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Attention Restoration Theory, which claims that spending time in nature helps replenish your attention. Anytime I am trying to solve a deep problem, I go for long walks in a quite green space.

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The first step to being able to do this, is to define and classify work we do into deep and shallow buckets. This cannot be done at an org level but can be a org level policy which is then practiced at a team and individual level.

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Some decisions are better left to your unconscious mind to untangle. I have observed this in my experience but never really consciously acknowledged this as a practice.

When there is a deep lurking problem on my mind, I dream the solution (find the solution during the morning lucid sleep phase)

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I think we've all seen this work fabulously

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The author talks about the open office concept which inspires serendipitous creativity. I know this concept was used to make a larger point about maintaining a spoke in which to work deeply but this spoke to me on another level - This is entirely missing in remote work.

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I have uninstalled all SM apps and rarely miss them but I am still very distracted by television (entertainment content). This prevents me from creating deep work slots in my routine

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The book is comprehensive and an easy read.

What I liked

Simple practical suggestions for building deep work habits

I have struggled with multi-tasking and shallow work in my previous job roles so the book was a reminder to not beat myself up

Several inspiring examples, experiments and case studies

What I din’t like

I found the book a bit repetitive especially, the first part.

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1. Define clear indicators of what it means to be productive
2. Batching - block few hours in the day to concentrate on work
3. No meetings in the first half of every Monday and second half of every Friday. This will help to plan for the week ahead, take a stock of the week gone by and finish pending tasks, if any.

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Structured, Instructive, a good playbook

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Structured, Instructive, a good playbook

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What I liked
Gives a very structured approach and some good strategies for implementing deep work in our routine.

What I didn't like
The author gives many examples to support his hypothesis but at points, it feels like he is trying too hard to support his hypothesis by name-dropping

The book (intentionally) ignores an important factor that pushes one to do deep work - passion. If you're truly passionate about your work >> you're motivated to push yourself >> hence motivated to go deep.

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1. I have turned off notifications for all of my social media accounts (WhatsApp, Insta, LinkedIn). I access these accounts only if I have some free time in the day.
2. Meditation (seriously planning Vipassana course this year :-))

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The book helped me a great deal in understand how I have been focusing my efforts on a lot of SHALLOW tasks.

As much as this realisation triggers your brain to reflect on your approach to the tasks, the book also talks about simple things you can do to structure your day better and do DEEP work.

The Rhythmic approach to deep work is something I really look forward to adopting.

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I do plan to do a few things:

1. Structure my week in advance and setup work blocks and meeting time on the calendar.

2. Embrace the Downtime: reduce the number of times I access social media/slack/emails on a usual evening, instead free up that time to engage in activities that relax my mind better.

3. Setup a block every day to read and follow it religiously.

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The habit of addressing emails and IM's real time

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The habit of addressing emails and IM's real time

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Problem: One thing that restricts me from diving deeper into something is the habit of checking Slack and Emails on real time basis.

Solution: My mission for the next 2 weeks will be to change this habit and see if I really miss on anything urgent at different times of the day.

Reflection: This analysis will further help me decide on the Deep work blocks based on the time of the days.

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Shutdown routine, Better communication, 4Dx Framework, No meetings for the specific time block

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Shutdown routine, Better communication, 4Dx Framework, No meetings for the specific time block

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1. Shutdown routine. Finish your day before a fixed time. The less time you have the more wisely you spent
2. Train people on how to communicate better. A good process-centric message immediately closes the ticket. (E.g ClickUp ticket - The better instruction you put,  ticket get resolve quickly, the better requirement you put, design get become ready quickly )
3. Explore the 4DX framework while prioritizing features/modules.
4. Org wide or team-wide, everyone should block the meetings for specific time block

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Block calendar for deep work, Schedule every block of your day

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Block calendar for deep work, Schedule every block of your day

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1 - From the last 2-3, we as a team start following a one routine in which every team members block their calendar for deep work daily between 3 - 6 p.m.

2 - When my day starts, I schedule every block of my day on the calendar.

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Get distracted from slack messages even in non working hours

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Get distracted from slack messages even in non working hours

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Problem: I get distracted from slack messaged even in non working hours. I can't turn off slack notification on the mobile because I can't turn off sentry channel.

Possible solution: Exploring some settings in slack in which you turn on specific channel when you are not active.

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Collaborative deep work, Memorize a deck of card

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Collaborative deep work, Memorize a deck of card

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Collaborative deep work

I've never experienced Collaborative deep work. I would like to explore while brainstorming, debugging issues e.t.c

Memorize a deck of card
I also want to try out this technique of memorizing deck of card

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One time read, Only summary will be sufficient to read

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One time read, Only summary will be sufficient to read

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The book is okayish. Some of the routines I am already familiar but this book helps me to motivate again.

What I liked
- Collaborative deep work concept
- Some routines which helps you to drain the shallow work
- Shutdown routine, Quantify the depth of activity, Why communication is the key to close the loop immediately
- 4DX framework
- Technique of memorizing a deck of cards

What I don't like
- Part 1 is boring and repetitive
- Give more examples to prove the concept
- Practical implementation is still missing in many routines.

What I found
- I found journalist philosophy suits me according to the current situation.

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First attempt at adding Deep Work blocks

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First attempt at adding Deep Work blocks

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Slack's huddle option doesn't make it easy

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Slack's huddle option doesn't make it easy

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The ability to just jump on a quick call is making it harder to keep focus. It's a great feature for remote workers but it's unfortunately a "destroyer" of deep work

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The book starts from easier habits to follow to more brutal ways of respecting your time.

It could have been crisper in advocating its ideas. But every reader is different and it's good to have so many examples for the ones who might need more convincing.

Towards the end of the book, I was more fair and honest about the time I spent on shallow tasks. It helped me re-evaluate habits that I can avoid, habits that I should practice more and habits that I should pick up.

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As a first step, I have just started tracking how I spend my time. Some of the things that I have implemented and are working great for me:

1. Shallow and deep working hours - It has helped me to figure out what hours are least distracted. And also when other team members are least dependent on me so that they wouldn't bother me.
2. How much time do you spend on mobile and what's the frequency that I check notifications or messages.

I have also experimented with places within my house and a couple of different places. This has helped me further filter out my workspace and its surroundings.

I have slowly built a habit of reading.

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1. Identifying clear long term goals for each individual and help them set key activities that will support them

2. Batching sync up meetings into either half of the day or week

3. Advocating the idea of investing time before starting work - this will help out figure out questions or blockers that one might face. Practising this will allow them to minimise dependency on others.

4. We don't have an office right now, but would really love to have Eudaimonia Machine

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Have to build my time around others needs. Slack messages or small questions that other team members need to unblock break the rhythm and drains out a lot more time.

Meetings with a gap of <60 minutes between them.

Personal responsibilities - which are temporary but unavoidable.

Steps to address these: I have started mapping my deep working hours vs distracted ones. It has helped me to figure out what hours are least distracted and how can I plan my days based on these findings.

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Encouraging to invest time in understanding the project better before starting to work on it. This will help in figuring out questions or blockers in advance and minimise dependency on others.

With slack and ease of access to others, this important habit is often deprioritized.

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Overall :

Easy to read

First part repetitive

What I liked

Concept of attention residue and law of productivity

Schedule every minute a day

4DX Framework

Quantify the depth of every activity examples

Shutdown routine

What I didn’t like

More examples in the first part and repetitive

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I am scheduling blocks of each day on my calendar and also updating it, which help me in estimating time for the next day.

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Social media elimination: Fortnightly, I remove apps like Social Media from my phone to avoid distractions. Have also disabled notifications on my phone.

The craftsmen approach: Have identified the major goals from both professional and personal front and selected network tools like Pinterest and YouTube to meet those

Memory training: Learning a new language on Duolingo and practising songs on the ukulele has enhanced my ability to concentrate

Time blocking approach: I have recently started dividing my calendar with all other work apart from the scheduled meetings.

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Rhythmic strategy of scheduling: Early hours of the day can be used for cognitively demanding tasks since most of us have long attention span at that time. Tasks like meetings, messaging or responding on Slack can be combined into one deep task for the later part of the day

Bimodal philosophy of scheduling: Teams can divide quarters based on shallow and deep work. Ex: the time when schools go on a vacation or are shut can be utilised to do deep work.

A shutdown habit: Injecting regular and substantial downtime from work for our unconscious mind to wander and replenish

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Constantly jumping from one project to another on a daily basis.

Responding to slack messages every now and then.

Meeting the ad hoc requirements on the personal front

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Slack requests, quick calls or ad hoc meetings.

Some questions does not always require the attention of the person in front. If we do not get the answers from them, we try to find them ourselves and they are more rewarding in return.

Being mindful of another person’s time is the key.

We can keep notes of all the questions we want to ask and block time from our calendar to ask them in a go.

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Though a long read, it pushed me to reflect on the way of approaching tasks on a day to day basis. Part 2 would have been more than enough given the repetition of anecdotes(that too of mostly men).

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One of the most powerful books I've ever read

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One of the most powerful books I've ever read

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I find myself to be the happiest when I am working on a challenging problem statement and make significant progress on it. According to me, challenging work can only be done alone. This book gives a great framework and a set of practices that everyone can follow to do better work.

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A couple of things that I already practice

1. I have switched off all notifications on my phone and have found that it works great

2. I spend 30 minutes at the end of each week structuring my next week

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The first half of the year is where I am able to go really deep in producing high quality work that really matters and it has played a huge role in my progress as an individual.

The last quarter of the year is when I am least productive because of the Indian timeline of festivities and celebrations.

Keeping this in consideration I can now plan my long term and short goals.

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A few things that stood out to me

1. Don't have any meetings in the first half (before 1 pm) so people can focus on doing deep work. This will be helpful for most people - except probably sales and success.

2. Batch things - it is better to schedule 10-15 minutes everyday with people who you work closely with rather than continuously communicating on Slack. Schedule 30-60 minutes each day to clear out emails, slack, whatsapp.

3. Overall, be more reflective of how you are spending your time. In the personal review each week, also reflect on the past week rather than just thinking of the coming week.

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I spend time planning my week in advance but I often underestimate the time required to finish a specific task because of which other things get delayed and that causes stress. It's a vicious cycle.

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1. Learnt about H Index for research output

2. Learnt how to memorise a deck of cards

3. Really liked the idea of a eudaimonia machine

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I find it very hard to multitask and I am thus always trying to create methods and structures to avoid having to multitask. This book reinforces my belief in the fact that multitasking is useless and only work that is deep is intellectually rewarding.

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Dedicated 1 day per week for just deep work on important issues. (Bimodal philosophy)

Batched all sync up meetings which require communication with multiple people into starting 2 days of the week.

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Key personal takeaways:

- Ritualizing deep work into your routine (Bimodal for me)

- Structuring your deep thinking

- Quantifying the depth of every activity

Eudaimonia machine idea to design our new office

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It beautifully captures the essence that one needs to get into a state of deep work to do meaningful work.

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- Shutdown routine
- Structured day
- Eudaimonia Machine
- 4DX Framework

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What I liked:
• some good strategies that help you cut out shallow work

What I did not like:
• tech bro writing to/about other tech bros. There are enough amazing women who could serve as better, more inspiring examples in the book.
• Would have preferred shorter chapters
• many parts are repetitive

I’ve found greater value in David Allen and Marie Kondo.

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I don’t have slack on my phone anymore, and I have structured hours for all the networking and community work I want to do on social media. I also try and have a hard stop to the day, and insist that my team does the same. We also do daily individual syncs and bi-weekly syncs as a team and try and bunch up our tasks and discussions for these syncs.

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I feel compelled to answer all mails and messages immediately. I try and schedule email hours on my calendar, but often mess this up.