Comments on: Are You Productivity-Inclined Or Simplicity-Inclined?

By: Blatternet

Blatternet — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 10:20:39 +0000

By: Simple Productivity Blog

Simple Productivity Blog — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 11:03:02 +0000

By: Life Design Matters

Life Design Matters — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 08:32:01 +0000

By: Poojan Wagh

Poojan Wagh — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 03:21:36 +0000

You know, I actually think that Tim Ferris is really in the simplicity camp. He states in his book (The 4-Hour Work Week) that most of corporate work is unnecessary, and that we should simplify. He also leverages the Pareto principle (also outlined in your summary of Eat That Frog). He advocates taking very long (by American standards) and frequent vacations. That sounds like simplicity to me.

By: Blatternet

Blatternet — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 05:09:37 +0000

By: James

James — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 09:49:17 +0000

Glad you liked the post Mike, Shanel really delivered. Thanks Shanel! You make a good point about Getting Things Done. I don’t think it necessarily encourages us to work flat out and make things more complicated than necessary, but for whatever reason that’s what a lot of people have ended up doing.

By: Mike Rindfleisch

Mike Rindfleisch — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 15:45:54 +0000

This was a wonderful post. Very thought provoking. My take came to a similar paradoxical reading to Pascal’s. Are simplicity and productivity really different? I thought of David Allen’s Getting Things Done and his central hypothesis that you want to reach a clear mind state as often as possible. Have systems you can trust to core-dump and review as necessary, so that you can reach simplicity. So, Allen’s main project is to reach simplicity by making your productivity more effective, to borrow from Pascal.

By: James

James — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 09:17:10 +0000

This is why I should do more guest posts. It provides a different voice and perspective which in this case has got people discussing it. I think a lot of the problem is down to viewing productivity in the traditional sense of getting more and more done. In that case, yes, there is a conflict between it and simplicity. However, the idea of personal productivity is increasingly focusing on simplifying our lives so we can do the really important stuff effectively and efficiently. In that sense, they certainly do work together though you will struggle to find that definition used in the workplace.

By: Shanel Yang

Shanel Yang — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 22:44:47 +0000

Pascal and Mike, no need to apologize for disagreeing with me. However, I’m not sure that you guys actually disagree. I am not saying that productivity and simplicity are mutually exclusive. Far from it. Rather, I have coined a couple of new phrases specifically for the purpose of this post, which I clearly defined about when I used the terms productivity-inclined and simplicity-inclined vis-a-vis achieving goals.

I have no problem explaining it again. Productivity-inclined is a preference for hyper-productivity, squeezing in as much as you possibly can within a 24 hour period with an extremely full schedule and tight routine. On the other hand, simplicity-inclined is a preference for achieving goals and happiness by paring your life down to the essentials and actually having less items on your to-do list but with more focus.

Now, if you still feel we are in disagreement, that’s fine, too. As they say, it takes different strokes for different folks! What does it mean to be simplicity-inclined? In a phrase, less is more. I believe that goals don’t have to be lists of more than say, thirteen steps.

By: Mike King

Mike King — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 21:07:43 +0000

When I first read the title, I thought, “Huh? They go together”. Now, I see Pascal thought so too.

Anyway, there are definitely two mindsets but they can certainly be combined and I really like Pascal’s suggestion that it is effectiveness when this is done. There are a lot of cases where one fits or the other, but they can almost always be joined in some way as well.

I think you may be better to consider the two styles as fast paced or easy going, rather than the categories you picked. I also cannot agree on this one, sorry!