Jason Fried: Why work doesn't happen at work
This is Jason Fried, co-author of Rework and co-founder of 37signals.  For this week's OWL assignment, click the link under this pic and watch the video of Jason's speech on why work doesn't happen at work.

 

WATCH HERE >> Jason Fried: Why work doesn't happen at work | Video on TED.com

I just finished one of the most helpful books I've ever read about how to do business.  As you can see by the back cover, the ideas presented in this book go against the grain of traditional business practice - "underdo the competition" - say what!?

The reason why I paid attention to what Jason and David (the authors) have to say in this book is because their software product company, 37signals, is phenomenally successful as a result of staying true to these "radical" principles.  They do millions of dollars of profit every year and have only about 16 employees.

I like hearing other people's ideas about how to build a successful business, but I like it even more when I can see proof of the direct application and positive results of those ideas.

Here's some of my notes from the book:

• Underdo the competition. It's tempting to give into the lure of more:  more features, more menu choices, more products, more employees, more everything.  "What?  That company has 10 features in their product?  Let's do 20!"  "Hey, that restaurant has 20 choices on their menu!  We gotta come up with 30!"  This is crazy.  Focus on quality, simplicity, and ease of use because that is what really matters.  All that other stuff wears off faster than you can blink so that in the end, you're not left with more, you're just left with stuff.  Yuck.

• Say NO to the customer.  Be a good fit for the masses.  Don't try to appeal to the few.  This means saying "no" to customers when their requests don't fall in line with what your business is about.  Another point - you have to get crystal clear on what you stand for as a business in order to know where to set boundaries so that you know when to say no.  Trying to please everyone is a recipe for a company that stands for nothing.  The only requests that really matter are the ones you hear over and over.

•  Workaholics create more problems than they solve.  This one is my favorite.  We live in a culture that makes heroes out of people who are willing to spend all day and night suffering away at their desks and computers.  The human brain is simply not designed to spend so many hours in a row concentrating on work.  Yes, we can and do force ourselves to buckle down with a task for hours on end.  However, unless you're some kind of super human, the quality of the work you produce this way is going to suffer and you wind up creating more problems than you solve.                                      
• Jason and David of 37signals know that work doesn't happen at work.  They don't require any of their employees to come into the office and clock in hours at the desk.  All they care about is that the work gets done.  You can argue with this, but you'd be arguing with a company that does millions of dollars of profit every year with just a handful of employees.  Of course, the significant key in this is hiring the right people.
• Go home in time for dinner, they say.  Catch your kid's soccer game.  Committing to leave the office on time forces you to focus and get the job done.  If you commit to leaving at say, 4 pm, you're not going to waste time chit-chatting with co-workers or whatever.  You're attitude will be, "Okay, I have this specific number of hours left.  I'm going to give this task my all, but I'm leaving at 4.  Period."  You don't have to feel guilty if you're going home and your co-workers are still toiling away at their computers.  You can be proud of yourself because you know how to set boundaries and spend your time productively.

There's alot more awesome, fresh ideas in the book.  These are just the 3 that really popped up for me because I've started applying them in my own business recently before I even heard of the book, and it's nice to find that I'm not alone.  ;) 

What do you do when you just don't feel like doing what you're supposed to do?  Let's face it - you're going to have those days no matter how clear you get on your goals and what you want out of life.  It's so easy to slack off and lose momentum.

Not every day is going to be perfect and I hope you're not shooting for perfection anyway.  You're never going to get perfect, you can only and always get better.  You have to think progress not perfection!

So with that in mind, how can we make progress every single day?  Here's a tip that I got from an article by Robert Pagliarini that I've tried on a couple of areas in my life and it works.  Think "I can at least...".  This practice will save you on those days when you're feeling too tired, or stressed, or "blah" to do as much as you planned.

Here's an example:
Let's say you have a goal to save $5 every day because ultimately you want to have money specifically saved to invest in a mutual fund by the end of the year.  As easy as this sounds, you'll probably have days where that $5 disappeared on gas or emergency groceries or maybe you just blew it on candy.  Instead of feeling that you messed up for that day, do the next best thing instead.  In this case, you say, "Well, I can at least save $1 today."  And do that. 

This is about more than the "something is better than nothing" principle.  When you can't accept anything less than $5 a day and you miss it, you've not only sacrificed a day, you've sacrificed a precious bit of your momentum and you've made it that much easier to miss it again and again.  Before you know it, the year is gone and you've gotten nowhere because you've sabotaged your success with your need for perfection.  It's funny how obsessing over perfection so often leads to its exact opposite.  That $1 saves you.  It preserves your self-respect.  It's a symbol of your commitment to progress no matter what.

Now, before you say, "What's the big deal?  I can make up for missing a day by saving $10 tomorrow.  So it's ok if I don't do anything today."  The money in itself is not the point.  Your mindset is the point.  Really successful people know that their success is the result of the little things that they do every day.  They understand that this is how the magic of the compound effect works in their lives.  Success is not a result of what you do to make up for what you didn't do.

So, what's your back up plan?

Here's some ideas:
Goal: I exercise for 45 minutes a day
Back-up: I can at least exercise for 10 minutes today

Goal: Study Spanish for 1 hour every day
Back-up: I can at least study 10 words today

There is another awesome benefit about this principle.  When you think, "I can at least ..." and you do it, you'll find it easier to keep going and you'll find yourself on top of your game anyway.  For instance, if the thought of exercising for 45 minutes feels too daunting for you one day, but you get up to at least do 10 minutes, you're going to find after 10 minutes that you feel good enough to do the next 35!

Remember: Think progress not perfection.

This weekend's OWL assignment comes from another tip from the Chris Guillebeau CD.  He tells a story about a guy who wasn't too happy with how complacent he was being with his life.  So one day, he decides to break out of his routine by visiting a nearby museum on his lunch break.  Then he started getting into photography.  When his company needed work done overseas, he took the opportunity and got to experience France for a few weeks.  The next time he had to go to France for work, he took his family.  Gradually he shifted his work until he was able to work for himself as a consultant.  Then, because they loved France so much, he moved there with his family.  This guy was able to change his entire life all because he decided to do something different one day and let that little "life experiment" open his eyes up to what else he could do outside of his usual routine.

This story really highlights how the decision to break out of our routine and make a conscious effort to do something that isn't normal behavior for us can initiate a snowball effect in our lives.  The man in the story (true story btw) basically wanted to make a life-change, but as you can imagine, based on his circumstances he couldn't just pick up and commit to anything drastic off the bat.  So he started with something small, then he allowed himself to follow a passion (photography).  These little experiments made him more comfortable with change so when there was an opportunity to work in Europe, he took it. Then getting familiar with living in a foreign country led him to consider the possibility of moving his family.  One thing led to another, but it all started with him deciding to do something out of the ordinary with his lunch break.

Even if you don't desire to dramatically change your life, it's still good to develop our sense of awareness so that we are not living our lives on auto-pilot mode.  Our brains love routine.  Your brain is perfectly happy seeing you live every year the same as last year.  And that's what we do even while we're wishing things could be different.  Einstein calls this the definition of insanity: doing the same things over and over and expecting different results.

You may feel like you're fooling yourself when you first try this experiment - you'll wonder how could something so insignificant contribute to any real change.  But even just breaking out of your routine even the tiniest bit will fire up parts of your brain that you've rarely used before.  Then all you have to do is keep that ball rolling and magic will start happening.

I can trace many of the significant events and opportunities in my life to one simple decision to do something different one day.

So your assignment is to pick something to do this week that breaks your routine and takes you out of your comfort zone a little bit and be open to where it leads you after that.