I’m the weird kind of nerd who listens to podcasts on Saturday nights and tonight I was catching up on some episodes of Back to Work. Episode 115 was about meetings and I figured I’d jot some notes down. I’m glad I did, it was… Continue reading →
Hiring Engineers, a Process. The tips for successful interviews are particularly interesting. I also like the way Eran summed it up at the end with:
A job interview goes both ways. We interview you, and you interview us. We want great talent and respect is the first step.
Paul Graham on how to do what you love:
You have to like what you do enough that the concept of “spare time” seems mistaken. Which is not to say you have to spend all your time working. You can only work so much before you get tired and start to screw up. Then you want to do something else—even something mindless. But you don’t regard this time as the prize and the time you spend working as the pain you endure to earn it.
Got back in to town last night and am heading to Lisbon for a weeklong meetup with my wonderful team at Automattic. It’s going to be a blast!
It’s almost 7 years old now but through the show notes of a Back to Work episode I ran across this interview Merlin Mann did with David Allen in 2006. It’s a compilation of 8 short conversations they had about everything from procrastination to priorities. Something… Continue reading →
The Redemption of Distraction:
It would be foolish to decry all distraction as if they themselves were the root of our intermittent concentration. Indeed, the issue is not that we allow too many dings, bells, and whistles to superficially interrupt our day, but that we do not adequately leverage distraction, like the chimes of the monastic, to pull us back to the effort of focussed labour.
That’s a fantastic way to look at it. via Pat Dryburgh
This industry we work in is magical. For the first time in human history, it’s possible to be represented (almost) solely through the merits of your work.
I think I’ve finally settled in to an ideal flow with my digital tools. Things, Mail.app, Basecamp, and nvALT/Simplenote are my happy places. It’s been a while since I’ve gone so long without tweaking something.
If it’s a priority then it’s done. That’s how you know it’s a priority.
Merlin Mann in Episode 98 of Back to Work. Related reading.
A Short Lesson in Perspective:
Pretty soon, The Overnight Test became the Over Lunch Test…Now of course we are all suffering from the same affliction. Our technology whizzes along at the velocity of a speeding electron, and our poor overtaxed neurons struggle to keep up. Everything has become a split-second decision. Find something you like. Share it. Have a half-baked thought. Tweet it. Don’t wait. Don’t hesitate. Seize the moment. Keep up. There will be plenty of time to repent later. Oh, and just to cover your ass, don’t forget to stick a smiley on the end just in case you’ve overstepped the mark.