Blogs and Discussions Best Picks for February

2009 may be set for a gloomy destination, but that doesn’t mean your choices have to be as well.

What you focus on – and what you choose not to focus on – will decide how 2009 and the years after it turn out. David Zinger’s analogy of “The One Ball” describes the boons of gaining mastery and focus. The Harvard Business Review’s coverage on beating the recession will help you focus on activities in your work and life.

Attempts to define happiness may elude the most sincere efforts, but The Happiness Project blog seems to have found solace in the ambiguity, suggesting we should aim to be “happier,” wherever our perspectives take us on that. Enhance Life advises us to avoid heavy thinking (where we indulge in regrets and worry), resulting in indecision, doubt and over-caution.

In personal productivity, Kelly Forrister shares tips on making the review process work. More than just a weekly review, she shares how daily and even yearly sessions are key for gaining perspective over one’s life. Web Worker Daily analyses various productivity systems and teaches readers how to make productivity a habit.

In a twist on personal productivity and relationships, the Think Simple Now blog discusses and demonstrates how social skills can determine success as much as professional skills.

Our Top Five Career Effectiveness Picks

Harvard Business Review

Recessions Call For More Creativity, Not Less

Need To Find A Job? Stop Looking So Hard

BNET

The Buyology Of The Brain

Employee Engagement Zingers

The One Ball: Choice

Slow Leadership

Self-defense In Good Times And Bad

Our Top Five Personal Effectiveness Picks

The Happiness Project

What Is “Happiness” Anyway?

Web Worker Daily

Project Management, Collaboration, And How Our Brains Work

Dumb Little Man

How To Stay Sane As The Job Market Plots Against You

Enhance Life

Is Heavy Thinking Ruining Your Life?

ZenHabits

How To Find Islands Of Ease In The Chaos Of Life

Our Top Five Personal Productivity Picks

Web Worker Daily

How To Turn Productivity Into A Habit

Kelly Forrister’s Simply GTD

Best & Worst Practices Of Weekly Review

GTD Times

When Productivity Is Low, “GTD” Improves Performance By 20% Or More

Think Simple Now

The Popularity Factor

Stepcase Lifehack

Toward A New Vision Of Productivity, Part 9: The Trouble With People

Our Top Five Online Discussions Picks

Davidco Forums

How Can I Stay Focused And Stay Off Of Non Productive Websites

The topic of tackling procrastination is a complex one, inviting many opinions on how to overcome it. From the perspective of the book “Getting Things Done,” users advised clarifying the end goals and identifying next actions to move forward. Others encouraged envisioning and inducing emotional attachments to the project to create a desire to see it through. Other methods include being accountable to a second party and using a timer to set time blocks to work on a task.

ZenHabits Forums

New Year, New Goals

Users share tips on goal setting for the rest of 2009. Some members recommended visualising the entire year, month by month. More than just a tracking tool, this helps members resolve their current positions and helps them focus on what they want to work on. Members also shared their thoughts on establishing systems and routines to improve their quality of life, such as getting a good night of sleep and maintaining exercise habits.

Ready4Anything

Chapter 4 – How Many Tasks

Daunted by David Allen’s claim that he clears as many as 100 tasks a day for a variety of projects, forum members discussed how many tasks a day are manageable. Some mentioned that task management, specifically in the task definition phase, should be as robust as your work requires it to be. This is also a function of how well you know your work. To boost the number of tasks completed, suggestions included relying on checklists to ensure that routine tasks are completed step by step to the end.

Get Everything Done Forums

Autofocus

The good feedback for Autofocus continues to come in, and as beta testers settle with the system, more are coming up with ways to customise it. Some examples: creating closed lists from the comprehensive list made in the Autofocus system; “starring” tasks and completing those; using Microsoft Outlook to handle reminders; and introducing contexts to give added clarity to a set of tasks. Overall, the Autofocus system has proven to be successful and dependable in its purest form. However, users are seeing the benefits of making their own tweaks, while being coached on them by Mark Forster himself.

Get Organized Now Forums

Checklists

Checklists are an effective way to keep track of tasks, either on a personal, group or support level (assisting someone else). These checklists are important for standardising work flow and rationalising steps to completion, while providing a framework for improvement. At a higher level, procedure manuals were also cited as helpful. Checklists for travel (covering transport details, sightseeing information, agendas and check-in procedures) were also mentioned as vital to making a trip as smooth as possible, especially in places with no Internet access.

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