How to do not everything or start-up as a training in time management

    It all started in 2009. I worked for a large software company. Our team was involved in the implementation of a rather large project. My responsibilities were pretty blurry. While my manager ensured the implementation of the project from the outside (he talked with the directorate, managers, etc.), I was engaged in solving the internal problems of the project - designed, made plans, set tasks for developers, monitored the direction of work, etc. Shortly before the events described, the company changed its leadership, a very tangible reorganization took place, the course of development of the company as a whole (and the project in particular) has significantly shifted compared to the original plan. And I could not say that a new direction of development suits me.

    The year was drawing to a close. The present was predictable and rather dull, the future proposed by the new leadership looked foggy and did not inspire confidence. At this time, one good friend suggested: "Let's do something of our own!"

    I will not talk about what we did, how we did, etc. I want to tell how I changed when participating in a startup. What lessons did I go through, what did I learn to learn. I hope the cones and experience gained will be useful to someone or at least interesting.


    Instead of an epigraph.
    A Jew comes to the rabbi and says:
    - Rebbe, help! such a difficult life for me, even in the loop ...
    - Tell me, what torments you?
    - I have a big family, and we all live in a one-room apartment, my mother is seriously ill, my wife is walking, my son got in touch with hooligans, my daughter became pregnant from whom it is unknown, I was fired from work ... What should I do?
    - Buy a goat.
    - ??
    - Buy a goat and come back in a week.

    Week later. The Jew comes to the rabbi again:
    - Rebbe, how so? Why did I obey you and buy a goat? Life has become completely unbearable, besides everything else, now stink and dirt everywhere !!! What should I do?!
    - Sell a goat and come to me in a day.

    A day later, a completely happy Jew resorts to the rabbi:
    - I sold a goat! Now I know what happiness is !!!
    Folk wisdom.


    Part 1. What was


    By the time this story began, I was already practicing some time management techniques. I read the book of Gleb Arkhangelsky, a number of articles on this topic. Imbued with the idea of ​​personal time management, and with moderate energy applied some methods gleaned from books. Actively used an electronic organizer to manage workflow and even some household chores. As a result, I managed to do quite a lot at work, tried not to allow rummages and the accumulation of unfinished business. I was considered a good specialist, successfully carried out work on the current project and even managed to do something else. For example, once a year I wrote an article (usually co-authored ;-)). Also, once a week I gave an hour and a half lecture to students. A pregnant wife, a small child and a dog were waiting for me at home.

    The steady working rhythm suited me perfectly, I was almost satisfied with everything. In particular, personal performance seemed to me quite sufficient. Therefore, I decided that I could completely cope with the additional burden that involved participation in a new activity.

    Part 2. What has become


    Almost two years have passed since then. I became a little less new, and the amount of gray hair in my beard reached four. What else has changed?

    At the moment, I am in the lead roles in two large projects and one small. And in another as a consultant. The lesson with students began to last two and a half hours. A lecture of this duration is an almost unbearable lesson both for the students and the lecturer, so I assigned the second half of the lesson to practical classes. The students and I decided to try to make a small and simple information system for a semester with our own hands. It turns out that I am participating in another project - i.e. there are already four.

    Over the past six months, I have published 5 specialized articles in an electronic magazine for developers. He wrote more than two dozen posts on his blog devoted to applied aspects of development. Every day I read articles on professional topics, participating in forums. I put in order many fragmentary information with which my head was full, pulled the theoretical base under many practical developments.

    Bottom line: my professional growth over the past two years is comparable to the previous ten. But the actual length of the working day has greatly decreased, since the number of household chores has increased: three to five times a week I take my older child to various classes, not counting any force majeure (children, you know, often get sick ).

    As you can easily see, there is a rather big increase in productivity. How did you manage to achieve this?

    Part 3. How it was


    It all started pretty rosy. We came up with an idea, figured out how everything should look, and with energy started implementation. The first six months I was engaged in this project on the job. He worked mainly in the evenings, sometimes he found time in the office. When the product drew more or less, I realized that I was no longer able to fit two projects in my head - they both demanded a lot of attention from me. I made a difficult decision for myself: to leave my main place of work and immerse myself completely in a new project. The preparation of this decision took some time — I did not want to leave the ruins behind me. Gradually, I stopped playing a key role in the first draft and wrote a letter of resignation with almost a clear conscience. At the same time, I managed to keep my workplace, so leaving was, to some extent, a formality - I was sitting in the same room, at the same computer. This happened in the fall of 2010.

    Autumn is the beginning of the school year. The eldest child went to kindergarten and began to bring in all kinds of bacilli, which the younger one was happy to be sick with - only six months had passed. I often had to stay at home until noon, or even stay for the whole day, as my wife simply could not physically cope with two semi-sick blockheads. But still there were two of us, so sometimes I could work on a project, even while at home. In order not to waste time in vain, I organized a workplace on my home computer. However, this did not give a noticeable effect - surprisingly much time was taken up by the need to synchronize the environment on working and home computers. Then I started a laptop and since then it has been my main workplace, which I always carry with me. Thanks to this decision, I could continue to work anywhere from the place on which he stopped. This allowed us to keep performance at a decent level and almost keep up with the schedule, even staying at home.

    Then the Universe decided to give me entertainment. First, the oldest child on a walk broke his collarbone. He was taken to the hospital by ambulance, and I went with him. We stayed in the hospital only until the morning, but that was enough for him to pick up some monstrous ailment there ... For the
    next few months I remember vaguely. Separate shots of the next “entertainments” pop up: on the new year, the younger one screamed in the cold to a monstrous sore throat, on February 23 I got into a small accident that cost me heaps of nerves and almost all my savings, April was remembered as a viral pneumonia of the elder. Problems rained down one after another. I got to the office no more than once every two weeks. I had to work in fits and starts, communication with colleagues took place mostly through the Internet.

    And by the end of May we made the first version of the program. The lag from the original plan was only a month.

    This period was incredibly difficult for me. But it was precisely these difficulties that taught me to concentrate on the task and do the work, using any opportunities. For example, laying the baby to sleep, think about the device of the next function. When he falls asleep - trot to the computer to record the results. After 10 minutes, run to calm, then to the store for bread, and again to the computer. I used every pause that occurred, even in a few minutes, to at least move forward a little. In the future, as life returned to its usual course, I was able to devote “emerging” time to other activities — reading books, writing articles, and other projects.

    Conclusion


    In conclusion, I want to take stock and summarize my experience a bit. I have made several conclusions for myself and try to follow them.

    Conclusion 1. To engage in increasing productivity, you need a reason.

    I hope that no one has the feeling that it is worth invoking adventures on their ... head, as this immediately leads to an amazing increase in productivity. Here a completely different component is important - a sincere desire for a result, which, combined with an unsatisfactory speed of approaching the result, involuntarily leads to systemic changes in the environment. Simply put - if a person is happy with everything, then he is unlikely to move and strive to work better, but to do more.

    Conclusion 2. In order for a case to be done, you need to do it, and not talk about why it is difficult or impossible.

    Discussions about how to do, which are not backed up by practical actions, are also rather meaningless. I do not call for "sawing" without hesitation. I just want to say that thoughts should be aimed at the result, and not art painting on water with objects of peasant life.

    Conclusion 3. Everything is impossible to keep up.

    At the same time, it is important not to worry about what is not being done. It is better to focus on dealing with the consequences of not being in time. Hence a simple consequence - at first it is better to do not those things that bring one to a lofty goal, but those that promise maximum problems if they are not done on time. Because these problems in the future will eat away your valuable resource of time, which is better to spend calmly on a high goal.
    And a small addition: if you do everything that is planned, then most likely you can do more.

    That's all.

    Questions?

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