some thoughts on productivity and motivation:

Before anything else, the amount of energy you physically have is important, and if it’s too low you’re just kind of fucked. 

I’ve gotten better at noticing my energy levels over time. One current barometer I use is the escalator in my office building. If I’m feeling really high energy, I’ll just naturally be impatient and want to walk up it; if I’m really tired I’ll go “thank god, a chance to stand still for 30 seconds;” otherwise I’m somewhere in between.

The only things I’ve gotten from this so far are really obvious:

  • sleep matters. I think I’m noticeably less good at doing things on 5 hours of sleep than on 8
  • being sick or hungover is really bad
  • prescription stimulants are really good

Once you’re all set on that, I think the most important thing is feeling like what you do matters. Like:

  • how motivated would you feel to do this task if it would save someone’s life?
  • is what you’re doing way more important than that?
  • if not, then uh, why are you doing it?

With a good enough framework for why everything matters I generally find it’s not too hard to motivate myself to do even boring or unpleasant things. If I don’t feel motivated to do something, I think it’s useful to introspect on why that is. Sometimes it’s just “this task is really triggering or aversive to me for no good reason” (in which case I might want to try to get someone else to do it if possible, or might decide that I just have to get over it). But often it’s “deep down I don’t really think that this is worth doing,” and then it’s useful to figure out if I’m right.

I used to think of “burnout” as a thing that happened if you worked too many hours and didn’t have enough time to relax. Now I feel like the two things aren’t that related. It can be easy to work a ton if you know why you’re doing it and feel like what you’re doing is important and appreciated and valued and you’re doing a good job, and it can be exhausting to work 40 hours a week if those things aren’t true.

It’s interesting to remember that “starting projects” used to be something that I found hard, because I don’t feel that way at all anymore. (It can still be hard just because it’s always hard to carve a chunk out of my day for anything, but it’s not hard psychologically.) I think I used to do a thing where I would put off starting something, then I would put it off for so long that it would loom in my mind and feel scary, and that would make it harder to start.

Getting past the looming cycle is maybe something you just have to do. I do feel like as a manager, you should never get things get to looming. If there’s a big thing your report should be starting, just ask them every hour if they’ve started it yet.