Discussion on: My Best Short Productivity Tips

Some of my tips:

• Never start a meeting without an agenda, it's a sure waste of time. Never leave a meeting without action steps, or you'll waste time in several more pointless meetings.
• There's nothing wrong with setting up do-not-disturb times on your calendar so you can focus on deep work; just make sure you leave time for your coworkers outside of those blocks.
• Don't confuse urgent tasks with important tasks...sometimes they are not the same. Most issues I have seen with productivity relate to people failing to categorize tasks on the 2D matrix that is importance vs urgency.
• Similarly, strategy and tactics are different things. Tactics are your day-to-day maneuvers to make forward progress, strategy is a long-term goal or outcome. If you don't have both, you will not be an effective team.

I learned a ton about working effectively from family members who are military officers and I'd encourage anyone who is interested in learning more to read up on military history, I personally find it fascinating.