up. It could be knocked down at any moment.

I had started dating my future wife Lauren at that point, and as we became more serious she became a second source of meaning. I had someone I could rely on to accept and love me no matter what happened in my work. The risks and disappointments I faced each day could now be contained to one sphere of my life without invading all the others. Work fell to perhaps a 70% share of my meaning portfolio.

After a few more years of intense effort, I finally managed to create a full-time living for myself, cobbled together from different sources. I slowly started giving myself permission to spend more time with friends, to pursue hobbies such as sailing, and to focus on my health more. Work fell to 60% of my meaning portfolio.

In 2020 we welcomed our first child, and once again my meaning portfolio needed to be rebalanced. This was a key turning point, as it was the first time in a decade that my work fell below a 50% allocation of my portfolio. That meant it ceased to be the central organizing principle of my life, replaced by my growing family, especially once our second child arrived in 2022. 

Now I would estimate my work accounts for about 30% of my meaning portfolio. That’s still a significant share, but it is not the overriding priority anymore. Things can happen in the business that in the past would have rocked my world, but now are limited to just one of my many identities.

Diversifying your meaning portfolio

I’ve learned that when you derive most of your meaning from work, every problem seems much bigger than it really is. Every problem feels high stakes, existential, and all-consuming because it threatens the very basis of your identity. I spent so much time running around trying to individually fix every problem, thinking that if I just solved enough of them, the level of panic I felt would subside.

Many problems can indeed be fixed, but there is also a more fundamental solution you can try: diversifying your investments of meaning. Spread out your care and attention and create a wider base of support for your self-worth. There will still be problems, but they will feel so much less dramatic, which paradoxically makes you far more effective at addressing them mindfully without overreacting.

I always thought the term “net worth” was strange, given that it usually refers to a person’s total financial assets. It was so clear to me, even at a young age, that money had nothing to do with someone’s worth.

I’ve found that a meaning portfolio is a far better measure of self-worth, giving you places and people to turn to when one area of life knocks you down. And I’m certain that when we look back at the end of our lives, we will treasure the contents of our meaning portfolio far more than any financial asset.

I encourage you to consider what makes up your meaning portfolio. Which sources are giving you meaningful returns for your effort, and which aren’t? Which meaning assets were important in the past, but you can now let go of? Which parts of your meaning portfolio, if you invested more of your time and attention in them, might thrive and grow and provide even more meaning to you in return?

Follow us for the latest updates and insights around productivity and Building a Second Brain on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube. And if you’re ready to start building your Second Brain, get the book and learn the proven method to organize your digital life and unlock your creative potential.

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The Financial Reality of a Traditionally Published Book – a Complete Breakdown

The next area I want to examine is finances: How much money has the book made in the year since its release? How much did I spend to catapult it to bestseller status? And would I do anything differently? 

Here are the real numbers.

How much money did the book make by itself?

A year after its release, Building a Second Brain has sold over 100,000 copies in the US and UK alone, including 13,000 pre-orders made in the 9 months preceding its release. 

In total, I’ve made $478,800 in advances across all formats and translations of the book. 

That includes $325,000 for the initial U.S. rights, plus another $153,800 for 20 other foreign rights sales ranging from $800 in Turkey to $31,000 in China. In other words, all the foreign rights we’ve sold so far add up to 47% of the value of U.S. rights, though it’s expected to keep climbing.

Now that may sound like a lot of money at first. It’s definitely in the top .1% of advances, and a dream come true for any author. But wait until you hear what the corresponding outlay was. 

Here’s the breakdown of the main costs:

$152,000 in U.S. federal (37%) and California state taxes (12.5%)$140,000 for the promotional agency$125,000 (plus a percentage of ongoing royalties) for the editor$40,000 for design (book cover, illustrations, swag, and visual brand identity)$25,000 for the website (plus ongoing maintenance)$15,000 for a book launch party$12,000 on three multi-day writing retreats

To summarize, I’ve made about $478,000 and spent $509,000 in my quest to make Building a Second Brain a bestseller. In other words, despite this book becoming a breakout success, we’re only approaching breakeven.

I’m not including a variety of indirect and personal costs we incurred to make the book possible, from money spent on babysitters and house cleaners to takeout dinners when I was too exhausted to make food. These are just the direct costs required to create and promote it.

If I include the time our full-time staff (not including me and my wife Lauren) spent on the project, these figures look very different. Our team of 6 employees estimates that 28% of their total combined capacity was spent on the book over the last three years, which amounts to another $516,000. Taking that number into account, Forte Labs has spent over a million dollars on this book. 

These figures also don’t take into account royalties. We seem to be about halfway through earning out the advance, which means that in about a year (mid-2024) I should begin receiving about $26,000 per month in royalties (8,700 books sold per month, with my share at $3 per book). 

At this rate, and taking our staffing costs into account, it should take another 18 months after that, or until the end of 2025, before we break even on the entire project. That’s 3.5 years after the book’s release, and a full 7 years since I first started working on the proposal in early 2019. 

To summarize, I can’t help but conclude that, if the book is viewed in isolation, writing traditionally published books is an awful business model for authors. 

What if we include online course sales?

What the numbers above don’t take into account, of course, is the extent to which the book has fueled sales of our other products. 

Based on our internal data, 16% of our newsletter growth in 2021 and 2022 came from people interested in the book. Since our email newsletter is our main sales channel, this corresponds to roughly $720,000 in course sales if we assume those people purchase in typical numbers. So by that measure, the revenue associated with this book rises from $478,000 to about $1.2 million in total. Which means we’ve already broken even on the endeavor and profited almost $200,000 before even starting to receive royalties.

It has likely also had a positive impact on our other sources of revenue (such as YouTube ads, newsletter sponsors, other ebook sales, affiliate commissions on SaaS tools, and speaking gigs), but it’s difficult to know how much came directly as a result of the book, so these are conservative assumptions.

As a side note, we have a lot of evidence that the book also significantly cannibalized sales of our courses. Comments such as “I read the book and got what I needed, so didn’t feel the need to buy the course” became more common. My conclusion is that the book caused some people to not buy the course, and caused others to buy the course who wouldn’t have otherwise. So the book changed our customer base instead of just growing it.

My conclusion is that traditional publishing only makes sense financially if you have a product or service to sell on the backend. That could be another book, an online course or other program, a set of templates, coaching, consulting, or speaking services. 

If I had to spend 7 years working so hard on my book only to break even, I would feel pretty disappointed regardless of any other accolades or milestones I’d reached. The uptick in sales of our products balances the books and makes the whole endeavor worthwhile.

Books are global marketing campaigns

Publishing a book is a lot like launching a massive global marketing campaign for an idea. 

You are creating tons of assets, forming dozens of partnerships and alliances, recruiting hundreds of people who will eventually take part in its creation, and leveraging global supply chains throughout the world to make your book available “wherever books are sold.” 

All that is worth doing for an idea you deeply believe in, but you wouldn’t expect a marketing campaign to be profitable in and of itself. From that perspective, it’s remarkable that a marketing campaign can even pay for itself and break even! Your campaign will ultimately attract vast amounts of attention, but what do you want to do with that attention once you have it? What action do you want people to take?

A common criticism of traditional publishing is that it isn’t profitable for writers. Based on the numbers I’ve shared, that seems to be true even for a breakout bestseller. But it also kind of misses the point. Writers are no longer just narrow specialists – they have the potential to be global media businesses in their own right. And a business has to do more than supply one product. It has to think about the holistic picture of profitability that is needed to ensure its survival. 

The critical importance of having a course

Upon further reflection, having a course is even more pivotal for writers than I understood when I started for a few reasons.

Before the book: First, you need a way to thoroughly validate and prove your ideas before you even put them on the page. 

If you’re going to dedicate years of your life to a set of ideas, you had better be sure they work. The best way to do that is to test them with real people through speaking, teaching, coaching, or consulting to see how effective they are for a wide variety of people. Teaching what you know as part of a course allows you to get rapid feedback and iterate through multiple versions of your message to find the one that sticks. Live cohort-based courses are the single most effective way to do this in my experience since live teaching gives you instant feedback on a sentence-by-sentence level.

While writing the book: Second, you need a way to sustain yourself financially during the writing of the book. 

As I’ve shared, I fully intended to spend 100% of the advances for my book on its promotion, which meant I needed another source of income to pay my bills (not to mention my team). While speaking, coaching, and consulting can serve to test your ideas, an online course has the advantage of selling while you sleep (or write).

After the book comes out: And third, you need a way to monetize and capitalize on the attention your book will attract once it’s out. 

You need a “next step” for people to take once they’ve read your book and want to put it into action. While in theory, you could create this product after the book comes out, it’s much better to have it ready on the day of its release since you’ll have your hands full promoting the book itself.

What I would do differently

If I could go back in time and do it all again, I don’t think I’d spend money differently. I took a maximalist approach of saying yes to everything, which means I left no stone unturned and thus have no regrets.

From a financial perspective, the expenses I incurred seem high but justifiable. You only launch your first book once, and I didn’t want to scrimp and save only to look back and wonder what could have been. That meant I probably said yes to expenditures that weren’t strictly necessary, overpaid instead of negotiating harder, and was less strategic and discerning than I could have been.

On the other hand, I learned a tremendous amount about what works and what doesn’t, which was my ultimate goal. Even if we’re only breaking even now, we also created an evergreen asset that will be valuable for many years into the future.

An informal analysis I did of 20 bestselling nonfiction books revealed that their Google search volume peaked on average 6 years after release. If the same is true of mine (and it’s a huge assumption that it will become a perennial bestseller), then BASB will reach its zenith of popularity around 2028. I can barely imagine how much will have changed in that time, both in the world and in my personal life and business. In a way, it’s out of my control anyway. I’ve given the world the best gift I know how to give, and what happens from here on out is up to the world. 

In the next installment, I’ll detail how exactly we went about promoting this book.

Follow us for the latest updates and insights around productivity and Building a Second Brain on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube. And if you’re ready to start building your Second Brain, get the book and learn the proven method to organize your digital life and unlock your creative potential.

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The 5 Pillars of My Writing Process

In the second part of this blog series, I shared how I treated my book as a series of small projects culminating in a final product.

The same was true for each of the 10 chapters it contained: each one was its own project, with a deadline and a goal for what that chapter was trying to achieve. Each chapter had its own project folder (according to my PARA Method), where I collected everything I would draw on – notes, sources, supporting materials, stories, action steps, and key details.

These projects guided me over the 14 months it took to finish the manuscript. Here are the five pillars of my writing process that I depended on to make consistent progress, each one building on the one before:

Pre-existing blog postsOutlinesMorning writing sessionsWriting retreatsOutsourcing my life

Let’s dive into each one.

#1 – Pre-Existing Blog Posts

The single most important resource I drew upon was my blog, where I’d published almost 500 articles containing more than 700,000 words since 2014. I always viewed these articles as research for a book I would write one day, and that is exactly what they became.

On average, about 70% of each chapter in the book was made up of writing I’d already published on the blog, though it often had to be extensively rewritten to conform to its newfound style and purpose. I can’t overemphasize how crucial it was to be able to start each chapter with 70% of the background research already done.

The remaining 30% came from notes I retrieved from my Second Brain. In total, I drew on 254 notes (saved as long ago as 2015) to round out the manuscript. Trying to digest all of those at once would have been a nightmare. By breaking them down into 10 chapter-specific groups, I only had to load an average of 26 notes into my head to complete each chapter. Totally doable!

Here’s what the project folder for Chapter 4, on how to capture information in one’s Second Brain, looked like:

That’s only 10 short notes encompassing the vast field of “knowledge capture”! And it was more than enough material for my needs. In fact, I didn’t even use all these notes and had to cut out a lot to get it to a reasonable length.

Here’s an example of one of the notes from this folder, containing my responses to a Q&A about knowledge capture. The bolded passages are the ones I thought were good, and the highlights in yellow indicate points that were important enough I considered incorporating them into the book. (You’ll notice that this is my Progressive Summarization technique in action.)

Here’s another example (view the public note) of how I deconstructed a publication from Microsoft called The Innovator’s Guide to Modern Note Taking, turning it into a highlighted chapter-by-chapter summary that was easy to reference in the flow of writing.

Treating each chapter as its own self-contained project also made it easy to go back and cite all my sources once the writing was complete. All that material (whether I ended up using it or not) remains available in my Second Brain in Evernote for reuse in future projects I may take on.

#2 – Outlines

After I had compiled the notes I thought I might want to use in a project folder for a chapter, my next step was to turn them into an outline. In my book, I call such a “digital outline” that links to other notes an “Archipelago of Ideas.”

Writing is inherently hierarchical, taking the form of:

Point 1Supporting point ASupporting point BSupporting point CPoint 2Supporting point ASupporting point BSupporting point C

Which means that the outline I used as the “scaffolding” for my writing also had to be hierarchical. This is where outlines can be so powerful: since they mirror the logical structure of the writing they will ultimately turn into, outlines can serve as a kind of “map” of where you’re going as you put down one sentence after another. 

For example, here’s part of my outline for Chapter 1, where I draw on my past notes about what it feels like to be disorganized. Note how the green links lead to the original source, while the points indented underneath them contain the specific excerpts from that source that I thought might be worth using:

Outlines also serve another purpose: they’re markers for where you left off. That is an important function when even a single chapter might take many weeks to complete, spread across dozens of writing sessions.

#3 – Morning Writing Sessions

I was used to writing multiple thousand-word articles since I’d been doing that for years on my blog. But each chapter in my book was about 6,500 words long on average, and after I’d finished a first draft of the first couple of them I quickly realized that this was an entirely different scenario.

Writing a single stand-alone article, all you have to remember is the main points of that one article. But when writing a book, you have to keep in your head 10 or 20 times more information. Every time I wanted to make an edit – whether it was changing the spelling of “note-taking” to “notetaking” or a much more substantive one like changing how I framed the purpose of a Second Brain – I then had to consider all the implications that change created.

Changing the spelling of a term is easy – all you have to do is perform a “find and replace” search. But for more subtle edits with unexpected side effects, it’s far more difficult. How could I detect that an edit in Chapter 7 to broaden the examples of “self-expression” I provide, also requires a different set of examples in Chapter 4 for which kinds of content they should save in their notes in the first place? (This is a real example).

Essentially, the “mental model” of the book you have to keep in mind is always growing, which means as the manuscript grows in size, the cognitive load needed to “hold it in mind” compounds exponentially. 

To overcome this challenge, I decided to do everything I could to make my weekday morning writing sessions as immersive as possible. I canceled all meetings and commitments before lunchtime, sequestered myself in our home office with noise-canceling headphones, and started each morning by picking one problem I would dedicate myself to that day. 

A “problem” could be deciding which term to use for a concept, choosing a metaphor to explain a technique, deciding on the exact sequence of points to build an argument, deciding which details in a story to include and which to remove, etc. It would often take an entire morning just to solve one of these problems, which explains how writing a book can take years.

I would typically sit down to work on my chosen problem for the day first thing in the morning, to give myself the longest possible runway for “cognitive liftoff” before I got tired or interrupted. But sometimes as I began to unpack the problem it would dawn on me that I couldn’t resolve the problem that day. Either because I didn’t have enough source material to draw from, or there were other more fundamental problems that had to be solved first, or because I simply didn’t have the energy.

In those situations, as soon as I recognized I wasn’t going to succeed on my current mission, I tried to switch as decisively as possible to preparing my tomorrow self to be able to solve it: distilling the notes I would need, getting feedback from others, listing my options, reducing the scope of the problem, and gaining clarity on what I was trying to achieve and why. My goal was to eliminate “thrashing” – the torturous process of trying to force myself to reach a goal that I wasn’t ready to reach.

#4 – Writing Retreats

Most of the writing problems I faced could be resolved in a morning writing session or two using the approach above. But some challenges were so great that they required larger blocks of time.

For those handful of major challenges, I turned to a more heavy-duty approach: off-site multi-day writing retreats. I ultimately went on 3 writing retreats over the course of about a year, and they were crucial to overcoming critical bottlenecks in my writing process. I chose the locations carefully:

An Airbnb apartment overlooking the beach in MalibuA high-end hotel near the waterfront in Marina del Rey, in Los AngelesA rural inn in the wine country of Temecula in Southern California

These retreats had to be as efficient as possible because I was leaving my wife and infant son at home, and because each one cost thousands of dollars. Here are 12 guidelines and rules of thumb I used to make them as productive as possible:

Choose a place 1-2 hours from home, so it feels like “a world apart” but you don’t waste too much time in transit.3 nights and 4 days seemed like the ideal duration – long enough to get into deep flow, but not so long that I got lonely or felt like I was away from my family too long.Choose hotels, because you want everything to be provided for you and to not have to think about bedding, food, etc. during your time there (for one of my retreats I stayed at an Airbnb, but I noticed the higher cognitive load of having to think about these things).The ideal writing spot is minimalistic and quiet to avoid distractions, but also comfortable so that discomfort doesn’t become a distraction; hotel rooms are best because you can control every aspect of the room without needing permissionDo the prep work and planning for what you will tackle before you get there, otherwise you’ll spend the first day just getting your bearings.Make sure you’re well-rested and well-slept before the retreat, otherwise you’ll be too tired to focus and just spend the days sleeping.Ergonomics are important for such long writing stretches, so bring a laptop stand or external monitor, and external keyboard and mouse, and make sure your chair and desk are comfortableExercise regularly before and during the retreat, because you’ll need the physical stamina to stay in flow for such long periods.Set a rule that you’re only allowed to remove things, not add things, which helps you avoid the temptation of “doing more research.”Use long walks in nature and immersion in water (swimming pools, hot tubs, or a lake or ocean) to “reset” after a long day of writing.Pay close attention to your diet, since you need to maintain your energy levels for the long haul; avoid one-time energy spikes like sugary coffee

Make sure you have everything you might possibly need for the duration of the retreat (at my retreat in Marina Del Rey, I had to go into town to get a bathing suit because I’d forgotten one, and it somehow ended up consuming half a day by the time I got back to writing).

Here’s how I spent the 58 hours of one 3-day retreat (notice that even with all the focus I could muster, less than half the time was actually spent writing):

24 hours of writing and editing16 hours of sleeping3 hours resting3 hours taking and reviewing notes3 hours eating2 hours exercising7 hours miscellaneous#5 – Outsourcing My Life

The fifth and in many ways most important pillar of my writing process was essentially outsourcing my life during the period I was most immersed in writing.

Early on in the process, it became clear that I simply didn’t have the bandwidth to manage my quickly growing business, conduct my busy personal life, care for my new family, while also writing a 65,000-word manuscript. It just wasn’t physically possible.

I made the decision to lean on all the people in my life who supported me. I know it was an incredible privilege to be able to do so. As I wrote in The Psychological Toll of Writing a Book, some of the steps I took included:

Limiting myself to two activities – focused writing and recovery – and eliminating, outsourcing, reducing in scope, or postponing everything else (including signing up for a daily meal delivery service for our family, hiring someone to do all our housekeeping and laundry, and letting my team handle most decisions).Leaning on our families – my wife Lauren and I made more requests of our families during this period than ever, for food preparation and babysitting and home projects and much more, and I discovered how fortunate we are to have such generous, caring families behind us.Spending money to save time – we were fortunate to have an online education business that was booming during the pandemic, and I used the money that was coming in with abandon to save even the smallest amount of my mental energy, from buying a new minivan to hiring a personal assistant and personal trainer to getting everything we needed delivered.Getting feedback constantly – I didn’t have enough mental horsepower to make all the decisions that needed to be made for the book, so I drew heavily on the ideas and contributions of everyone around me. I would discuss thorny writing challenges late at night with my wife, get feedback from the team on key decisions, talk through my thinking with friends, collaborators, and advisors, and even run polls on Twitter to test different options.Trusting my publishing team – early on I realized that I either needed to trust the people I’d partnered with to bring this book to fruition (my agent, publisher, and editor) or else I’d have to fight them every step of the way. I knew I didn’t have the energy for that, so I decided to trust them even when I didn’t understand or agree with their advice.

In the next post, I’ll share how we marketed and sold the book that emerged as a result of this process, leading to a spot on the bestseller list.

Follow us for the latest updates and insights around productivity and Building a Second Brain on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube. And if you’re ready to start building your Second Brain, get the book and learn the proven method to organize your digital life and unlock your creative potential.

The post The 5 Pillars of My Writing Process appeared first on Forte Labs.

The Rise of Prediction Factories: How AI Allows Us to Replace Rules with Decisions

Two books I read recently helped me tremendously to understand what’s happening now with Artificial Intelligence: Prediction Machines and Power and Prediction (affiliate links) by Ajay Agrawal, Joshua Gans, and Avi Goldfarb.

The authors are economists and professors at the University of Toronto, one of the leading institutions studying the economic impacts of AI. Their books helpfully frame the advent of AI as just one in a long series of economic paradigm shifts, each of which has been closely studied and dissected before. 

This article is a summary of the ideas I found most enlightening and impactful, and my interpretation of how they apply to modern knowledge work.

AI Is Prediction

It’s easy to get caught up in all the hype around AI’s potential, but at the fundamental economic level, AI is about dramatically lowering the cost of prediction.

When you ask ChatGPT “What is the capital of Delaware?”, the machine learning algorithm that powers it doesn’t “know” the answer in any sense. Instead, it is predicting “What does the user want to hear?”

But what exactly is prediction?

We use that word in a day-to-day sense of “guessing what’s going to happen,” but here we’re using it in a much broader sense. Prediction is the process of “filling in missing information.” It takes data you have, such as shoppers’ buying habits in a store, and uses it to generate data you don’t have, such as what they’re likely to buy next.

Think of each time you swipe your credit card at a store. The merchant has no idea who you are or what your creditworthiness might be. No human at the credit card provider knows either. 

It is an algorithm that crunches the data it has about you, as well as the specifics of the transaction you’re trying to make, and then in seconds provides an answer: Approved or Not Approved. That is an example of a prediction not about the future, but about whether this transaction is authorized right at this moment.

Machines predict whether a smudge on an x-ray might be a tumor. They predict whether the person looking into the iPhone camera is its owner or not. They predict what you might want to buy next on Amazon, which links you might want to click on Google, and even when to automatically apply the brakes in your car to avoid a collision. 

Prediction isn’t only about predicting what will happen in the future – it is about predicting what data a user might want.

The Mass Production of Prediction

Putting on an economist’s lens, we can think of modern AI as a dramatic fall in the cost of prediction. Just as the factories of the Industrial Revolution started churning out mass-produced consumer goods, making previously rare and expensive items suddenly cheap and commonplace, we are witnessing the rise of “prediction factories” doing much the same with information.

Many of the highest-paying jobs requiring the most training involve making predictions. Doctors predict the right diagnosis, lawyers the right legal argument, and engineers the most effective piece of code to accomplish a function. Previously it was tremendously expensive to access the predictions of these highly trained professionals, but the price of that particular commodity is now plummeting. 

What happens when the price of something drops? We typically find many more ways to use it. In other words, as the price drops, demand goes up.

The economist William Nordhaus documented how the price of artificial light plummeted by a factor of 400 from the early 1800s to today. We replaced kerosene with electricity, and it became trivially inexpensive to light our homes and offices at all hours. 

In response, our consumption of artificial light exploded! We learned to use light carelessly, with abandon, illuminating everything from our garden pathways at home to empty streets at night.

The invention of computers similarly made arithmetic – a valuable commodity previously requiring highly trained bookkeepers – so cheap that we use it now without a second thought. We didn’t just consume more arithmetic – we also found radically innovative and unexpected new ways to use it: to play digital music, manipulate digital images, send digital messages, and consume digital content in all forms.

Note that the digital spreadsheet eliminated the most time-consuming activity for bookkeepers: doing arithmetic calculations. You might think that the entire profession would have disappeared as a result. But products like VisiCalc (the very first spreadsheet computer program) actually made their work more valuable overall. You could easily calculate the expected return for various projects, and then run multiple scenarios using different assumptions. 

The same people who had laboriously calculated the answers by hand in the past were now best positioned to ask the right questions of the new computerized spreadsheet. Instead of making them obsolete, the new technology augmented them with superpowers.

What will happen as the cost of prediction goes from “expensive” to “practically free”? We need to understand a couple other points to find out.

AI Decouples Prediction And Judgment

One reason prediction is currently so expensive and so few are qualified to provide it is that it is bundled with another rare quality: judgment.

When you ask your doctor for a diagnosis, you don’t just want to know your odds of survival (which is a prediction). You also want to know the course of treatment they recommend. That takes judgment. The judgment of what to do next always depends on the prediction of what will happen if we do.

“If you take this test, we’ll know what’s causing your pain.” “If you take these pills, your symptoms will be alleviated.” “If you undergo this surgery, your prognosis will improve.”

In other words, judgment has always been bundled together with prediction, which makes it even more difficult and expensive to access them in combination.

While prediction says what is likely to happen, judgment assigns value to the possible outcomes. It is the skill of determining the reward or profit of an outcome. Prediction says what will likely happen; judgment decides how much that outcome is worth to you.

To exercise judgment, you need to know what you want, and how much it matters to you to get it. It is about making tradeoffs to achieve the highest value possible from the options at hand.

Both prediction and judgment are combined to produce a crucial capability: decision-making. Decision-making is at the core of most occupations today, not to mention every moment of our daily lives.

Schoolteachers decide the best way to educate their students. Managers decide who to recruit and who to promote. Police officers decide how to handle potentially dangerous situations. Parents decide how much screen time their kids can have.

As humans, we have always had to do these three things – prediction, judgment, and decision-making – together. 

But now that prediction is being unbundled and made superabundant, we have the chance for the first time to break this process down into its constituent parts. We can start to think clearly about which human activities will then diminish in value, and which ones will increase in value.

AI Allows Us to Replace Rules With Decisions

As talented as humans are at making decisions, it is also tremendously taxing for us.

Think about the last time you made a major purchase for your home, like an oven, mattress, or new car. It probably took days if not weeks of serious reflection, researching and comparing options, identifying essential features, weighing tradeoffs, and of course, determining what you could afford.

To mitigate the tremendous mental and energetic cost of decision-making, we’ve developed countless rules as a society to guide our actions. We always stick to the right on streets and walkways (or left, in certain countries). We always take our trash out to the curb on certain pickup days. We always start work around the same time and end at the same time. 

We may chafe at some of these rules, but there’s no question they save us a staggering amount of cognitive effort. So much so that we add a whole new set of rules to govern our personal lives: always eat this, never eat that; always shop here, never shop there; always do it this way, never do it that way.

We form these habits and rules when it costs too much to optimize our decisions. We decide not to decide. Just try to imagine how difficult life would be if you had to invent a completely new routine every day. 

AI is a disruption to this rules-based order in which we live. If our rules exist to save us energy, and the reason we need to save energy is because decisions are so taxing, and one of the key inputs to decisions are predictions, then by making predictions cheap and plentiful, AI changes the very basis on which our society runs.

Here’s an example: We typically follow the rule to arrive at the airport two hours before the scheduled departure of our flight. This rule is so ingrained in us that it feels almost like a law of nature.

But it’s helpful to examine why this rule exists in the first place. It comes down to the large degree of uncertainty surrounding our arrival at the airport and getting to our gate. We don’t know what traffic will be like, how long the parking or dropoff will take, how long the lines will be at check-in and security, or any one of a number of other delays or snafus that might arise.

We can’t easily acquire the information that would be needed to reduce that two-hour buffer, so we make do: we leave early, bring lots of reading material or entertainment devices with us, and assume we’ll be waiting for a long time.

Now imagine if you had an AI that could take in all the needed information – your personal habits and time needed to get ready; local traffic and weather patterns; details about the layout and accessibility of the departing airport, and even data like the typical on-time departure rates for the airline and specific flight you’re taking. From all this data it could generate a customized airport departure time that told you exactly when to leave to maximize your chances of making your flight while minimizing the time you’ll have to wait.

Rather than blindly following a hard-wired rule like “two hours before,” you’re now following a personalized recommendation suited to your situation. In other words, because the prediction of how long it will take to arrive at your flight has become so cheap, you can now make the decision of when to leave, rather than following a rule.

Instead of making do with uncertainty, you now have the option to optimize your decision. You gain access to more options, without having to pay the cost of calculating them. You can contemplate more complexity with less risk. Rather than uncertainty being a threat or something to tolerate, it opens up more pathways for you to choose from.

When the Price of Something Falls, Its Complements Increase in Value

There’s another piece to the puzzle we have to understand: when the price of something falls, anything that is a “complement” to it will gain in value.

For example, imagine there was a technological breakthrough in battery technology and all cars could now be powered virtually for free via built-in solar panels. People would take many more trips and drive many more miles in response, leading to a rise in the value of all the complements to driving: drive-through fast-food and coffee places, roadside rest stops and convenience stores, and even streaming music and audiobooks.

If we think of prediction as just such a raw material that has suddenly plummeted in price, we should expect anything that is a complement to prediction – that is consumed along with prediction – to become more valuable.

This includes data because high-quality predictions require a lot of data. Any data that is difficult to acquire or that changes frequently will be disproportionately valuable, and those who know how to acquire it will be sought after.

It includes judgment – the skill of knowing which predicted outcomes are valuable and why. Judgment is based mostly on experience, and thus human experience of unusual or complex events will become far more valuable. Paradoxically, the more we automate business and society, the fewer opportunities humans will have to acquire hard-won experience, thus making it even more valuable.

It also includes action – we still need a human to take most of the actions inspired by the predictions that machines make. People who know how to effectively navigate the tremendous complexity and uncertainty of the real world, and to advance particular ideas or causes or points of view, will be more valuable than ever. 

And finally, a sense of perspective is a complement to prediction that will rise in value. One definition of wisdom is “broad framing” – not losing sight of the big picture and keeping seemingly intractable problems and crises in perspective. As each element of decision-making gets increasingly unbundled into ever more specialized and narrow algorithms, this kind of broad perspective will become even more challenging to maintain than it already is.

At the same time, human-generated prediction will fall in value as it faces more and more competition from the “prediction factories” of AI. 

For example, cab drivers were once required to memorize all the roads in their city to be able to efficiently route passengers to their destination. This knowledge would often take them years to acquire and was highly prized and well-compensated. But as soon as we all gained smartphone-based navigation, the value of a cab driver’s ability to predict the best route to a location dropped to nothing.

AI Deployment is Going to Take a Long Time

AI pioneer Andrew Ng, who founded the Google Brain project and was chief scientist at Baidu, proclaimed that “AI is the new electricity. It has the potential to transform every industry and to create huge economic value.” 

We can look to history for examples of what it looks like when an epochal new technology transforms society. And using electricity as a guide, that history suggests the spread of AI will take a long time.

Thomas Edison’s invention of the lightbulb in 1879 is hailed as one of the most revolutionary moments in human history. And yet, two decades after this groundbreaking moment, electricity had barely begun to be adopted – only 3% of US households had it. That number was barely higher in factories.

However, fast-forward another couple of decades, and electricity was everywhere, reaching half the US population. Understanding what happened in those “in-between times” is crucial to predicting how AI will likely play out in our lifetimes.

Electricity was a challenge to the existing dominant source of power in the late 19th century: steam power. 

Steam power was reliable but highly inefficient, losing 30–85% of its potential before it could be applied. Steam power would typically enter a factory at a single source, a 3-inch drive shaft of iron or steel to which belts and pulleys could be attached throughout the rest of the building. This system had one serious drawback: you either had to power the entire factory at full steam, or not at all. You couldn’t use power in small doses, or in different locations.

By changing from steam power to electricity, factories unlocked enormous advantages. They could be built far away from cities, in cheaper and more spacious areas. They could mount electric drives to individual machines, making them portable for the first time. It became cheaper to use power in smaller doses, only if and when needed, rather than powering the entire factory. And it was cleaner and more consistent as well.

But why did it take four decades before such a powerful innovation spread to half the country? It was because it couldn’t be tacked on to existing factories. The very concept of a factory had to be reinvented, and new ones had to be designed and built from scratch in new and untested locations before the benefits could be realized. New kinds of organizations had to be created that were capable of designing and running such factories. Only then did electrification show up in the productivity statistics, and in a big way.

Electricity was such a radical breakthrough that it required a new system-level solution. It decoupled energy use from its source, challenging deep assumptions that had been embedded in manufacturing for decades if not centuries. 

Artificial Intelligence is of similar magnitude: by decoupling prediction from the rest of the decision-making process, it is reshaping how intelligence is accessed and applied. In turn, that is shifting where and how we as humans apply our own thinking to solve problems. 

Just as with the rise of electricity, to fully realize the benefits of AI we will need completely new system-level solutions and even new kinds of organizations that we probably can’t envision today. Just think about how cars were vastly better than horses once widely available, but cars needed gas stations, good roads, and a whole new set of laws to function.

Which means AI will also take a long time to be deployed – probably decades. Technological change happens fast, but the social technologies needed to deploy it evolve slowly. 

Three Case Studies of AI-Driven Prediction

Let’s take a look at three case studies, explained in detail in Prediction Machines and Power and Prediction, of what will happen once we have access to abundant AI-generated predictions:

College admissionsSchool bus driversWeather forecastsCollege Admissions

The challenging, time-consuming process of applying to college can be reframed as a prediction problem: each university is trying to predict which of the applicants is most likely to succeed in completing their degree.

Now imagine if the predictions required to make admissions decisions were free and instantaneous. Admissions advisors could run an algorithm that told them with a high degree of confidence who are the best candidates. 

The cost of applications might fall to zero since they don’t require human time to evaluate. Schools might not even need applications – perhaps they could simply access your online profiles (with your permission) and generate an admission decision based on that data.

The admissions process itself might reverse: instead of an inbound process of prospective students applying to certain universities, those universities could proactively reach out to people whom their algorithm suggests would make excellent students. Not only would this save a lot of people a lot of effort, it might even lead to a wider applicant pool of people who wouldn’t normally consider higher education.

To take this a step further, imagine if this approach was extended throughout a student’s college career. The algorithm could predict which tutors and supplementary classes they would need at various points to maximize the value of their education. Rigid rules such as “everyone follows the same curriculum” and “everyone does the same homework” could be replaced with far more personalized assignments precisely targeted to address their weaknesses.

School Bus Drivers

If self-driving cars become fully automated, the job of bus drivers might seem an obvious candidate for elimination. But consider that bus drivers do much more than drive: they supervise a large number of kids, look out for and protect them from hazards, and maintain discipline inside the bus, among other responsibilities.

If the act of driving became automated, they might be able to spend much more time on these other, arguably more valuable tasks. That might elevate the job into a caretaking and educating role, which would require more training and higher standards but also might be better compensated.

The lesson, often repeated elsewhere, is that AI often automates a task, but rarely an entire job. If there is even one element of a job requiring human involvement, then a human must still perform it. And they can often use all the time that’s been freed up on higher value, more complex tasks.

Weather Forecasts

Over the last few decades, weather forecasts have become far more accurate, timely, and precise. Many of us now depend on daily and hourly forecasts without a second thought, and they’re rarely mistaken.

But a weather forecast is a “one-size-fits-all” service. It is the same forecast for everyone living in a city or region. Imagine if those forecasts could be personalized at the individual level. 

You’d be given a temperature forecast that took into account your personal sensitivity to humidity and wind. The prediction for rain would consider your personal risk of being caught outside without a jacket or umbrella, based on where you live and even what you’re wearing. Your personal weather forecast could advise you to make certain decisions – such as wearing different clothes, taking an alternate route to work, or bringing your plants in from the back porch.

This example illustrates that the barrier to being able to offer more personalized products and services is often automation. We could generate the personalized weather forecast described above today, but it would take too much human time to be practical. 

If AI took over the process, we should be able to switch from generic, uniform rules to thousands or millions of individualized recommendations, on everything from weather to traffic to job-seeking to having good conversations.

Five Questions to Thrive in the Age of AI

AI represents the rise of a new source of competition for us humans. Not only do we have to worry about other people taking our jobs, intelligent machines will substitute for an increasing number of the tasks we perform as well.

At this point, you may be wondering, “How can I use these ideas to protect and advance my own career and life?”

There are five questions suggested at various points in these two books that I think are worth asking yourself:

1. Which rules I’m currently following could be replaced with a decision?

The rules we follow throughout our days protect us from having to make too many decisions. But in protecting us, they also limit us. It takes perceptiveness and meta-cognition (the awareness of your own thinking) to even notice when you’re following a rule.

If you’re an investment analyst who researches new companies and writes reports with your findings, what rules are you following in the preparation of those reports? Do you always start the same way, looking at the same sources of data, evaluating them with the same criteria, and presenting your results in the same format? 

Those are all rules. How can you use AI to customize or automate one or more of those steps so you have the ability to make a more finely-tuned decision about how to execute them?

2. How can I enhance my judgment using AI prediction?

Now that prediction and judgment have been decoupled, you will probably have to do much less prediction, but make more decisions with a greater degree of judgment. How can you use the newly plentiful supply of predictions to hone your decision-making skills?

For example, if you’re a graphic designer, you no longer have to create a new image from scratch hoping or guessing that it will be what your client wants. Instead, you can generate dozens of options with the click of a button. Could you apply your design skills to create a step-by-step process of iteration that includes your client, bringing them into the design process as a value-added service?

Imagine an immersive viewing room where AI-generated images move slowly across the walls in succession. Thematic music fills the air to create a sensory experience. The images get tweaked and tuned in real time based on which images most resonate with them, using eye-tracking technology and heart rate variability data. By the time they step out of the viewing, they have an image in hand which is better than you could have created upfront.

3. How can I find and access new, unconventional sources of data?

One of the clearest lessons of recent AI models is that it takes an enormous amount of data to train them. There are serious concerns that humanity’s total supply of data will only last so long. We’ll have to constantly find and create more.

Given that fact, how can you put yourself in a position of securing access to new, untapped, hidden, secret, or quickly changing information? Perhaps it’s data about the natural world, such as how forests are growing or the movement of deep-sea oil reserves. Maybe it’s highly sensitive data, like people’s deepest fears or secret preferences (acquired ethically I hope).

All that data can be stored in a system of personal knowledge management – which I call a Second Brain – so you always have it ready to feed into any AI (or human) you’re interacting with. We offer in-depth training in how to build such a system as a best-selling book and a self-paced course.

Until AI can directly access the full richness of reality, both in the physical world and the psychological one, it will depend on us to learn and improve its understanding of the world.

4. What is the smallest number of decisions I can make to achieve my mission?

This one may seem counterintuitive, but in the future, any decision that requires a human in the loop will be far slower, more expensive, and more complex (and maybe in some situations even more risky) than one handled purely by AI. Decisions that can be made solely by AI will happen at AI speed, whereas human decisions will have to proceed through the much slower world of human minds, relationships, and institutions.

Given this new predictive superpower we now have access to, there will be tremendous value in structuring an activity so that it requires as few human decisions as possible. 

Imagine two non-profit microfinance organizations working to end poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa. They are both well-intentioned, well-resourced, and good at what they do. But one of them has automated the process of deciding who should be given a micro-loan using AI. 

Over time they are likely to make lending decisions faster, improve the accuracy of those decisions by incorporating data on the results, changing how the staff operates to further improve the algorithm, and using flexible lending criteria that takes into account more variables than any human could consider.

This AI-driven nonprofit could well achieve a more effective, fair, and customized lending portfolio than its counterpart, leading to lower costs that further frees up funds for more lending. By minimizing the surface area of their organization that is exposed to humans, and thus the decisions that humans have to make, they could greatly accelerate their impact.

5. What information, if supplied to AI, would allow me to make better predictions?

Predictions are like precisely engineered products, finely tuned for very specific purposes. Although we are early in the AI revolution and a few general-purpose platforms like GPT-4 are dominating the industry, that is likely to change as more companies enter.

Even if it doesn’t, there will always be a need for us to provide the context and details the AI needs to make a prediction. This is why almost any ChatGPT prompt can benefit from more rules and guidelines, specific details, background context, and examples for how to understand what you’re asking.

Most of our information management tasks, from reading to notetaking to file management to content curation to social media, will have to change in a world shaped by AI. We’ll need to think about the apps and platforms we use to orchestrate all that information as a system, and consciously design it to feed us just the right information we need to craft the next AI prompt. 

The better the quality of the data you have access to, and the easier it is to access it, the more you will find yourself empowered and unleashed by AI, rather than threatened by it.

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