1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:04,328 [percussion music plays] 2 00:00:04,328 --> 00:00:06,314 Welcome to Carnegie Mellon Online. 3 00:00:06,314 --> 00:00:09,382 For more multimedia from Carnegie Mellon University, 4 00:00:09,382 --> 00:00:14,348 visit www.cmu.edu/multimedia 5 00:00:17,868 --> 00:00:20,915 [audience applauds] 6 00:00:20,915 --> 00:00:22,264 Thank you, that’s very kind, 7 00:00:22,264 --> 00:00:25,053 but never tip the waiter before the meal arrives. 8 00:00:25,053 --> 00:00:26,774 [audience laughs] 9 00:00:28,144 --> 00:00:29,241 Thank you, Gabe and Jim, 10 00:00:29,241 --> 00:00:33,133 I couldn’t imagine being more grateful for an introduction. 11 00:00:33,133 --> 00:00:36,376 These are two people that I have known a long, long time. 12 00:00:36,376 --> 00:00:38,092 I taught here at University of Virginia. 13 00:00:38,092 --> 00:00:39,090 I love this school. 14 00:00:39,090 --> 00:00:41,193 It’s just an incredible place filled 15 00:00:41,193 --> 00:00:44,359 with tradition and history and respect, 16 00:00:44,359 --> 00:00:46,379 the kind of qualities that I really admire, 17 00:00:46,379 --> 00:00:48,858 that I want to see preserved in American society. 18 00:00:48,858 --> 00:00:50,570 And this is one of the places 19 00:00:50,570 --> 00:00:53,022 that I just love for preserving that. 20 00:00:53,022 --> 00:00:56,084 I think the honor code alone at the University of Virginia 21 00:00:56,084 --> 00:00:58,559 just is something that every university administrator 22 00:00:58,559 --> 00:01:00,578 should study and look at, and say, you know, 23 00:01:00,578 --> 00:01:02,160 "Why can’t we do that, too?” 24 00:01:02,160 --> 00:01:05,065 So I think there are a lot of things about this place to love. 25 00:01:06,485 --> 00:01:09,867 I’m going to talk today on the topic of time management. 26 00:01:09,867 --> 00:01:12,147 The circumstances are, as you probably know, 27 00:01:12,147 --> 00:01:14,208 a little bit unusual. 28 00:01:14,208 --> 00:01:17,200 I think at this point I’m an authority to talk about what to do 29 00:01:17,200 --> 00:01:18,924 with limited time. 30 00:01:18,924 --> 00:01:20,021 [audience laughs] 31 00:01:20,021 --> 00:01:22,591 My battle with pancreatic cancer started 32 00:01:22,591 --> 00:01:24,347 about a year and a half ago; 33 00:01:24,347 --> 00:01:26,183 fought, did all the right things, 34 00:01:26,183 --> 00:01:28,001 but it’s, you know, as my oncologist said, 35 00:01:28,001 --> 00:01:31,111 if you could pick off a list, that’s not the one you’d want to pick. 36 00:01:31,111 --> 00:01:33,758 So, on August 15th, 37 00:01:33,758 --> 00:01:34,868 these were my CAT scans. 38 00:01:34,868 --> 00:01:36,796 You can see if you scroll through all of them, 39 00:01:36,796 --> 00:01:39,001 there about a dozen tumors in my liver. 40 00:01:39,001 --> 00:01:42,585 And, the doctors at that time said, 41 00:01:42,585 --> 00:01:44,162 “You are likely to have three to—” 42 00:01:44,162 --> 00:01:45,329 I love the way they say it, 43 00:01:45,329 --> 00:01:48,792 “You have three to six months of good health left.” 44 00:01:48,792 --> 00:01:50,736 Right? Optimism and positive phrasing. 45 00:01:50,736 --> 00:01:52,115 It’s like when you’re at Disney, 46 00:01:52,115 --> 00:01:53,497 “What time does the park close?” 47 00:01:53,497 --> 00:01:55,214 “The park is open until 8.” 48 00:01:55,214 --> 00:01:56,445 [audience laughs] 49 00:01:56,445 --> 00:01:58,958 So I have three to six months of good health. 50 00:01:58,958 --> 00:02:01,102 Well, let’s do the math. 51 00:02:01,102 --> 00:02:04,232 Today is 3 months and 12 days. 52 00:02:04,232 --> 00:02:06,181 So what I had on my Day-Timer for today 53 00:02:06,181 --> 00:02:09,618 was not necessarily being at the University of Virginia. 54 00:02:09,618 --> 00:02:12,858 I’m pleased to say that we do treat with palliative chemo. 55 00:02:12,858 --> 00:02:14,784 They’re going to buy me a little bit of time, 56 00:02:14,784 --> 00:02:17,853 on the order of a few months, if it continues to work. 57 00:02:17,853 --> 00:02:20,900 I am still in perfectly good health. 58 00:02:20,900 --> 00:02:22,814 With Gabe here, I’m not going to do push-ups, 59 00:02:22,814 --> 00:02:24,647 because I’m not going to be shown-up. 60 00:02:24,647 --> 00:02:25,646 [audience laughs] 61 00:02:25,646 --> 00:02:28,175 Gabe is really in good shape. 62 00:02:28,175 --> 00:02:31,072 But I continue to be in relatively good health. 63 00:02:31,072 --> 00:02:32,604 I had chemotherapy yesterday. 64 00:02:32,604 --> 00:02:34,266 You should all try it, it’s great. 65 00:02:34,266 --> 00:02:36,097 [audience laughs] 66 00:02:36,097 --> 00:02:37,951 But it does sort of beg the question: 67 00:02:37,951 --> 00:02:40,752 I have finite time, some people have said, you know, 68 00:02:40,752 --> 00:02:42,267 "Why are you going and giving a talk?” 69 00:02:42,267 --> 00:02:44,360 There are lots of reasons for coming here to talk. 70 00:02:44,360 --> 00:02:47,747 One of them is that... 71 00:02:47,747 --> 00:02:49,875 I said I would...right? 72 00:02:49,875 --> 00:02:51,331 That’s a pretty simple reason. 73 00:02:51,331 --> 00:02:52,814 And I’m physically able to. 74 00:02:52,814 --> 00:02:55,500 Another one is that going to the University of Virginia 75 00:02:55,500 --> 00:02:57,211 is not like going to some foreign place. 76 00:02:57,211 --> 00:02:59,299 “Aren’t you spending all your time with family?” 77 00:02:59,299 --> 00:03:00,939 And by coming back here for a day, 78 00:03:00,939 --> 00:03:02,529 I am spending my time with family, 79 00:03:02,529 --> 00:03:04,511 both metaphorically and literally, 80 00:03:04,511 --> 00:03:05,680 because it turns out that-- 81 00:03:05,680 --> 00:03:07,370 many of you may have seen this picture 82 00:03:07,370 --> 00:03:09,398 from the talk that I gave. 83 00:03:09,398 --> 00:03:11,911 These are my niece and nephew, Chris and Laura. 84 00:03:11,911 --> 00:03:16,125 And my niece, Laura, is actually a senior, 85 00:03:16,125 --> 00:03:20,028 oh, a fourth year here at Mr. Jefferson’s university. 86 00:03:20,028 --> 00:03:21,281 So, Laura, could you stand up 87 00:03:21,281 --> 00:03:23,086 so they see you’ve gotten taller. 88 00:03:23,086 --> 00:03:24,207 There we are. 89 00:03:24,207 --> 00:03:26,076 [audience applauds] 90 00:03:29,266 --> 00:03:33,639 And I couldn’t be happier to have her here at this university. 91 00:03:33,639 --> 00:03:36,203 And the other person— so that’s Laura, 92 00:03:36,203 --> 00:03:39,353 the other person in this picture is Chris. 93 00:03:39,353 --> 00:03:40,791 And Chris, if you could stand up 94 00:03:40,791 --> 00:03:42,884 so they see
 that you’ve gotten much taller. 95 00:03:42,884 --> 00:03:44,627 [audience applauds] 96 00:03:47,907 --> 00:03:50,662 And they have grown in so many ways, 97 00:03:50,662 --> 00:03:51,592 not just in height. 98 00:03:51,592 --> 00:03:54,503 And it’s been wonderful to see that, and be an uncle to them. 99 00:03:54,503 --> 00:03:56,680 Is there anybody here on the faculty 100 00:03:56,680 --> 00:03:58,790 or PhD students
 of the history department? 101 00:03:58,790 --> 00:04:00,982 Do we have any history people here at all? 102 00:04:00,982 --> 00:04:02,599 Okay, anybody here is from history, 103 00:04:02,599 --> 00:04:05,048 find Chris right after the talk... 104 00:04:05,048 --> 00:04:07,091 because he’s currently in his sophomore year 105 00:04:07,091 --> 00:04:08,212 at William and Mary, 106 00:04:08,212 --> 00:04:10,918 and he’s interested in going into a PhD program in history 107 00:04:10,918 --> 00:04:11,852 down the road. 108 00:04:11,852 --> 00:04:14,695 And, there aren’t many better PhD programs in history 109 00:04:14,695 --> 00:04:15,756 than this one. 110 00:04:15,756 --> 00:04:19,613 So...so I’m pimping for my nephew here, all right. 111 00:04:19,613 --> 00:04:22,001 Let’s be clear, all right. 112 00:04:22,001 --> 00:04:24,389 [audience laughs and applauds] 113 00:04:24,389 --> 00:04:26,778 So, what are we going to talk about today? 114 00:04:26,778 --> 00:04:28,651 We’re going to talk about, you know— 115 00:04:28,651 --> 00:04:31,550 this is not like the lecture you may have seen me give before. 116 00:04:31,550 --> 00:04:33,356 This is a very pragmatic lecture. 117 00:04:33,356 --> 00:04:35,348 And one of the reasons I agreed to come back 118 00:04:35,348 --> 00:04:37,784 and give this is because Gabe had told me that-- 119 00:04:37,784 --> 00:04:39,391 and many other faculty members told me, 120 00:04:39,391 --> 00:04:42,194 that they had gotten so much tangible value 121 00:04:42,194 --> 00:04:43,929 about how to get more done. 122 00:04:43,929 --> 00:04:45,444 And I truly do believe that time 123 00:04:45,444 --> 00:04:47,106 is the only commodity that matters. 124 00:04:47,106 --> 00:04:49,088 So this is a very pragmatic talk. 125 00:04:49,088 --> 00:04:52,218 And it is inspirational in the sense that it will inspire you 126 00:04:52,218 --> 00:04:54,639 by giving you some concrete things you might do 127 00:04:54,639 --> 00:04:56,480 to be able to get more time done— 128 00:04:56,480 --> 00:04:58,846 more things done in your finite time. 129 00:04:58,846 --> 00:05:02,052 So I’m going to talk specifically about how to set goals, 130 00:05:02,052 --> 00:05:05,109 how to avoid wasting time, how to deal with a boss-- 131 00:05:05,109 --> 00:05:07,280 originally this talk was how to deal with an adviser, 132 00:05:07,280 --> 00:05:11,137 but I’ve tried to broaden it so it’s not so academically focused. 133 00:05:11,138 --> 00:05:12,978 And how to delegate to people. 134 00:05:12,978 --> 00:05:16,095 Some specific skills and tools that I might recommend 135 00:05:16,095 --> 00:05:17,844 to help you get more out of the day. 136 00:05:17,844 --> 00:05:19,771 And to deal with the real problems in our life, 137 00:05:19,771 --> 00:05:21,358 which are stress and procrastination. 138 00:05:21,358 --> 00:05:22,699 if you can lick that last one, 139 00:05:22,699 --> 00:05:25,360 you’re probably in good shape. 140 00:05:25,360 --> 00:05:27,832 And really, you don’t need to take any notes, 141 00:05:27,832 --> 00:05:29,485 so I’ll presume if I see any laptops open, 142 00:05:29,495 --> 00:05:31,209 you’re actually just doing, you know, 143 00:05:31,209 --> 00:05:32,933 doing IM, or email, or something. 144 00:05:32,933 --> 00:05:34,558 [audience laughs] 145 00:05:34,558 --> 00:05:37,015 If you’re listening to music, please at least wear headphones, 146 00:05:37,015 --> 00:05:38,628 I would always say. 147 00:05:38,628 --> 00:05:40,743 But all of this will be posted on my website, 148 00:05:40,743 --> 00:05:42,453 and just to make it really easy, 149 00:05:42,453 --> 00:05:44,671 if you want to know when to look up, 150 00:05:44,671 --> 00:05:46,721 any slides that have a red star on them are points 151 00:05:46,721 --> 00:05:49,905 that I think you should really make sure that you got that one, 152 00:05:49,905 --> 00:05:51,269 all right. 153 00:05:51,269 --> 00:05:53,260 And conversely, if it doesn’t have a red star, 154 00:05:53,260 --> 00:05:54,303 well, pfft. 155 00:05:54,303 --> 00:05:55,792 [audience laughs] 156 00:05:55,792 --> 00:05:59,008 So the first thing I want to say is Americans are very, very bad 157 00:05:59,008 --> 00:06:02,744 at dealing with time as a commodity. 158 00:06:02,744 --> 00:06:06,183 We’re really good at dealing with money as a commodity. 159 00:06:06,183 --> 00:06:08,805 I mean, we’re, as a culture, very interested in money, 160 00:06:08,805 --> 00:06:11,150 and how much somebody earns, as a status thing, 161 00:06:11,150 --> 00:06:12,465 and so on and so forth. 162 00:06:12,465 --> 00:06:15,658 But we don’t really have time elevated to that. 163 00:06:15,658 --> 00:06:19,480 People waste their time, and it just always fascinates me. 164 00:06:19,480 --> 00:06:20,991 And, one of the things that I noticed 165 00:06:20,991 --> 00:06:23,956 is that very few people equate time and money, 166 00:06:23,956 --> 00:06:26,004 and they’re very, very equatable. 167 00:06:26,004 --> 00:06:28,246 So, the first thing I started doing when I was a teacher 168 00:06:28,246 --> 00:06:29,954 was asking my graduate students, 169 00:06:29,954 --> 00:06:32,362 “Well, how much is your time worth an hour?" 170 00:06:32,362 --> 00:06:33,467 Or if you work at a company, 171 00:06:33,467 --> 00:06:35,577 "How much is your time worth to the company?” 172 00:06:35,577 --> 00:06:38,121 What most people don’t realize is, is that if you have a salary, 173 00:06:38,121 --> 00:06:40,394 let’s say you make $50,000 a year, 174 00:06:40,394 --> 00:06:43,010 it probably costs that company twice that 175 00:06:43,010 --> 00:06:44,456 in order to have you as an employee, 176 00:06:44,456 --> 00:06:47,485 because there’s utilites, and other staff members, and so forth. 177 00:06:47,487 --> 00:06:49,883 So, if you get paid $50,000 a year, 178 00:06:49,883 --> 00:06:52,426 you are costing that company— 179 00:06:52,426 --> 00:06:55,546 they have to raise $100,000 in revenue. 180 00:06:55,546 --> 00:06:57,679 And if you divide that by your hourly rate, 181 00:06:57,679 --> 00:07:00,598 you begin to get some sense of what you are worth an hour. 182 00:07:00,598 --> 00:07:02,220 And when you have to make trade-offs of: 183 00:07:02,220 --> 00:07:04,040 “Should I do something like write software, 184 00:07:04,040 --> 00:07:06,620 “or should I just buy it, or should I outsource this?” 185 00:07:06,620 --> 00:07:10,699 Having in your head what you cost your organization an hour 186 00:07:10,699 --> 00:07:14,295 is really kind of a staggering thing to change your behavior, 187 00:07:14,295 --> 00:07:15,666 because you start realizing that, 188 00:07:15,666 --> 00:07:18,218 “Wow! If I free up three hours of my time, 189 00:07:18,218 --> 00:07:20,056 "and I’m thinking of that in terms of dollars, 190 00:07:20,056 --> 00:07:21,524 that’s a big savings.” 191 00:07:21,524 --> 00:07:23,733 So start thinking about your time and your money 192 00:07:23,733 --> 00:07:26,426 almost as if they are the same thing. 193 00:07:26,426 --> 00:07:29,117 And of course, Ben Franklin knew that a long time ago. 194 00:07:29,117 --> 00:07:30,581 So you got to manage it. 195 00:07:30,581 --> 00:07:32,819 And you got to manage it just like you manage your money. 196 00:07:32,819 --> 00:07:34,840 Now I realize not all Americans manage their money, 197 00:07:34,840 --> 00:07:38,181 that’s what makes the credit card industry possible. 198 00:07:38,181 --> 00:07:41,097 And that’s— and apparently mortgages, too, so.... 199 00:07:41,097 --> 00:07:43,679 [audience laughs] 200 00:07:43,679 --> 00:07:45,496 But most people do at least understand, 201 00:07:45,496 --> 00:07:46,986 they don’t look at you funny if you say, 202 00:07:46,986 --> 00:07:49,330 “Well, can I see your monetary budget for your household?” 203 00:07:49,330 --> 00:07:51,422 In fact, if I say, “your household budget,” 204 00:07:51,422 --> 00:07:54,193 you presume that I’m talking about money, 205 00:07:54,193 --> 00:07:56,054 when in fact the household budget I really want 206 00:07:56,054 --> 00:07:58,399 to talk about is probably your household time budget. 207 00:07:58,399 --> 00:08:00,490 At the entertainment technology center at Carnegie Mellon, 208 00:08:00,490 --> 00:08:02,863 students would come in, and at the orientation, I would say, 209 00:08:02,863 --> 00:08:05,994 “This is a master’s program, everybody’s paying full tuition.” 210 00:08:05,994 --> 00:08:08,930 And it was roughly $30,000 a year. 211 00:08:08,930 --> 00:08:10,136 And the first thing I would say, 212 00:08:10,136 --> 00:08:12,023 “If you’re going to come into my office and say, 213 00:08:12,023 --> 00:08:14,513 “‘I don’t think this is worth $60,000 a year,’ 214 00:08:14,513 --> 00:08:16,164 “I will throw you out of the office. 215 00:08:16,164 --> 00:08:17,904 "I’m not even going to have that discussion.” 216 00:08:17,904 --> 00:08:20,127 And of course they would say, “Oh god, this guy's a real jerk.” 217 00:08:20,127 --> 00:08:21,391 And they were right. 218 00:08:21,391 --> 00:08:24,848 But, what I then followed on with was, 219 00:08:24,848 --> 00:08:27,505 “Because the money is not important. 220 00:08:27,505 --> 00:08:30,263 “You can go and earn more money later. 221 00:08:30,263 --> 00:08:34,153 “And what you’ll never do is get the two years of your life back. 222 00:08:34,153 --> 00:08:36,588 “So if you want to come into my office, and talk about money, 223 00:08:36,588 --> 00:08:37,524 “I’ll throw you out. 224 00:08:37,524 --> 00:08:39,484 “But if you want to come into my office and say, 225 00:08:39,484 --> 00:08:42,151 “‘I’m not sure this is a good place for me to spend two years,’ 226 00:08:42,151 --> 00:08:44,380 “I will talk to you all day and all night, 227 00:08:44,380 --> 00:08:46,914 “because that means we’re talking about the right thing, 228 00:08:46,914 --> 00:08:51,074 “which is your time, because you can’t ever get it back.” 229 00:08:51,074 --> 00:08:53,294 A lot advice I'm will give you, notably for undergraduates— 230 00:08:53,294 --> 00:08:55,121 how many people here are undergraduates, 231 00:08:55,121 --> 00:08:56,317 by show of hands? 232 00:08:56,317 --> 00:08:58,959 Okay good, still young. 233 00:08:58,959 --> 00:09:01,554 [audience laughs] 234 00:09:01,554 --> 00:09:02,880 A lot of this— 235 00:09:02,880 --> 00:09:04,745 put it to Hans and Franz on Saturday Night Live, 236 00:09:04,745 --> 00:09:05,534 if you’re old enough. 237 00:09:05,534 --> 00:09:07,657 [faking German accent] “Hear me now, but believe me later.” 238 00:09:07,657 --> 00:09:08,481 Right? 239 00:09:08,481 --> 00:09:10,069 A lot of this is going to make sense later, 240 00:09:10,069 --> 00:09:12,103 and one of the nice things is Gabe has volunteered 241 00:09:12,103 --> 00:09:13,245 to put this up on the web. 242 00:09:13,245 --> 00:09:15,443 I understand that people can actually watch videos 243 00:09:15,443 --> 00:09:16,646 on the web now. 244 00:09:16,646 --> 00:09:17,882 So this is... 245 00:09:17,882 --> 00:09:20,368 [audience laughs] 246 00:09:20,368 --> 00:09:21,841 so a lot of this only makes sense later, 247 00:09:21,841 --> 00:09:25,383 and, when I talk about your boss, if you’re a student, 248 00:09:25,383 --> 00:09:27,111 think about that as your academic advisor. 249 00:09:27,111 --> 00:09:29,226 If you’re a PhD student, think about your PhD advisor. 250 00:09:29,226 --> 00:09:31,855 And if you’re, you know, if you’re watching this, 251 00:09:31,855 --> 00:09:33,607 and you’re a young child, think of your parent, 252 00:09:33,607 --> 00:09:36,644 because that’s sort of the person who is in some sense your boss. 253 00:09:36,644 --> 00:09:38,290 And the talk goes very fast. 254 00:09:38,290 --> 00:09:40,948 And as I said, I’m very big on specific techniques. 255 00:09:40,948 --> 00:09:42,469 I’m not really big on platitudes. 256 00:09:42,469 --> 00:09:43,518 I mean, platitudes are nice, 257 00:09:43,518 --> 00:09:47,912 but they don’t really help me get something done tomorrow. 258 00:09:47,912 --> 00:09:48,843 The other thing is that, 259 00:09:48,843 --> 00:09:50,890 one good thief is worth ten good scholars. 260 00:09:50,890 --> 00:09:52,568 And in fact, you can replace "scholars" 261 00:09:52,568 --> 00:09:56,339 in that sentence with almost anything, all right. 262 00:09:56,339 --> 00:09:59,570 So almost everything in this talk is to some degree inspired, 263 00:09:59,570 --> 00:10:03,372 which is a fancy way of saying “lifted,” 264 00:10:03,372 --> 00:10:04,746 from these two books, 265 00:10:04,746 --> 00:10:06,491 and I found those books very useful, 266 00:10:06,491 --> 00:10:08,675 but it’s much better to get them in distilled form. 267 00:10:08,675 --> 00:10:11,048 So what I’ve basically done is collected the nuggets 268 00:10:11,048 --> 00:10:13,253 for your behalf. 269 00:10:13,253 --> 00:10:15,148 I like the part about the time famine. 270 00:10:15,148 --> 00:10:16,366 I think it’s a nice phrase. 271 00:10:16,366 --> 00:10:19,564 Does anybody here feel like they have too much time? 272 00:10:21,124 --> 00:10:23,275 Okay, nobody; excellent! 273 00:10:23,275 --> 00:10:24,565 And I like the word “famine” 274 00:10:24,565 --> 00:10:26,552 because it’s a bit like thinking about Africa. 275 00:10:26,552 --> 00:10:28,526 I mean, you can airlift all the food you want 276 00:10:28,526 --> 00:10:32,368 in to solve the crisis this week, but the problem is systemic, 277 00:10:32,368 --> 00:10:35,314 and you really need systemic solutions. 278 00:10:35,314 --> 00:10:36,843 So a time management solution that says, 279 00:10:36,843 --> 00:10:39,091 "I’m going to fix things for you in the next 24 hours,” 280 00:10:39,091 --> 00:10:40,154 is laughable, like saying, 281 00:10:40,154 --> 00:10:42,529 “I’m going to cure hunger in Africa in the next year.” 282 00:10:42,529 --> 00:10:43,884 You need to think long-term, 283 00:10:43,884 --> 00:10:46,583 and you need to change fundamental underlying processes, 284 00:10:46,583 --> 00:10:47,996 because the problem is systemic. 285 00:10:47,996 --> 00:10:49,582 We just have too many things to do, 286 00:10:49,582 --> 00:10:51,534 and not enough time to do them. 287 00:10:51,534 --> 00:10:53,773 Also remember that it’s not just about time management. 288 00:10:53,773 --> 00:10:56,129 That sounds like a kind of lukewarm, 289 00:10:56,129 --> 00:10:57,646 you know, a talk on time management, 290 00:10:57,646 --> 00:10:59,717 that’s kind of, you know, milk toast. 291 00:10:59,717 --> 00:11:00,725 But what if the talk is: 292 00:11:00,725 --> 00:11:03,345 “How about not having ulcers?” 293 00:11:03,345 --> 00:11:06,332 All right, that catches my attention. 294 00:11:06,332 --> 00:11:08,136 So a lot of this is life advice. 295 00:11:08,136 --> 00:11:11,238 This is, how to change the way you’re doing a lot of the things 296 00:11:11,238 --> 00:11:12,803 and how you allocate your time, 297 00:11:12,803 --> 00:11:16,463 so that you will lead a happier, more wonderful life, 298 00:11:16,463 --> 00:11:18,781 and I loved in the introduction that you talked about fun, 299 00:11:18,781 --> 00:11:21,260 because if I’ve brought fun to academia, 300 00:11:21,260 --> 00:11:23,911 well it’s about damn time. 301 00:11:23,911 --> 00:11:25,478 Whew! 302 00:11:25,478 --> 00:11:28,130 I mean, you know, if you’re not going to have fun, 303 00:11:28,130 --> 00:11:30,083 why do it...right? 304 00:11:30,083 --> 00:11:31,178 That’s what I want to know. 305 00:11:31,178 --> 00:11:32,981 I mean, life really is too short, 306 00:11:32,981 --> 00:11:35,298 if you’re not going to enjoy it— you know, people who say, 307 00:11:35,298 --> 00:11:37,139 “I’ve got a job, but I don’t really like it.” 308 00:11:37,139 --> 00:11:40,384 And I’m like, “Well, you could change.” 309 00:11:40,384 --> 00:11:41,481 “That’d be a lot of work.” 310 00:11:41,481 --> 00:11:43,313 “True, you should keep going in to work every day, 311 00:11:43,313 --> 00:11:44,854 “doing a job you don’t like. 312 00:11:44,854 --> 00:11:46,372 “Thank you, good night,”
 right? 313 00:11:46,372 --> 00:11:47,525 [audience laughs] 314 00:11:47,525 --> 00:11:49,972 So, the overall goal is fun. 315 00:11:49,972 --> 00:11:52,796 My middle child Logan is my favorite example. 316 00:11:52,796 --> 00:11:55,389 I don’t think he knows how to not have fun. 317 00:11:55,389 --> 00:11:56,789 Now granted, a lot of the things he does 318 00:11:56,789 --> 00:11:59,480 are not fun for his mother and me, 319 00:11:59,480 --> 00:12:01,738 but he’s lovin’ every second of it. 320 00:12:01,738 --> 00:12:03,089 And he doesn’t know how to do anything 321 00:12:03,089 --> 00:12:05,590 that isn’t ballistic and full of life, 322 00:12:05,590 --> 00:12:07,461 and he’s going to keep that quality, I think. 323 00:12:07,461 --> 00:12:08,616 He’s my little Tigger. 324 00:12:08,616 --> 00:12:10,885 And I always remember Logan when I think 325 00:12:10,885 --> 00:12:13,338 about the goal is to make sure that you lead your life, 326 00:12:13,338 --> 00:12:15,132 you know— I want to maximize use of time, 327 00:12:15,132 --> 00:12:17,309 but really, that’s the means, not the end. 328 00:12:17,309 --> 00:12:20,992 The end is maximizing fun. 329 00:12:20,992 --> 00:12:24,987 People who do intense studies, and log people on video tape, 330 00:12:24,987 --> 00:12:26,105 and so on and so forth, 331 00:12:26,105 --> 00:12:27,848 say that the typical office worker 332 00:12:27,848 --> 00:12:31,261 wastes almost two hours a day. 333 00:12:31,261 --> 00:12:33,241 Their desk is messy, they can’t find things, 334 00:12:33,241 --> 00:12:35,262 miss appointments, unprepared for meetings, 335 00:12:35,262 --> 00:12:36,474 they can’t concentrate. 336 00:12:36,474 --> 00:12:38,793 Does anybody in here, by show of hands, 337 00:12:38,793 --> 00:12:40,929 ever have any sense that one of these things 338 00:12:40,929 --> 00:12:43,140 is part of their life? 339 00:12:43,140 --> 00:12:45,784 Okay, I think we’ve got everybody. 340 00:12:45,784 --> 00:12:47,160 So these are the universal thing, 341 00:12:47,160 --> 00:12:49,586 and you shouldn’t feel guilty 342 00:12:49,586 --> 00:12:50,900 if some of these are plaguing you, 343 00:12:50,900 --> 00:12:52,384 because they plague all of us, 344 00:12:52,384 --> 00:12:54,461 they plagued me for sure. 345 00:12:54,461 --> 00:12:56,055 And I also want to tell you, 346 00:12:56,055 --> 00:12:57,560 it sounds a little cliched and trite, 347 00:12:57,560 --> 00:13:01,693 but being successful does not make you manage your time well. 348 00:13:01,693 --> 00:13:03,717 Managing your time well makes you successful. 349 00:13:03,717 --> 00:13:05,494 If I have been successful in my career, 350 00:13:05,494 --> 00:13:07,198 I assure you it’s not because I’m smarter 351 00:13:07,198 --> 00:13:08,604 than all the other faculty. 352 00:13:08,604 --> 00:13:09,467 I mean, looking around, 353 00:13:09,467 --> 00:13:11,104 and seeing some of my former colleagues, 354 00:13:11,104 --> 00:13:12,409 I mean, I see Jim Cohoon up there. 355 00:13:12,409 --> 00:13:15,169 I am not smart than Jim Cohoon, okay. 356 00:13:15,169 --> 00:13:16,880 I constantly look around at the faculty 357 00:13:16,880 --> 00:13:18,175 at places like the University of Virginina 358 00:13:18,175 --> 00:13:19,319 or Carnegie Mellon, and I go, 359 00:13:19,319 --> 00:13:21,333 “Damn! These are smart people.” 360 00:13:21,333 --> 00:13:22,981 Right, and I snuck in. 361 00:13:22,981 --> 00:13:23,929 [audience laughs] 362 00:13:23,929 --> 00:13:26,527 But what I like to think I’m good at is the meta-skills, 363 00:13:26,527 --> 00:13:29,024 because if you have to run with people who are faster than you, 364 00:13:29,024 --> 00:13:31,759 you have to, like, find the right ways 365 00:13:31,759 --> 00:13:34,749 to optimize what skills you do have. 366 00:13:34,749 --> 00:13:37,136 So let’s talk first about goals, priorities, and planning. 367 00:13:37,136 --> 00:13:41,179 Anytime anything crosses your life, you’ve got to ask, 368 00:13:41,179 --> 00:13:42,857 “This thing I’m thinking about doing, 369 00:13:42,857 --> 00:13:43,983 “why am I doing it?” 370 00:13:43,983 --> 00:13:46,072 Almost no one I know starts with this core principle of: 371 00:13:46,072 --> 00:13:48,977 there’s this thing on my to-do list, why is it there? 372 00:13:48,977 --> 00:13:50,217 Because if you start asking why— 373 00:13:50,217 --> 00:13:51,773 I mean, again, my kids are great at this. 374 00:13:51,773 --> 00:13:56,103 That’s all I ever hear at home is, “Why? Why? Why?” 375 00:13:56,115 --> 00:13:57,851 Eventually, they will stop saying why, 376 00:13:57,851 --> 00:13:59,517 and just going to say, “Okay, I’ll do it.” 377 00:13:59,517 --> 00:14:00,689 Right? 378 00:14:00,689 --> 00:14:01,850 So ask: Why am I doing this? 379 00:14:01,850 --> 00:14:02,670 What is the goal? 380 00:14:02,670 --> 00:14:04,980 Why will I succeed at doing it? 381 00:14:04,980 --> 00:14:08,438 And here’s my favorite: What will happen if I don’t do it? 382 00:14:08,438 --> 00:14:09,897 If I just say, “Yeah, I’m just not—.” 383 00:14:09,897 --> 00:14:11,092 The best thing in the world is 384 00:14:11,092 --> 00:14:13,969 when I have something on my to-do list, and I just go, hm, no. 385 00:14:13,969 --> 00:14:14,972 [audience laughs] 386 00:14:14,972 --> 00:14:17,828 No one has ever come and taken me to jail. 387 00:14:18,618 --> 00:14:20,387 I got out of a speeding ticket last week. 388 00:14:20,387 --> 00:14:21,514 It was really cool. 389 00:14:21,514 --> 00:14:24,814 [audience laughs and claps] 390 00:14:24,814 --> 00:14:26,484 It’s like the closest I’m ever going to be 391 00:14:26,484 --> 00:14:30,796 to attractive and blond. 392 00:14:30,796 --> 00:14:33,934 And I told the guy, you know, why we had just moved, 393 00:14:33,934 --> 00:14:34,970 and so on and so forth. 394 00:14:34,970 --> 00:14:36,836 And he looked at me and he said, 395 00:14:36,836 --> 00:14:38,958 “Well for a guy whose only got a couple months to live, 396 00:14:38,958 --> 00:14:40,512 you sure look good.” 397 00:14:40,512 --> 00:14:41,369 [audience laughs] 398 00:14:41,369 --> 00:14:43,403 I just pulled up my shirt to show the scar, said, 399 00:14:43,403 --> 00:14:47,067 “Yeah, I look good on the outside, but the tumors are inside.” 400 00:14:47,067 --> 00:14:49,278 He just ran back to his cruiser and— 401 00:14:49,278 --> 00:14:52,064 [audience laughs] 402 00:14:52,064 --> 00:14:54,925 So that’s one positive law enforcement experience for me. 403 00:14:54,925 --> 00:14:57,560 [audience laughs] 404 00:14:57,560 --> 00:14:59,391 So the police have never come 405 00:14:59,391 --> 00:15:01,506 because I crossed something off my to-do list. 406 00:15:01,506 --> 00:15:02,874 And that’s a very powerful thing, 407 00:15:02,874 --> 00:15:04,544 because you just got all that time back. 408 00:15:04,544 --> 00:15:06,776 The other thing to keep in mind when you’re goal-setting, 409 00:15:06,776 --> 00:15:09,360 is a lot of people focus on doing things right. 410 00:15:09,360 --> 00:15:12,331 I think it’s very dangerous to focus on doing things right. 411 00:15:12,331 --> 00:15:14,798 I think it’s much more important to do the right things. 412 00:15:14,798 --> 00:15:16,883 If you do the right things adequately, 413 00:15:16,883 --> 00:15:18,477 that’s much more important 414 00:15:18,477 --> 00:15:21,581 than doing the wrong things beautifully. 415 00:15:21,581 --> 00:15:22,435 All right. 416 00:15:22,435 --> 00:15:26,709 Doesn’t matter how well you polish the underside of the banister. 417 00:15:26,709 --> 00:15:29,130 Okay? And keep that in mind. 418 00:15:29,130 --> 00:15:30,792 Lou Holtz had a great list: 419 00:15:30,792 --> 00:15:33,229 Lou Holtz’s 100 things to do in his life. 420 00:15:33,229 --> 00:15:35,643 And he would, sort of, once a week look at it, and say, 421 00:15:35,643 --> 00:15:37,875 you know, "If I’m not working on those 100 things, 422 00:15:37,875 --> 00:15:40,035 why was I working on the others.” 423 00:15:40,035 --> 00:15:41,778 And I just think that’s an incredible way 424 00:15:41,778 --> 00:15:43,561 to frame things. 425 00:15:44,971 --> 00:15:46,370 There’s something called the 80/20 rule. 426 00:15:46,370 --> 00:15:47,955 Sometimes you’ll hear about the 90/10 rule, 427 00:15:47,955 --> 00:15:49,406 but the key thing to understand 428 00:15:49,406 --> 00:15:52,084 is that a very small number of things in your life, 429 00:15:52,084 --> 00:15:53,275 or on your to-do list, 430 00:15:53,275 --> 00:15:56,069 are going to contribute the vast majority of the value. 431 00:15:56,069 --> 00:15:59,112 So if you have— if you’re a salesperson, 432 00:15:59,112 --> 00:16:02,770 80% of the revenue is going to come from 20% of your clients. 433 00:16:02,770 --> 00:16:05,342 And you better figure out who those 20% are, 434 00:16:05,342 --> 00:16:08,795 and spend all of your time sucking up to them, 435 00:16:08,795 --> 00:16:11,300 because that’s where the revenue comes. 436 00:16:11,300 --> 00:16:13,151 So you’ve got to really be willing to say, 437 00:16:13,151 --> 00:16:14,913 “This stuff is what’s going to be the value, 438 00:16:14,913 --> 00:16:15,910 and this other stuff isn’t.” 439 00:16:15,910 --> 00:16:18,045 And you’ve got to have the courage of your convictions to say, 440 00:16:18,045 --> 00:16:18,907 “And therefore, 441 00:16:18,907 --> 00:16:22,272 I’m going to shove the other stuff off of the boat.” 442 00:16:22,272 --> 00:16:26,366 The other thing to remember is that experience comes with time. 443 00:16:26,366 --> 00:16:27,848 And it’s really, really valuable. 444 00:16:27,848 --> 00:16:30,135 And there are no shortcuts to getting it. 445 00:16:30,135 --> 00:16:32,745 So, good judgement comes from experience, 446 00:16:32,745 --> 00:16:35,479 and experience comes from bad judgement. 447 00:16:35,479 --> 00:16:37,359 So, if things aren’t going well, 448 00:16:37,359 --> 00:16:39,330 that probably means you’re learning a lot, 449 00:16:39,330 --> 00:16:40,883 and it’ll go better later. 450 00:16:40,883 --> 00:16:42,405 [audience laughs] 451 00:16:42,405 --> 00:16:45,585 This is, by the way, why we pay so much in American society 452 00:16:45,585 --> 00:16:47,782 for people who are, you know, 453 00:16:47,782 --> 00:16:50,400 typically older, but have done lots of things in their past, 454 00:16:50,400 --> 00:16:51,948 because we pay for their experience, 455 00:16:51,948 --> 00:16:55,596 because we know that experience is one of the things you can’t fake. 456 00:16:57,176 --> 00:16:59,458 And do not lose the sight— do not lose sight 457 00:16:59,458 --> 00:17:01,407 of the power of inspiration. 458 00:17:01,407 --> 00:17:03,564 So, Randy’s in an hour-long talk, 459 00:17:03,564 --> 00:17:05,850 and we’ve already hit our first Disney reference. 460 00:17:05,850 --> 00:17:07,001 [audience laughs] 461 00:17:07,001 --> 00:17:09,363 Walt Disney’s quote-- Walt Disney has many great quotes, 462 00:17:09,363 --> 00:17:11,847 but the one I loved is, “If you can dream it, you can do it.” 463 00:17:11,847 --> 00:17:13,685 And a lot of my cynical friends say, 464 00:17:13,685 --> 00:17:14,702 yada-yada-yada, 465 00:17:14,702 --> 00:17:16,155 To which I say, “Shut up.” 466 00:17:16,155 --> 00:17:17,721 [audience laughs] 467 00:17:17,723 --> 00:17:20,595 Inspiration is important, and I’ll tell you this much, if you 468 00:17:20,595 --> 00:17:22,889 if you-- I don’t know if Walt was right, 469 00:17:22,889 --> 00:17:23,974 but I’ll tell you this much, 470 00:17:23,974 --> 00:17:26,595 if you refuse to allow yourself to dream it, 471 00:17:26,595 --> 00:17:29,230 I know you won’t do it. 472 00:17:29,230 --> 00:17:31,942 So the power of dreams are that they give us a way 473 00:17:31,942 --> 00:17:34,863 to take the first step towards an accomplishment. 474 00:17:34,863 --> 00:17:37,402 And Walt was also not just a dreamer. 475 00:17:37,402 --> 00:17:39,580 Walt worked really hard. 476 00:17:39,580 --> 00:17:41,650 Disneyland, this amazes me, because I know a bit 477 00:17:41,650 --> 00:17:44,097 about how hard it is to put theme park attractions together, 478 00:17:44,097 --> 00:17:47,215 and they did the whole original Disneyland park 479 00:17:47,215 --> 00:17:50,405 in 366 days. 480 00:17:50,405 --> 00:17:54,760 That’s from the first shovelful of dirt to the first paid admission. 481 00:17:54,760 --> 00:17:55,833 All right. 482 00:17:55,833 --> 00:17:57,790 Think about how long it takes to do something, say, 483 00:17:57,790 --> 00:17:59,151 at a state university. 484 00:17:59,151 --> 00:18:04,117 [audience laughs] 485 00:18:04,117 --> 00:18:05,283 By comparison! 486 00:18:05,283 --> 00:18:08,750 So, it’s, you know, it’s just fascinating. 487 00:18:08,750 --> 00:18:10,096 When someone once asked Walt Disney, 488 00:18:10,096 --> 00:18:12,025 “How did you get it done in 366 days?”, 489 00:18:12,025 --> 00:18:15,952 he just deadpanned, “We used every one of them.” 490 00:18:15,952 --> 00:18:16,638 [audience laughs] 491 00:18:16,638 --> 00:18:19,023 So again, there are no shortcuts, 492 00:18:19,023 --> 00:18:23,783 there’s a lot of hard work in anything you want to accomplish. 493 00:18:23,783 --> 00:18:25,036 Planning is very important. 494 00:18:25,036 --> 00:18:26,779 One of the time management cliches is, 495 00:18:26,779 --> 00:18:30,244 “Failing to plan is planning to fail.” 496 00:18:30,244 --> 00:18:32,677 And planning has to be done at multiple levels. 497 00:18:32,677 --> 00:18:34,643 I have a plan every morning when I wake up, I say, 498 00:18:34,643 --> 00:18:35,827 “What do I need to do today? 499 00:18:35,827 --> 00:18:37,040 “What do I need to do this week? 500 00:18:37,040 --> 00:18:38,605 “What do I need to do each semester?” 501 00:18:38,605 --> 00:18:41,272 That’s sort of the time quanta, because I’m an academic. 502 00:18:41,272 --> 00:18:43,915 And that doesn’t mean you’re locked in to it. 503 00:18:43,915 --> 00:18:45,949 People say, “Yeah, but things are so fluid. 504 00:18:45,949 --> 00:18:47,497 “I’m going to have to change the plan.” 505 00:18:47,497 --> 00:18:50,150 And I’m like, “Yes! You are going to have to change the plan. 506 00:18:50,150 --> 00:18:53,440 “But you can’t change it unless you have it.” 507 00:18:53,440 --> 00:18:54,260 And the excuse of, 508 00:18:54,260 --> 00:18:56,883 I’m not going to make a plan because things might change, 509 00:18:56,883 --> 00:18:59,505 is just this paralysis of: I don’t have any marching orders. 510 00:18:59,505 --> 00:19:00,554 So have a plan, 511 00:19:00,554 --> 00:19:01,655 accept that it will change, 512 00:19:01,655 --> 00:19:05,316 but have it so you have the basis to start with. 513 00:19:05,316 --> 00:19:06,415 To-do lists. 514 00:19:06,415 --> 00:19:08,553 How many people here, right now, if I said, 515 00:19:08,553 --> 00:19:11,969 can you produce it, could show me their to-do list? 516 00:19:11,969 --> 00:19:15,264 Okay, not bad, not bad. 517 00:19:16,324 --> 00:19:17,619 The key thing with to-do lists 518 00:19:17,619 --> 00:19:20,627 is you have to break things down into small steps. 519 00:19:20,627 --> 00:19:22,072 I literally once, on my to-do list, 520 00:19:22,072 --> 00:19:24,401 when I was a junior faculty member at the University of Virginia, 521 00:19:24,402 --> 00:19:26,274 I put: “Get tenure.” 522 00:19:26,274 --> 00:19:29,100 [audience laughs] 523 00:19:29,100 --> 00:19:31,996 That was naive! 524 00:19:31,996 --> 00:19:33,714 And I looked at that for a while, and I said, 525 00:19:33,714 --> 00:19:36,791 “That’s really hard, I don’t think I can do that.” 526 00:19:36,791 --> 00:19:40,082 And, my children, Dylan and Logan and Chloe, 527 00:19:40,082 --> 00:19:42,217 particularly Dylan, is at the age 528 00:19:42,217 --> 00:19:45,595 where he can clean his own damn room, thank you very much. 529 00:19:45,595 --> 00:19:47,860 But he doesn’t like to. 530 00:19:47,860 --> 00:19:50,923 And, Chris is smiling, because I used to do this story on him, 531 00:19:50,923 --> 00:19:53,112 but now I’ve got my own kids to pick on. 532 00:19:53,112 --> 00:19:54,253 [audience laughs] 533 00:19:54,253 --> 00:19:55,576 But Dylan will come to me and say, 534 00:19:55,576 --> 00:19:57,560 “I can’t pick up my room, it’s too much stuff.” 535 00:19:57,560 --> 00:19:58,937 [lets out exaggerated sigh] 536 00:19:58,937 --> 00:20:00,798 He’s not even a teen and he’s already got that, 537 00:20:00,798 --> 00:20:01,531 you know? 538 00:20:01,531 --> 00:20:02,776 [lets out exaggerated sigh] 539 00:20:02,776 --> 00:20:04,968 And I say, “Well, can you make your bed?” 540 00:20:04,968 --> 00:20:07,314 “Yeah, I can do that." [imitates footsteps retreating] 541 00:20:07,314 --> 00:20:09,124 “Okay, can you put the clothes in the hamper?” 542 00:20:09,124 --> 00:20:11,381 “Yeah, I can do that.” [iimitates footsteps retreating] 543 00:20:11,381 --> 00:20:12,942 And you know, you do three or four things, 544 00:20:12,942 --> 00:20:14,220 and then it’s like, 545 00:20:14,220 --> 00:20:15,860 “Well, Dylan, you just cleaned your room.” 546 00:20:15,860 --> 00:20:17,235 [childlike voice] “I cleaned my room!” 547 00:20:17,235 --> 00:20:18,113 And he feels good. 548 00:20:18,113 --> 00:20:19,464 He is empowered. 549 00:20:19,464 --> 00:20:20,852 [audience laughs] 550 00:20:20,852 --> 00:20:22,060 And everybody’s happy, and 551 00:20:22,060 --> 00:20:24,805 of course, I’ve had to spend twice as much time 552 00:20:24,805 --> 00:20:27,231 managing him as I could’ve done it by myself, 553 00:20:27,231 --> 00:20:29,344 but that’s okay, that’s what being a boss is about, 554 00:20:29,344 --> 00:20:30,898 is growing your people, 555 00:20:30,898 --> 00:20:32,849 no matter how small or large they might be at the time. 556 00:20:32,849 --> 00:20:34,115 [audience laughs] 557 00:20:34,115 --> 00:20:36,435 The last thing about to-do lists, or getting yourself going, 558 00:20:36,435 --> 00:20:38,188 is if you’ve got a bunch of things to do, 559 00:20:38,188 --> 00:20:41,147 do the ugliest thing first. 560 00:20:41,147 --> 00:20:43,651 There’s an old saying, "If you have to eat a frog, 561 00:20:43,651 --> 00:20:46,322 "don’t spend a lot of time looking at it first. 562 00:20:46,322 --> 00:20:49,987 "And if you have to eat three of them, don’t start with the small one." 563 00:20:49,987 --> 00:20:52,187 [audience laughs] 564 00:20:56,537 --> 00:20:58,768 All right, this is the most important slide 565 00:20:58,768 --> 00:21:00,194 in the entire talk. 566 00:21:00,194 --> 00:21:01,870 So, if you want to leave after this slide, 567 00:21:01,870 --> 00:21:04,938 I will not be offended because it’s all downhill from here. 568 00:21:04,938 --> 00:21:06,115 And this is blatantly stolen, 569 00:21:06,115 --> 00:21:08,298 this is Steven Covey’s great contribution to the world. 570 00:21:08,298 --> 00:21:12,733 He talks about it in one— in the Seven Habits book. 571 00:21:12,733 --> 00:21:14,528 Imagine your to-do list— 572 00:21:14,528 --> 00:21:17,403 most people sort their to-do list, either, you know, 573 00:21:17,403 --> 00:21:20,142 “the order that I got it, throw it on the bottom.” 574 00:21:20,142 --> 00:21:22,737 Or, they sort it in due-date list, 575 00:21:22,737 --> 00:21:25,126 which is more sophisticated, and more helpful. 576 00:21:25,126 --> 00:21:28,844 But still very, very wrong. 577 00:21:28,844 --> 00:21:30,917 So looking at the four-quadrant to-do list. 578 00:21:30,917 --> 00:21:32,420 If you’ve got a quadrant where things are 579 00:21:32,420 --> 00:21:34,435 “Important and Due Soon,” 580 00:21:34,435 --> 00:21:36,478 “Important and Not Due Soon,” 581 00:21:36,478 --> 00:21:38,396 “Not Important and Due Soon,” 582 00:21:38,396 --> 00:21:40,569 and “Not Important and Not Due Soon.” 583 00:21:40,569 --> 00:21:41,648 All right, 584 00:21:41,648 --> 00:21:44,160 which of these four quadrants do you think, 585 00:21:44,160 --> 00:21:45,679 upper left, upper right, lower left, lower right, 586 00:21:45,679 --> 00:21:48,877 which one do you think you should work on immediately? 587 00:21:48,877 --> 00:21:50,008 Upper left! 588 00:21:50,008 --> 00:21:51,449 You are such a great crowd. 589 00:21:51,449 --> 00:21:52,337 Okay. 590 00:21:52,337 --> 00:21:55,646 And which one do you think you should probably do last? 591 00:21:55,646 --> 00:21:56,542 Lower right. 592 00:21:56,542 --> 00:21:58,104 And that’s, you know, that’s easy. 593 00:21:58,104 --> 00:21:59,919 That’s obviously number one. 594 00:21:59,919 --> 00:22:02,229 That’s obviously number four. 595 00:22:02,229 --> 00:22:06,627 But this is where everybody in my experience gets it wrong. 596 00:22:06,627 --> 00:22:07,550 What we do now is we say, 597 00:22:07,550 --> 00:22:09,470 “I do the number ones, and then I move on 598 00:22:09,470 --> 00:22:11,704 “to the stuff that's ‘Due Soon and Not Important.’” 599 00:22:11,704 --> 00:22:13,429 When you write it in this quadrant list, 600 00:22:13,429 --> 00:22:14,580 it’s really stunning, 601 00:22:14,580 --> 00:22:15,887 I’ve seen people do this, they say, 602 00:22:15,887 --> 00:22:17,715 "This is due soon, and I know it’s not important, 603 00:22:17,715 --> 00:22:19,618 “so I’m going to get right to work on it.” 604 00:22:19,618 --> 00:22:22,272 [audience laughs] 605 00:22:22,272 --> 00:22:24,756 And, the most crucial thing I can teach you 606 00:22:24,756 --> 00:22:26,678 about time management is when you’re done picking 607 00:22:26,678 --> 00:22:30,747 off the “Important and Due Soon,” that’s when you go here. 608 00:22:30,747 --> 00:22:32,692 You go to it’s “Not Due Soon and It’s Important.” 609 00:22:32,692 --> 00:22:34,847 And there will be a moment in your life where you say, 610 00:22:34,847 --> 00:22:37,107 “Hey, this thing that’s due soon but not important, 611 00:22:37,107 --> 00:22:40,131 “I won’t do it! 612 00:22:40,131 --> 00:22:43,201 “Because it’s not important! It says so right here on the chart!” 613 00:22:43,161 --> 00:22:48,645 [audience laughs] 614 00:22:48,645 --> 00:22:51,614 And magically, you have time 615 00:22:51,614 --> 00:22:53,410 to work on the thing that is not due soon, 616 00:22:53,410 --> 00:22:54,420 but is important, 617 00:22:54,420 --> 00:22:59,321 so that next week it never got a chance to get here, 618 00:22:59,321 --> 00:23:01,673 because you killed it in the crib. 619 00:23:01,673 --> 00:23:03,572 [audience laughs] 620 00:23:03,572 --> 00:23:05,588 My wife won’t like that metaphor. 621 00:23:05,588 --> 00:23:08,531 [audience laughs] 622 00:23:08,531 --> 00:23:11,747 But you kill, or you solve the problem, 623 00:23:11,747 --> 00:23:13,517 of something that’s due next week 624 00:23:13,517 --> 00:23:16,364 when you’re not under time stress, because it’s not due tomorrow. 625 00:23:16,364 --> 00:23:19,586 And suddenly you become one of those zen-like people, 626 00:23:19,586 --> 00:23:21,381 who always seem to have all the time in the world, 627 00:23:21,381 --> 00:23:24,583 because they’ve figured this out. 628 00:23:24,583 --> 00:23:25,348 All right. 629 00:23:25,348 --> 00:23:27,222 Paperwork. 630 00:23:27,222 --> 00:23:29,991 The first thing you need to know is that having cluttered paperwork 631 00:23:29,991 --> 00:23:30,843 leads to thrashing. 632 00:23:30,843 --> 00:23:32,513 You end up with all these things on your desk, 633 00:23:32,513 --> 00:23:34,303 and you can’t find anything, 634 00:23:34,303 --> 00:23:35,518 the moment you turn to your desk, 635 00:23:35,518 --> 00:23:37,073 your desk is saying to you, 636 00:23:37,073 --> 00:23:38,505 [in a gruff voice] “I own you.” 637 00:23:38,505 --> 00:23:39,324 [audience laughs] 638 00:23:39,324 --> 00:23:42,549 [in a gruff voice] “I have more things than you can do. 639 00:23:42,549 --> 00:23:46,420 "And they are many colors and laid out.” 640 00:23:46,420 --> 00:23:48,595 So what I find is that it’s really crucial 641 00:23:48,595 --> 00:23:50,593 to keep your desk clear, 642 00:23:50,593 --> 00:23:52,893 and we’ll talk about where the paper goes in a second, 643 00:23:52,893 --> 00:23:54,109 and you have one thing on your desk, 644 00:23:54,109 --> 00:23:57,401 because then it’s like, “Haha! Now it’s Thunderdome! 645 00:23:57,401 --> 00:23:59,729 "Me and the ONE piece of paper.” 646 00:23:59,729 --> 00:24:02,868 And so I usually win that one. 647 00:24:02,868 --> 00:24:04,679 One of the mantras of time management is 648 00:24:04,679 --> 00:24:06,782 "Touch each piece of paper once." 649 00:24:06,782 --> 00:24:09,761 You get the piece of paper, you look at it, you work at it, 650 00:24:09,761 --> 00:24:13,124 and I think that’s extremely true for email. 651 00:24:13,124 --> 00:24:15,658 How many people here— well, I’m going to take it for granted 652 00:24:15,658 --> 00:24:17,844 that everybody here has an email inbox. 653 00:24:17,844 --> 00:24:18,936 How many people right now 654 00:24:18,936 --> 00:24:22,920 have more than 20 items in their email inbox? 655 00:24:22,920 --> 00:24:26,790 Ohh! I’m in the right room. 656 00:24:26,790 --> 00:24:30,014 Your inbox is not your to-do list. 657 00:24:30,014 --> 00:24:34,893 And my wife has learned that I need to get my inbox clear. 658 00:24:34,893 --> 00:24:38,688 Now sometimes, this really means just filing things away, 659 00:24:38,688 --> 00:24:41,053 and putting something on my to-do list. 660 00:24:41,053 --> 00:24:43,428 But remember, the to-do list is sorted by importance. 661 00:24:43,428 --> 00:24:46,538 But my—does anybody here have an email program 662 00:24:46,538 --> 00:24:49,458 where you can press the “Sort by Importance” button? 663 00:24:51,328 --> 00:24:54,254 It’s amazing how people who build software, 664 00:24:54,254 --> 00:24:57,299 that really is a huge part of our life and getting work done, 665 00:24:57,299 --> 00:24:59,421 haven’t a clue. 666 00:24:59,421 --> 00:25:01,612 And that’s not a slam on any particular company. 667 00:25:01,612 --> 00:25:03,636 I think they all have missed the boat. 668 00:25:03,636 --> 00:25:06,223 And I just find it fascinating... 669 00:25:06,223 --> 00:25:07,765 because everyone I know, or most I know, 670 00:25:07,765 --> 00:25:09,237 have this inbox that's— 671 00:25:09,237 --> 00:25:11,916 all right, I gotta ask, how many people have more than 100 things 672 00:25:11,916 --> 00:25:13,364 in their email inbox? 673 00:25:13,364 --> 00:25:16,223 Oh, I’m just not going to keep going, this is too depressing. 674 00:25:16,223 --> 00:25:18,304 [audience laughs] 675 00:25:18,304 --> 00:25:21,713 So, you really want to get the thing in your inbox, 676 00:25:21,713 --> 00:25:22,886 look at it, and say, 677 00:25:22,886 --> 00:25:24,102 “I’m either reading it now, 678 00:25:24,102 --> 00:25:26,818 “or I’m going to file it and put an entry in my to-do list.” 679 00:25:26,818 --> 00:25:29,118 And that’s just a crucial thing, because otherwise, 680 00:25:29,118 --> 00:25:30,673 every time you go to read your email, 681 00:25:30,673 --> 00:25:34,064 you’re just swamped, and it’s as bad as the cluttered paper. 682 00:25:36,044 --> 00:25:37,504 You’re all trying to figure out how 683 00:25:37,504 --> 00:25:41,209 that heading goes with that picture. 684 00:25:41,209 --> 00:25:44,639 A filing system is absolutely essential. 685 00:25:44,639 --> 00:25:46,203 And I know this because I married 686 00:25:46,203 --> 00:25:48,075 the most wonderful woman in the world, 687 00:25:48,075 --> 00:25:50,689 but she’s not a good filer. 688 00:25:50,689 --> 00:25:52,413 But she is now, 689 00:25:52,413 --> 00:25:55,657 because...after we got married, 690 00:25:55,657 --> 00:25:57,151 and we moved in together, 691 00:25:57,151 --> 00:25:59,492 and we resolved all the other typical couple things, I said, 692 00:25:59,492 --> 00:26:03,142 “We have to have a place where our papers go, 693 00:26:03,142 --> 00:26:05,399 “and it’s in alphabetical order.” 694 00:26:05,399 --> 00:26:07,838 And she said, “Well, that sounds a little compulsive…” 695 00:26:07,838 --> 00:26:10,485 [audience laughs] 696 00:26:10,485 --> 00:26:13,613 And I said, “Okay, honey….” 697 00:26:13,613 --> 00:26:16,227 So I went out to IKEA, and I got this big, nice, 698 00:26:16,227 --> 00:26:19,860 way-too-expensive, big, wooden, fake-mahogany thing, 699 00:26:19,860 --> 00:26:20,967 with big drawers, 700 00:26:20,967 --> 00:26:23,366 so she liked it, because it looked kind of nice. 701 00:26:23,366 --> 00:26:25,632 And having A Place in our house 702 00:26:25,632 --> 00:26:28,716 where any piece of paper went, and was in alphabetical order, 703 00:26:28,716 --> 00:26:31,289 did wonderful things for our marriage, 704 00:26:31,289 --> 00:26:32,499 because there was never any, 705 00:26:32,499 --> 00:26:35,086 “Honey, where did you put blah-blah-blah?” 706 00:26:35,086 --> 00:26:36,670 And there was never being mad at somebody 707 00:26:36,670 --> 00:26:38,554 because they put something in some unexpected place. 708 00:26:38,554 --> 00:26:40,610 There was an expected place for it. 709 00:26:40,610 --> 00:26:42,516 And when you’re looking for important receipts, 710 00:26:42,516 --> 00:26:44,622 or whatever it is, this is actually important. 711 00:26:44,622 --> 00:26:48,946 And, we have found that this has been a wonderful thing for us. 712 00:26:48,946 --> 00:26:51,153 I think file systems among groups of people, 713 00:26:51,153 --> 00:26:52,823 whether it’s a marriage or an office, are crucial, 714 00:26:52,823 --> 00:26:54,088 But even if it’s just you, 715 00:26:54,088 --> 00:26:56,650 having a place where you know you put something, 716 00:26:56,650 --> 00:26:59,572 really beats all hell out of running around for an hour, going, 717 00:26:59,572 --> 00:27:02,549 “Where is it? I know it’s blue. 718 00:27:03,429 --> 00:27:04,837 “And I was eating when I read it.” 719 00:27:04,837 --> 00:27:08,049 I mean, this is not a filing system. 720 00:27:08,049 --> 00:27:10,690 This is madness. 721 00:27:10,690 --> 00:27:11,882 A lot of people ask me, 722 00:27:11,882 --> 00:27:14,081 “So Randy, what does your desk look like?” 723 00:27:14,081 --> 00:27:15,558 So, as my wife would say, 724 00:27:15,558 --> 00:27:16,987 this is what Randy’s desk looks like 725 00:27:16,987 --> 00:27:19,015 when he’s photographing it for a talk. 726 00:27:19,015 --> 00:27:22,679 [audience laughs] 727 00:27:22,679 --> 00:27:24,548 The important thing is that I’m a computer geek, 728 00:27:24,548 --> 00:27:26,526 so I have the desk off to the right, 729 00:27:26,526 --> 00:27:29,075 and then I have the computer station off to the left. 730 00:27:29,075 --> 00:27:30,654 I like to have my desk in front of a window 731 00:27:30,654 --> 00:27:32,830 whenever I can do that. 732 00:27:32,830 --> 00:27:34,245 This is an old photograph. 733 00:27:34,245 --> 00:27:36,059 These have now been replaced by LCD monitors, 734 00:27:36,059 --> 00:27:38,176 but I left the old picture because the crucial thing is 735 00:27:38,176 --> 00:27:40,212 it doesn’t matter if they’re fancy high-tech, 736 00:27:40,212 --> 00:27:42,295 the key thing is screen space. 737 00:27:42,295 --> 00:27:43,471 Lots of people have studied this. 738 00:27:43,471 --> 00:27:44,985 How many people in this room 739 00:27:44,985 --> 00:27:48,566 have more than one monitor on their computer desktop? 740 00:27:48,566 --> 00:27:49,509 Okay, not bad. 741 00:27:49,509 --> 00:27:52,043 So we’re getting there, it’s startin' to happen. 742 00:27:52,043 --> 00:27:54,187 What I’ve found is that I could go back 743 00:27:54,187 --> 00:27:58,293 from three to two, but I just can’t go back to one. 744 00:27:58,293 --> 00:28:00,442 There’s just too many things, and as somebody said, 745 00:28:00,442 --> 00:28:03,424 it’s the difference between working on a desk, like at home, 746 00:28:03,424 --> 00:28:06,535 and trying to get work done on the little tray on an airplane. 747 00:28:06,535 --> 00:28:08,243 In principle, the little tray on the airplane 748 00:28:08,243 --> 00:28:10,608 is big enough for everything you need to do. 749 00:28:10,608 --> 00:28:14,424 It’s just that in practice, it’s pretty small. 750 00:28:14,424 --> 00:28:16,867 So, multiple monitors, I think, are very important. 751 00:28:16,867 --> 00:28:20,308 And I’ll show you in a second what is on each of those. 752 00:28:20,308 --> 00:28:23,440 And I believe in multiple monitors, we’ve believed in it for a long time. 753 00:28:23,440 --> 00:28:26,560 That’s my research group, 754 00:28:26,560 --> 00:28:29,313 our laboratory a long time ago, at Carnegie Mellon. 755 00:28:29,313 --> 00:28:31,750 That’s Caitlin Kelleher, who's now Doctor Kelleher, thank you, 756 00:28:31,750 --> 00:28:34,114 and she’s at Washington University in St. Louis, 757 00:28:34,114 --> 00:28:36,764 doing wonderful things. 758 00:28:36,764 --> 00:28:38,619 But we had everybody with three monitors, 759 00:28:38,619 --> 00:28:40,859 and the cost on this is absolutely trivial. 760 00:28:40,859 --> 00:28:44,246 If you figure the cost of adding a second monitor 761 00:28:44,246 --> 00:28:46,947 to an employee’s yearly cost to the company, 762 00:28:46,947 --> 00:28:49,655 it’s not even 1% anymore. 763 00:28:49,655 --> 00:28:50,881 So why would you not do it? 764 00:28:50,881 --> 00:28:52,686 So one of my “walk-aways” for all of you 765 00:28:52,686 --> 00:28:54,571 is you should all go to your boss and say, 766 00:28:54,571 --> 00:28:56,982 “I need a second monitor, I just can’t work without it. 767 00:28:56,982 --> 00:28:58,628 “Randy told me to tell you that.” 768 00:28:58,628 --> 00:29:00,340 [audience laughs] 769 00:29:00,340 --> 00:29:01,874 Because it will increase your productivity, 770 00:29:01,874 --> 00:29:04,863 and the computers can all drive two monitors, so why not? 771 00:29:04,863 --> 00:29:07,009 So what do I have on my three monitors? 772 00:29:07,009 --> 00:29:10,288 On the left is my to-do list, 773 00:29:10,288 --> 00:29:12,478 all sorts of stuff in there. 774 00:29:12,478 --> 00:29:14,437 And my system, we’re all idiosyncratic, 775 00:29:14,437 --> 00:29:17,426 my system is that I just put a number zero through nine, 776 00:29:17,426 --> 00:29:20,308 and I use an editor that can quickly sort on that number 777 00:29:20,308 --> 00:29:21,236 in the first column. 778 00:29:21,236 --> 00:29:24,053 But the key thing is, it’s sorted by priority. 779 00:29:24,053 --> 00:29:26,012 In the middle is my mail program. 780 00:29:26,012 --> 00:29:30,086 Note the empty inbox. 781 00:29:30,086 --> 00:29:34,095 And, I try very hard, I sleep better if I go to sleep 782 00:29:34,095 --> 00:29:35,997 with the inbox empty. 783 00:29:35,997 --> 00:29:39,505 When my inbox does creep up, I get really testy. 784 00:29:39,505 --> 00:29:41,250 So, my wife will actually say to me, 785 00:29:41,250 --> 00:29:43,218 “I think you need to clear the inbox.” 786 00:29:43,218 --> 00:29:45,214 [audience laughs] 787 00:29:45,214 --> 00:29:47,140 On the third one is a calendar. 788 00:29:47,140 --> 00:29:49,327 This is from a number of years ago, 789 00:29:49,327 --> 00:29:52,098 but that’s kind of like what my days would be. 790 00:29:52,098 --> 00:29:54,006 I used to be very heavily booked. 791 00:29:54,006 --> 00:29:55,950 And, I don’t care which software you use, 792 00:29:55,950 --> 00:29:57,355 I don’t care which calendar you use, 793 00:29:57,355 --> 00:29:58,911 I don’t care if it’s paper or computer, 794 00:29:58,911 --> 00:30:00,852 whatever works for you, 795 00:30:00,852 --> 00:30:04,027 but you should have some system whereby you know 796 00:30:04,027 --> 00:30:08,363 where you’re supposed to be next Tuesday at 2 o’clock. 797 00:30:08,363 --> 00:30:11,225 Because even if you can live your life without that, 798 00:30:11,225 --> 00:30:14,505 you’re using up a lot of your brain to remember all that. 799 00:30:14,505 --> 00:30:16,281 And I don’t know about you, but I don’t have enough brain 800 00:30:16,281 --> 00:30:18,148 to spare to use it on things 801 00:30:18,148 --> 00:30:21,301 I can have paper or computers do for me. 802 00:30:22,521 --> 00:30:25,853 So back to the overview. 803 00:30:25,853 --> 00:30:28,973 On the desk itself, let’s zoom in a little bit. 804 00:30:28,973 --> 00:30:32,924 Look, I have the one thing I am working on at the time. 805 00:30:32,924 --> 00:30:34,247 I have a speaker phone. 806 00:30:34,247 --> 00:30:34,973 This is crucial. 807 00:30:34,973 --> 00:30:37,595 How many people here have a speaker phone on their desks? 808 00:30:37,595 --> 00:30:40,998 Okay, not bad, but a lot more people don’t. 809 00:30:40,998 --> 00:30:43,780 Speaker phones are essentially free. 810 00:30:43,780 --> 00:30:46,327 And, I spend a lot of time on hold, 811 00:30:46,327 --> 00:30:48,748 and that’s because I live in American society 812 00:30:48,748 --> 00:30:50,572 where I get to listen to messages of the form, 813 00:30:50,572 --> 00:30:53,970 “Your call is extremely important to us. 814 00:30:53,970 --> 00:30:56,729 “Watch while my actions are cognitively dissonant 815 00:30:56,729 --> 00:30:58,200 from my words.” 816 00:30:58,207 --> 00:31:03,273 [audience laughs] 817 00:31:03,273 --> 00:31:07,314 It’s like the worst abusive relationship in the world. 818 00:31:07,314 --> 00:31:09,857 [audience laughs] 819 00:31:09,857 --> 00:31:11,560 I mean, imagine a guy picks you up on the first date 820 00:31:11,560 --> 00:31:12,605 and he smacks you on the mouth and says, 821 00:31:12,605 --> 00:31:13,826 “I love ya, honey.” 822 00:31:13,826 --> 00:31:16,592 That’s pretty much how modern customer service works 823 00:31:16,592 --> 00:31:18,599 on the telephone. 824 00:31:18,599 --> 00:31:19,976 But the great thing about a speaker phone is 825 00:31:19,976 --> 00:31:21,912 you hit the speaker phone and you dial, 826 00:31:21,912 --> 00:31:23,716 and then you just do something else, 827 00:31:23,716 --> 00:31:25,935 and if it takes seven minutes, it takes seven minutes. 828 00:31:25,935 --> 00:31:27,966 And hey, I just look at this as somebody’s piping music 829 00:31:27,966 --> 00:31:29,179 into my office. 830 00:31:29,179 --> 00:31:30,466 That’s very nice of them. 831 00:31:30,466 --> 00:31:31,409 [audience laughs] 832 00:31:31,409 --> 00:31:34,710 I also found that having a timer on the phone is handy 833 00:31:34,710 --> 00:31:37,349 so that when somebody finally picks up in Bangalore, 834 00:31:37,349 --> 00:31:41,157 I can say things like, 835 00:31:41,157 --> 00:31:43,000 “I’m so glad to be talking with you. 836 00:31:43,000 --> 00:31:44,732 “By the way, if you’re keeping records on this sort of thing, 837 00:31:44,732 --> 00:31:46,839 “I’ve been on hold for seven and a half minutes.” 838 00:31:46,839 --> 00:31:48,052 But you don’t say it angry, you just say it as, 839 00:31:48,052 --> 00:31:50,296 ”I presume you’re logging this kind of stuff.” 840 00:31:50,296 --> 00:31:52,228 And you’re not angry, so they don’t get angry back at you, 841 00:31:52,228 --> 00:31:54,601 but they feel really guilty. 842 00:31:54,601 --> 00:31:56,763 And that’s good, you want guilty, all right. 843 00:31:56,763 --> 00:31:57,471 [audience laughs] 844 00:31:57,471 --> 00:31:58,631 So a speaker phone is really great. 845 00:31:58,631 --> 00:31:59,858 I find that a speaker phone 846 00:31:59,858 --> 00:32:02,767 is probably the best material possession 847 00:32:02,767 --> 00:32:05,572 you can buy to counter stress. 848 00:32:05,572 --> 00:32:08,171 If I were, like, teaching a yoga meditation class, 849 00:32:08,171 --> 00:32:09,540 I’d say, we’ll do all the yoga and meditation, 850 00:32:09,540 --> 00:32:10,831 I think it’s wonderful stuff, 851 00:32:10,831 --> 00:32:13,456 but everybody also has to have a speaker phone. 852 00:32:13,456 --> 00:32:15,565 [audience laughs] 853 00:32:15,565 --> 00:32:16,824 What else do we have besides a speaker phone? 854 00:32:16,824 --> 00:32:19,162 Let’s talk about telephones for a second. 855 00:32:19,162 --> 00:32:21,707 I think that the telephone is a great time-waster, 856 00:32:21,707 --> 00:32:24,317 and I think it’s very important to keep your business calls short. 857 00:32:24,317 --> 00:32:26,975 So I recommend standing during phone calls. 858 00:32:26,975 --> 00:32:29,059 Great for exercise, and if you tell yourself, 859 00:32:29,059 --> 00:32:30,820 “I’m not going to sit down until the call is over,” 860 00:32:30,820 --> 00:32:34,979 you’ll be amazed how much brisker you are. 861 00:32:34,979 --> 00:32:37,200 Start by announcing goals for the call. 862 00:32:37,200 --> 00:32:39,003 “Hello, Sue? This is Randy. 863 00:32:39,003 --> 00:32:40,126 “I’m calling you because I have three things 864 00:32:40,126 --> 00:32:41,369 “that I wanted to get done.” 865 00:32:41,369 --> 00:32:42,249 Boom, boom, boom. 866 00:32:42,249 --> 00:32:44,032 Because then you’ve given her an agenda, 867 00:32:44,032 --> 00:32:45,310 and when you’re done with the three things, 868 00:32:45,310 --> 00:32:45,964 you can say, “That’s great. 869 00:32:45,964 --> 00:32:48,334 “Those are the three things I had, it was great to talk to you, 870 00:32:48,334 --> 00:32:49,204 “love to talk to you again, bye.” 871 00:32:49,204 --> 00:32:51,261 Boom, we’re off the phone. 872 00:32:51,261 --> 00:32:54,951 Whatever you do, do not put your feet up. 873 00:32:54,951 --> 00:32:57,456 I mean, if you put the feet up, it’s just all over. 874 00:32:57,456 --> 00:33:00,266 And the other handy trick is have something on your desk 875 00:33:00,266 --> 00:33:03,730 that you actually are kind of interested in going to do next. 876 00:33:03,730 --> 00:33:05,579 So that the phone call instead of being, 877 00:33:05,579 --> 00:33:08,510 “Wow, I can get off the phone and go do some work, grr, 878 00:33:08,510 --> 00:33:10,160 “or I could keep chit-chatting.” 879 00:33:10,160 --> 00:33:11,394 And usually the person you’ve called, 880 00:33:11,394 --> 00:33:13,594 they’d like to chit-chat, too. 881 00:33:13,594 --> 00:33:15,917 So this is where the time-waster in the office goes. 882 00:33:15,917 --> 00:33:19,258 And if you’re a grad student… 883 00:33:19,258 --> 00:33:19,981 well, if you’re a grad student, 884 00:33:19,981 --> 00:33:23,663 you already know about time wasting. 885 00:33:23,663 --> 00:33:25,748 So having something you really want to do next 886 00:33:25,748 --> 00:33:27,669 is a great way to get you off the phone quicker. 887 00:33:27,669 --> 00:33:30,571 So you gotta train yourself. 888 00:33:30,571 --> 00:33:32,853 Getting off the phone is hard for a lot of people. 889 00:33:32,853 --> 00:33:36,220 I don’t suffer from an abundance of politeness, 890 00:33:36,220 --> 00:33:39,303 so—my sister, whose known me for a long time, 891 00:33:39,303 --> 00:33:42,043 is laughing a knowing laugh. 892 00:33:42,043 --> 00:33:45,591 So, when I want to get off the phone, I want to get off the phone. 893 00:33:45,591 --> 00:33:46,600 I’m done. 894 00:33:46,600 --> 00:33:49,279 And what I say is, you know, 895 00:33:49,279 --> 00:33:51,988 “I’d love to keep talking with you, but I have some students waiting.” 896 00:33:51,988 --> 00:33:53,159 Now I’m a professor. 897 00:33:53,159 --> 00:33:55,901 Somewhere there must be students waiting. 898 00:33:55,901 --> 00:33:59,046 [audience laughs] 899 00:33:59,046 --> 00:34:02,445 Right, I mean, it’s just, it’s gotta be. 900 00:34:02,445 --> 00:34:04,085 Now sometimes you get in a situation like 901 00:34:04,085 --> 00:34:06,347 with a telemarketer, all right. 902 00:34:06,347 --> 00:34:10,041 And, that’s awkward because a lot of people are so polite. 903 00:34:10,041 --> 00:34:11,259 I have no trouble with telemarketers. 904 00:34:11,259 --> 00:34:13,393 I’ll just go there with them. 905 00:34:13,393 --> 00:34:14,814 All right, if you’re a telemarketer and you call my house, 906 00:34:14,814 --> 00:34:16,699 you have made a mistake. 907 00:34:16,699 --> 00:34:17,777 [audience laughs] 908 00:34:17,777 --> 00:34:18,332 All right. 909 00:34:18,332 --> 00:34:19,228 “Yeah, I can’t talk right now, 910 00:34:19,228 --> 00:34:20,685 but why don’t you give me your home phone number, 911 00:34:20,685 --> 00:34:23,437 and I’ll call you back around dinnertime.” 912 00:34:23,437 --> 00:34:24,743 Seinfeld did a great bit on that. 913 00:34:24,743 --> 00:34:27,233 Or, if you want to be a little bit more over the line, 914 00:34:27,233 --> 00:34:28,517 “I’d love to talk with you about that, 915 00:34:28,517 --> 00:34:32,415 “but first, I have some things I’d like to sell you!” 916 00:34:32,415 --> 00:34:33,048 And the funny part is, 917 00:34:33,048 --> 00:34:36,579 they never realize you’re yanking with them. 918 00:34:36,579 --> 00:34:38,531 But if you have to hang up on a telemarketer, 919 00:34:38,531 --> 00:34:41,817 what you do is, you hang up while you’re talking. 920 00:34:41,817 --> 00:34:43,471 “Well, I think that’s really interesting, 921 00:34:43,471 --> 00:34:44,474 and I would love to keep—.” 922 00:34:44,474 --> 00:34:48,754 You know. 923 00:34:48,754 --> 00:34:51,782 I mean, talk about self-effacing! 924 00:34:51,782 --> 00:34:53,988 Hanging up on yourself! 925 00:34:53,988 --> 00:34:56,032 And they won’t figure it out, and if they do, and they call back, 926 00:34:56,032 --> 00:34:57,372 just don’t answer, all right. 927 00:34:57,372 --> 00:35:01,118 So, ten years from now, all anybody will remember 928 00:35:01,118 --> 00:35:04,619 from this talk is hang up on yourself. 929 00:35:04,619 --> 00:35:05,918 The other thing is, group your phone calls. 930 00:35:05,918 --> 00:35:08,598 Call people right before lunch or right before the end of the day, 931 00:35:08,598 --> 00:35:11,981 because then they have something they would rather do 932 00:35:11,981 --> 00:35:14,268 than keep chitty-chatting with you. 933 00:35:14,268 --> 00:35:16,782 So I find that calling somebody at 11:50 is a great way 934 00:35:16,782 --> 00:35:18,812 to have a ten minute phone call. 935 00:35:18,812 --> 00:35:20,788 Because frankly, you may think you’re interesting, 936 00:35:20,788 --> 00:35:23,233 but you are not more interesting than lunch. 937 00:35:23,233 --> 00:35:25,285 [audience laughs] 938 00:35:25,285 --> 00:35:27,427 I have become very obsessive about phones 939 00:35:27,427 --> 00:35:28,903 and using time productively, 940 00:35:28,903 --> 00:35:32,408 so I just think that everybody should have something like this. 941 00:35:32,408 --> 00:35:34,687 I don’t care about fashions, so, you know. 942 00:35:34,687 --> 00:35:35,917 I don’t have Bluetooth. 943 00:35:35,917 --> 00:35:37,520 And, you know, I have this big, ugly thing— 944 00:35:37,520 --> 00:35:41,332 “Hi, I’m Julie from Time Life,” right? 945 00:35:41,332 --> 00:35:44,504 But the thing this allows me to do, because you know, 946 00:35:44,504 --> 00:35:46,512 I am sort of living the limit case right now of, 947 00:35:46,512 --> 00:35:49,709 I’ve gotta get stuff done, and I REALLY don’t have a lot of time. 948 00:35:49,709 --> 00:35:52,913 So, I get an hour a day where I exercise on my bike. 949 00:35:52,913 --> 00:35:54,556 And this is me on my bike, and if you look carefully, 950 00:35:54,556 --> 00:35:56,822 you can see I’m wearing that headset, and I’ve got my cell phone. 951 00:35:56,822 --> 00:35:59,176 And for an hour a day, I ride my bike around the neighborhood. 952 00:35:59,176 --> 00:36:01,579 This is time that I’m spending on the phone, 953 00:36:01,579 --> 00:36:04,408 getting work done, and it’s not a moment being taken away 954 00:36:04,408 --> 00:36:06,479 from my wife or children. 955 00:36:06,479 --> 00:36:09,943 And it turns out that I can talk and ride a bike at the same time. 956 00:36:09,943 --> 00:36:11,615 [audience laughs] 957 00:36:11,615 --> 00:36:14,082 Amazing the skill sets I have. 958 00:36:14,082 --> 00:36:17,317 So, it works better in cold weather climate-- 959 00:36:17,317 --> 00:36:18,863 in warm weather climates. 960 00:36:18,863 --> 00:36:22,057 But, I have just found that having a headset frees me up, 961 00:36:22,057 --> 00:36:23,638 even if it's just around the house you wear a headset, 962 00:36:23,638 --> 00:36:26,308 you can fold laundry, it’s an absolute twofer. 963 00:36:26,308 --> 00:36:29,743 And, I just think telephones should have headsets, 964 00:36:29,743 --> 00:36:31,881 and someday we will all have the Borg implant, 965 00:36:31,881 --> 00:36:34,722 and it will be a non-issue. 966 00:36:34,722 --> 00:36:35,606 What else is on my desk? 967 00:36:35,606 --> 00:36:37,151 I have a sort of one of those address stampers, 968 00:36:37,151 --> 00:36:39,523 because I got tired of writing my address. 969 00:36:39,523 --> 00:36:41,085 I have a box of Kleenex. 970 00:36:41,085 --> 00:36:43,164 In your office at work, if you’re a faculty member, 971 00:36:43,164 --> 00:36:47,007 you have to have a box of Kleenex. 972 00:36:47,007 --> 00:36:51,021 Because if— Jim is laughing. 973 00:36:51,021 --> 00:36:53,268 At least if you teach the way I do— 974 00:36:53,268 --> 00:36:55,679 [audience laughs] 975 00:36:55,679 --> 00:36:58,931 there will be crying students in your office. 976 00:36:58,931 --> 00:37:00,659 And what I found to diffuse a lot of that 977 00:37:00,659 --> 00:37:03,438 is that I would have CS352, or whatever, 978 00:37:03,438 --> 00:37:05,779 written on the side of the Kleenex box. 979 00:37:05,779 --> 00:37:08,662 And I would turn it as I handed it to them. 980 00:37:08,662 --> 00:37:10,558 And they would take the Kleenex, and they would be like, “Oh.” 981 00:37:10,558 --> 00:37:13,947 I said, “Yeah, you’re— it’s for the class. 982 00:37:13,947 --> 00:37:15,806 “You’re not alone.” 983 00:37:15,806 --> 00:37:17,955 So having Kleenex is very important. 984 00:37:22,135 --> 00:37:24,819 And “thank you” cards. 985 00:37:24,819 --> 00:37:26,630 I’ll now ask the embarrassment question, 986 00:37:26,630 --> 00:37:29,922 and I don’t mean to pick on you, but it just points things out so well. 987 00:37:29,922 --> 00:37:33,231 By show of hands, who here has written a “thank you” note 988 00:37:33,231 --> 00:37:34,687 that is not a quid pro quo. 989 00:37:34,687 --> 00:37:35,356 I don’t mean, 990 00:37:35,356 --> 00:37:38,554 “Oh, you gave me a gift, I wrote you a ‘thank you’ note.” 991 00:37:38,554 --> 00:37:39,815 And I mean a physical “thank you” note, 992 00:37:39,815 --> 00:37:41,827 with a pen and ink and paper. 993 00:37:41,827 --> 00:37:43,989 Not email, because email is better than nothing 994 00:37:43,989 --> 00:37:45,980 [in high-pitched voice] but it’s that much better than nothing. 995 00:37:45,980 --> 00:37:47,093 Okay. 996 00:37:47,093 --> 00:37:48,881 How many people here have written a “thank you” note 997 00:37:48,881 --> 00:37:51,621 in the last week? 998 00:37:51,621 --> 00:37:54,833 Not bad, I do better here than at most places, because it is UVA. 999 00:37:54,833 --> 00:37:55,521 [audience laughs] 1000 00:37:55,521 --> 00:37:56,701 Chivalry is not dead, but that’s not the— 1001 00:37:56,701 --> 00:37:58,560 how many people in the last month? 1002 00:37:58,560 --> 00:38:01,232 How many people in the last year? 1003 00:38:01,232 --> 00:38:04,586 The fact that there are a non-trivial number of hands not up 1004 00:38:04,586 --> 00:38:07,456 for the year means that anybody who is in this audience, 1005 00:38:07,456 --> 00:38:11,297 his parents are going, “Ooo, that way my kid.” 1006 00:38:11,297 --> 00:38:14,370 “Thank you” notes are really important. 1007 00:38:14,370 --> 00:38:17,139 They’re a very tangible way 1008 00:38:17,139 --> 00:38:19,317 to tell someone how much you appreciated things. 1009 00:38:19,317 --> 00:38:20,199 I have “thank you” notes with me, 1010 00:38:20,199 --> 00:38:22,476 and that’s because I’m actually writing some later today 1011 00:38:22,476 --> 00:38:24,841 to some people who’ve done some nice things for me recently. 1012 00:38:24,841 --> 00:38:25,984 And you say, “Well, god, you have time for that?” 1013 00:38:25,984 --> 00:38:26,254 And I’m like, 1014 00:38:26,254 --> 00:38:28,050 “Yes, I’ve have time for that, because it’s important.” 1015 00:38:28,050 --> 00:38:29,682 Even in my current status, 1016 00:38:29,682 --> 00:38:31,959 I will make time to write “thank you” notes to people. 1017 00:38:31,959 --> 00:38:35,955 And even if you’re a crafty, weasely bastard, 1018 00:38:35,955 --> 00:38:38,863 you should still write “thank you” notes, 1019 00:38:38,863 --> 00:38:42,027 because it makes you so rare, 1020 00:38:42,027 --> 00:38:43,972 that when someone gets a “thank you” note, 1021 00:38:43,972 --> 00:38:45,813 they will remember you, all right. 1022 00:38:45,813 --> 00:38:47,341 It seems like the only place that “thank you” notes 1023 00:38:47,341 --> 00:38:48,819 are really taken seriously anymore 1024 00:38:48,819 --> 00:38:51,164 is when people are interviewing for jobs. 1025 00:38:51,164 --> 00:38:52,463 They now sometimes write “thank you” notes 1026 00:38:52,463 --> 00:38:54,597 to the recruiters, 1027 00:38:54,597 --> 00:38:56,340 which I guess shows a sign of desperation 1028 00:38:56,340 --> 00:38:58,499 on the part of the recent graduate. 1029 00:38:58,499 --> 00:38:59,935 But “thank you” notes are a wonderful thing, 1030 00:38:59,935 --> 00:39:02,124 and I would encourage of all you to go out and buy a stack 1031 00:39:02,124 --> 00:39:03,442 at your local dime store, 1032 00:39:03,442 --> 00:39:06,266 and have them on your desk, so that when the moment seizes you, 1033 00:39:06,266 --> 00:39:07,069 it’s right there. 1034 00:39:07,069 --> 00:39:09,271 And I leave my “thank you” notes out on the desk, 1035 00:39:09,271 --> 00:39:10,949 readily accessible. 1036 00:39:12,699 --> 00:39:13,748 And as I’ve said before, 1037 00:39:13,748 --> 00:39:15,604 gratitude is something that can go beyond cards. 1038 00:39:15,604 --> 00:39:17,188 When I got tenure here, 1039 00:39:17,188 --> 00:39:19,401 I took my whole research team down to Disney World 1040 00:39:19,401 --> 00:39:20,794 on my nickel for a week. 1041 00:39:20,794 --> 00:39:22,676 And I believe in large gestures, 1042 00:39:22,676 --> 00:39:23,937 but, you know, it was also a lot of fun. 1043 00:39:23,937 --> 00:39:26,236 I wanted to go, too, right. 1044 00:39:26,236 --> 00:39:30,366 I didn’t send them without proper chaperoning, after all. 1045 00:39:30,366 --> 00:39:30,758 What else? 1046 00:39:30,758 --> 00:39:35,032 I have a paper recycling bin, and this is very good, 1047 00:39:35,032 --> 00:39:38,388 because it helps save the planet, but it also helps save my butt. 1048 00:39:38,388 --> 00:39:39,757 So, when I have a piece of paper 1049 00:39:39,757 --> 00:39:41,790 that I would be throwing away, I put it in that bin, 1050 00:39:41,790 --> 00:39:44,471 and that takes, I don’t know, a couple of weeks 1051 00:39:44,471 --> 00:39:48,786 to get filled up and then actually sent somewhere else. 1052 00:39:48,786 --> 00:39:49,790 And so what I’ve really done here, 1053 00:39:49,790 --> 00:39:52,923 is I’ve created sort of the Windows/Macintosh trash can 1054 00:39:52,923 --> 00:39:54,979 you can pull stuff back out of. 1055 00:39:54,979 --> 00:39:57,688 It works in the real world, too. 1056 00:39:57,688 --> 00:39:59,705 And about once a month, I go ferreting through there 1057 00:39:59,705 --> 00:40:02,295 to find the receipt that I didn’t think I’d ever need again 1058 00:40:02,295 --> 00:40:03,543 that I suddenly need. 1059 00:40:03,543 --> 00:40:04,898 And it’s extremely handy. 1060 00:40:04,898 --> 00:40:07,347 I suspect that if I were giving this talk in ten years, 1061 00:40:07,347 --> 00:40:10,167 I would say I just put it in the auto-scanner, 1062 00:40:10,167 --> 00:40:12,038 right, because I find it almost inconceivable 1063 00:40:12,038 --> 00:40:13,051 that ten years from now— first of all, 1064 00:40:13,051 --> 00:40:15,415 that a lot of this stuff would be paper in my hands anyway. 1065 00:40:15,415 --> 00:40:16,148 But if it were paper, 1066 00:40:16,148 --> 00:40:18,626 that I would have any notion of doing anything other than 1067 00:40:18,626 --> 00:40:21,010 putting it on the desk where it goes, “zzzt,” and it’s already scanned, 1068 00:40:21,010 --> 00:40:24,180 because it touched the desk, all right. 1069 00:40:24,180 --> 00:40:26,882 You know, this kind of stuff is not really hard to do. 1070 00:40:26,882 --> 00:40:27,953 So I think that’s what’s going to happen. 1071 00:40:27,953 --> 00:40:32,269 And of course, I have a phone book. 1072 00:40:32,269 --> 00:40:34,724 Notepad--I can’t live without Post-It notes, 1073 00:40:34,724 --> 00:40:37,069 all right, I mean.... 1074 00:40:37,069 --> 00:40:40,301 And, the view out the window of the dog. 1075 00:40:40,301 --> 00:40:44,846 Because the dog reminds me that I should be out playing with him. 1076 00:40:44,846 --> 00:40:46,462 We have a— when I got married, 1077 00:40:46,462 --> 00:40:48,187 I married into a family. 1078 00:40:48,187 --> 00:40:49,994 I got a wife and two beautiful dogs. 1079 00:40:49,994 --> 00:40:51,437 There’s the other one. 1080 00:40:51,437 --> 00:40:52,246 [audience laughs] 1081 00:40:52,246 --> 00:40:54,215 Could you help me with a debate I’ve had with my wife? 1082 00:40:54,215 --> 00:40:54,971 By show of hands, 1083 00:40:54,971 --> 00:40:56,533 how many people would semantically say, 1084 00:40:56,533 --> 00:40:58,417 "The dog is on the couch"? 1085 00:40:58,417 --> 00:41:00,210 [audience laughs] 1086 00:41:00,210 --> 00:41:03,744 Nobody! Thank you! Thank you! 1087 00:41:03,744 --> 00:41:07,253 Because the dog was not allowed on the couch. 1088 00:41:07,253 --> 00:41:09,533 And my wife came in one day... 1089 00:41:11,173 --> 00:41:12,683 and-- 1090 00:41:12,683 --> 00:41:14,326 anyway, thank you for agreeing with me. 1091 00:41:14,326 --> 00:41:17,687 It makes me feel very good. 1092 00:41:17,687 --> 00:41:19,098 So the dog is wonderful. 1093 00:41:19,098 --> 00:41:20,337 The dogs have long gone on, 1094 00:41:20,337 --> 00:41:21,984 but they are still in our hearts and our memories, 1095 00:41:21,984 --> 00:41:27,538 and I think of them every day, and they’re still a part of my life. 1096 00:41:27,538 --> 00:41:29,748 I’ve presented to you how I do my office, 1097 00:41:29,748 --> 00:41:30,662 how I do things. 1098 00:41:30,662 --> 00:41:32,045 It’s not the only way. 1099 00:41:32,045 --> 00:41:33,720 One of the best assistants I’ve ever met 1100 00:41:33,720 --> 00:41:35,281 was a woman named Tina Cobb. 1101 00:41:35,281 --> 00:41:36,658 And she has a really different system. 1102 00:41:36,658 --> 00:41:38,535 She’s a spreader. 1103 00:41:38,535 --> 00:41:39,193 All right. 1104 00:41:39,193 --> 00:41:41,013 If you think about it, there’s a method to her madness. 1105 00:41:41,013 --> 00:41:44,085 Everything here is exactly one arm’s radius 1106 00:41:44,085 --> 00:41:45,762 from where she sits. 1107 00:41:45,762 --> 00:41:48,759 You know, it’s like a two-armed octopus. 1108 00:41:48,759 --> 00:41:50,070 And she got so much stuff done. 1109 00:41:50,070 --> 00:41:52,314 And I never presume to tell somebody else 1110 00:41:52,314 --> 00:41:54,924 how to change their system if their system is workin’. 1111 00:41:54,924 --> 00:41:57,780 Tina was much more efficient than I was, so, you know, 1112 00:41:57,780 --> 00:41:59,603 I would just say, “Look, do what works for you.” 1113 00:41:59,603 --> 00:42:01,581 And everybody has to find the system for themselves. 1114 00:42:01,581 --> 00:42:04,878 But you really gotta think about what makes me more efficient. 1115 00:42:04,878 --> 00:42:06,297 Now let’s talk about office logistics. 1116 00:42:06,297 --> 00:42:08,793 In most office settings, people come into each other’s offices, 1117 00:42:08,793 --> 00:42:11,128 and proceed to suck the life out of each other. 1118 00:42:11,128 --> 00:42:12,798 [audience laughs] 1119 00:42:12,798 --> 00:42:15,106 If you have a big, cushy chair in your office, 1120 00:42:15,106 --> 00:42:17,894 you might as well just slather butter all over yourself 1121 00:42:17,894 --> 00:42:19,528 and send yourself naked into the woods 1122 00:42:19,528 --> 00:42:21,291 for the wild animals to attack you. 1123 00:42:21,291 --> 00:42:23,449 [audience laughs] 1124 00:42:23,449 --> 00:42:25,777 I say make your office comfortable for you, 1125 00:42:25,777 --> 00:42:28,155 and optionally comfortable for others. 1126 00:42:28,155 --> 00:42:29,273 So no comfy chairs. 1127 00:42:29,273 --> 00:42:32,087 I used to have folding chairs in my office, 1128 00:42:32,087 --> 00:42:33,176 folded up against the wall, 1129 00:42:33,176 --> 00:42:35,098 so people who want to come in to me and talk with me, 1130 00:42:35,098 --> 00:42:36,380 they can stand. 1131 00:42:36,380 --> 00:42:37,334 And I would stand up, 1132 00:42:37,334 --> 00:42:38,905 because then the meeting’s going to be really fast, 1133 00:42:38,905 --> 00:42:40,936 because we want to sit down. 1134 00:42:40,936 --> 00:42:42,163 But then if it looks it’s something 1135 00:42:42,163 --> 00:42:43,195 that we should have a little bit more time on, 1136 00:42:43,195 --> 00:42:45,885 I very graciously go over and open the folding chair. 1137 00:42:45,885 --> 00:42:48,491 I’m such a gentleman. 1138 00:42:48,491 --> 00:42:49,935 Some people do a different tactic on this. 1139 00:42:49,935 --> 00:42:50,870 They have the chair already there, 1140 00:42:50,870 --> 00:42:52,842 but they cut two inches off the front leg, 1141 00:42:52,842 --> 00:42:54,006 so the whole time you’re in their office, 1142 00:42:54,006 --> 00:42:55,698 you’re sort of scooting yourself up. 1143 00:42:55,698 --> 00:42:58,463 [audience laughs] 1144 00:42:58,463 --> 00:42:59,922 I’m not advocating that, 1145 00:42:59,922 --> 00:43:02,599 but I thought it was damn clever the first time I saw it. 1146 00:43:02,599 --> 00:43:06,627 [audience laughs] 1147 00:43:06,627 --> 00:43:08,378 Scheduling yourself. 1148 00:43:08,378 --> 00:43:09,264 Verbs are important. 1149 00:43:09,264 --> 00:43:12,332 You do not find time for important things, 1150 00:43:12,332 --> 00:43:13,359 you make it. 1151 00:43:13,359 --> 00:43:17,639 And you make time by electing not to do something else. 1152 00:43:17,639 --> 00:43:19,241 There’s a term from economics 1153 00:43:19,241 --> 00:43:22,029 that everybody should hold near and dear to their heart, 1154 00:43:22,029 --> 00:43:25,148 and that term is “opportunity cost.” 1155 00:43:25,148 --> 00:43:27,635 The bad thing about doing something 1156 00:43:27,635 --> 00:43:28,756 that isn’t very valuable, 1157 00:43:28,756 --> 00:43:30,738 is not that it’s a bad thing to have done it. 1158 00:43:30,738 --> 00:43:32,835 The problem is that once you spend an hour doing it, 1159 00:43:32,835 --> 00:43:36,520 that’s an hour you can never again spend in any other way. 1160 00:43:36,520 --> 00:43:38,315 And that’s important. 1161 00:43:38,315 --> 00:43:40,688 Now how do you keep these unimportant things 1162 00:43:40,688 --> 00:43:42,062 from sucking into your life? 1163 00:43:42,062 --> 00:43:44,532 You learn to say no. 1164 00:43:44,532 --> 00:43:46,362 It’s great, my youngest child Chloe 1165 00:43:46,362 --> 00:43:47,940 is at an age where this is her new word. 1166 00:43:47,940 --> 00:43:49,660 About two weeks ago she learned it. 1167 00:43:49,660 --> 00:43:51,120 And it’s like now, everything is, “No!” 1168 00:43:51,120 --> 00:43:52,887 “No! No! No-no-no-no-no! No!” 1169 00:43:52,887 --> 00:43:54,664 She should be giving this talk. 1170 00:43:54,664 --> 00:43:55,762 [audience laughs] 1171 00:43:55,762 --> 00:43:57,433 And I asked her, and she said, “No!” 1172 00:43:57,433 --> 00:43:59,576 [audience laughs] 1173 00:43:59,576 --> 00:44:02,207 So she’s home playing. 1174 00:44:02,207 --> 00:44:03,102 All right. 1175 00:44:03,102 --> 00:44:05,494 But we all hate to say no because people ask us for help, 1176 00:44:05,494 --> 00:44:06,527 and we want to be gracious. 1177 00:44:06,527 --> 00:44:09,369 So let me teach you some gentle “no’s.” 1178 00:44:09,369 --> 00:44:10,483 The first one is, 1179 00:44:10,483 --> 00:44:12,169 “I’ll do it if— I’m really strapped, 1180 00:44:12,169 --> 00:44:14,471 “but I want to help you, I don’t want you to be in the bind, 1181 00:44:14,471 --> 00:44:18,259 “so if nobody else steps forward, I will do this for you.” 1182 00:44:18,259 --> 00:44:19,006 All right. 1183 00:44:19,006 --> 00:44:20,267 Or, “I’ll be your fallback, 1184 00:44:20,267 --> 00:44:21,784 “but you have to keep searching for somebody else.” 1185 00:44:21,784 --> 00:44:23,871 Now, you will find out about the person’s character 1186 00:44:23,871 --> 00:44:25,639 at that moment, because if they say, 1187 00:44:25,639 --> 00:44:27,769 “Great! Whew, I got my sucker!” 1188 00:44:27,769 --> 00:44:29,470 And they stop looking, 1189 00:44:29,470 --> 00:44:31,324 then they have abused the relationship. 1190 00:44:31,324 --> 00:44:32,284 But if they say, “That’s great! 1191 00:44:32,284 --> 00:44:33,913 “My stress level’s down at zero, 1192 00:44:33,913 --> 00:44:35,611 “because now I know it’s not going to be a disaster. 1193 00:44:35,611 --> 00:44:36,633 “But I’m going to keep looking 1194 00:44:36,633 --> 00:44:38,877 “for somebody for whom it’s less of a imposition.” 1195 00:44:38,877 --> 00:44:42,626 That’s a person that will get lots of this sort of support. 1196 00:44:42,626 --> 00:44:43,795 Okay? 1197 00:44:43,795 --> 00:44:45,111 When I was in graduate school, 1198 00:44:45,111 --> 00:44:46,821 we did a moving party with four people, 1199 00:44:46,821 --> 00:44:49,228 a lot of moving parties, to carry heavy objects. 1200 00:44:49,228 --> 00:44:51,821 We had four people, we should have had 12. 1201 00:44:51,821 --> 00:44:53,793 It was a long day. 1202 00:44:53,793 --> 00:44:55,588 And after that, I adopted a new policy. 1203 00:44:55,588 --> 00:44:57,468 I said, “From now on, when somebody says, 1204 00:44:57,468 --> 00:44:58,501 ‘Will you help me move?’, 1205 00:44:58,501 --> 00:45:00,784 I’ll say, ‘How much stuff you got?’” 1206 00:45:00,784 --> 00:45:01,605 And they would tell me, and I'd say, 1207 00:45:01,605 --> 00:45:03,864 “Hmm, that sounds about like eight people. 1208 00:45:03,864 --> 00:45:06,372 “If you give me the names of seven other people that’ll be there, 1209 00:45:06,372 --> 00:45:08,167 “I’ll be there.” 1210 00:45:08,167 --> 00:45:09,609 And I never again was at a moving party 1211 00:45:09,609 --> 00:45:13,398 that went for 14 hours, 1212 00:45:13,398 --> 00:45:15,680 in January in Pittsburgh. 1213 00:45:15,680 --> 00:45:18,165 [audience laughs] 1214 00:45:18,165 --> 00:45:20,075 Everybody has good and bad times. 1215 00:45:20,075 --> 00:45:22,406 A big thing about time management is, 1216 00:45:22,406 --> 00:45:26,093 “Find your creative time and defend it ruthlessly.” 1217 00:45:26,093 --> 00:45:29,417 Spend it alone, Maybe at home, if you have to. 1218 00:45:29,417 --> 00:45:32,992 But, defend it ruthlessly. 1219 00:45:32,992 --> 00:45:34,836 The other thing is find your dead time. 1220 00:45:34,836 --> 00:45:37,917 Schedule meetings, phone calls, exercise, mundane stuff, 1221 00:45:37,917 --> 00:45:42,759 but do stuff during that where you don’t need to be at your best. 1222 00:45:42,759 --> 00:45:43,910 And we all have these times. 1223 00:45:43,910 --> 00:45:45,683 And the times are not at all intuitive. 1224 00:45:45,683 --> 00:45:47,767 I discovered that my most productive time 1225 00:45:47,767 --> 00:45:49,752 was between 10pm and midnight, 1226 00:45:49,752 --> 00:45:50,941 which is really weird, but it’s sort of this-- 1227 00:45:50,941 --> 00:45:54,368 for me, it’s just this burst of energy right before the end. 1228 00:45:54,368 --> 00:45:58,554 Let’s talk about interruptions. 1229 00:45:58,554 --> 00:45:59,510 And interruption— 1230 00:45:59,510 --> 00:46:01,023 there are people who measure this kind of stuff, 1231 00:46:01,023 --> 00:46:02,659 who have stopwatches and clipboards, 1232 00:46:02,659 --> 00:46:04,706 and what they say is that an interruption 1233 00:46:04,706 --> 00:46:07,163 takes typically six to nine minutes, 1234 00:46:07,163 --> 00:46:09,127 but then there’s a four to five minute recovery 1235 00:46:09,127 --> 00:46:11,605 to get your head back into what you’re doing. 1236 00:46:11,605 --> 00:46:13,373 And if you’re doing something like software creation, 1237 00:46:13,373 --> 00:46:14,791 you may never get your head back there, 1238 00:46:14,791 --> 00:46:17,089 the cost can be infinity. 1239 00:46:17,089 --> 00:46:18,070 But if you do the math on that, 1240 00:46:18,070 --> 00:46:22,782 five interruptions blows a whole hour. 1241 00:46:22,782 --> 00:46:25,578 So you’ve got to find ways to reduce both the frequency 1242 00:46:25,578 --> 00:46:27,237 and the length of these interruptions. 1243 00:46:27,237 --> 00:46:29,928 One of my favorites is turn phone calls into email. 1244 00:46:29,928 --> 00:46:31,546 If you phone my office at Carnegie Mellon, it says, 1245 00:46:31,546 --> 00:46:34,959 “Hi, this is Randy. Please, send me email.” 1246 00:46:34,959 --> 00:46:38,443 [audience laughs] 1247 00:46:38,443 --> 00:46:40,441 Again, I presume everybody here has email. 1248 00:46:40,441 --> 00:46:42,812 How many people here, when a new message comes in, 1249 00:46:42,812 --> 00:46:45,385 does your computer go “ding,” or makes some other noise? 1250 00:46:45,385 --> 00:46:47,024 Do we still have people doing that? 1251 00:46:47,024 --> 00:46:49,102 What the heck is wrong with you people? 1252 00:46:49,102 --> 00:46:49,653 [audience laughs] 1253 00:46:49,653 --> 00:46:51,048 And I love the fact that computer scientists 1254 00:46:51,048 --> 00:46:54,489 just know nothing about anything, so for years by default, 1255 00:46:54,489 --> 00:46:56,853 all these packages out of the box would go “ding!” 1256 00:46:56,853 --> 00:46:58,141 every time you get a new piece of email. 1257 00:46:58,141 --> 00:47:02,069 So we had taken a technology explicitly designed 1258 00:47:02,069 --> 00:47:03,921 to reduce interruption, 1259 00:47:03,921 --> 00:47:06,308 and we turn them into interruptions. 1260 00:47:06,308 --> 00:47:07,904 So you just gotta turn that off. 1261 00:47:07,904 --> 00:47:09,985 The whole point of email is you go to it when you’re ready, 1262 00:47:09,985 --> 00:47:12,026 not you’re sitting around like Pavlov’s dog, saying, 1263 00:47:12,026 --> 00:47:13,723 “Oh, maybe I’ll get another email.” 1264 00:47:13,723 --> 00:47:16,191 [audience laughs] 1265 00:47:16,191 --> 00:47:18,799 In the same way you try to not interrupt other people, 1266 00:47:18,799 --> 00:47:20,852 I save stuff up so I have boxes 1267 00:47:20,852 --> 00:47:23,020 for Tina, or for my research group meeting. 1268 00:47:23,020 --> 00:47:25,420 And I put stuff in those boxes, and then once a week, 1269 00:47:25,420 --> 00:47:26,871 or however often when the box gets full, 1270 00:47:26,871 --> 00:47:27,993 I walk down the hall, 1271 00:47:27,993 --> 00:47:29,458 and I interrupt that person one time and say, 1272 00:47:29,458 --> 00:47:32,379 “Here are the eight things I have for you.” 1273 00:47:32,379 --> 00:47:33,512 How do you cut things short, 1274 00:47:33,512 --> 00:47:34,252 because people will always want 1275 00:47:34,252 --> 00:47:35,829 to spend more time than you want to spend. 1276 00:47:35,829 --> 00:47:38,266 Well you can say, look, somebody interrupts you and says, 1277 00:47:38,266 --> 00:47:38,903 “Got a few minutes?” 1278 00:47:38,903 --> 00:47:40,660 And I say, “Well, I’m in the middle of something right now.” 1279 00:47:40,660 --> 00:47:41,446 And that tells them, 1280 00:47:41,446 --> 00:47:43,224 “I'm interrupting it, I’m going to do it quickly, 1281 00:47:43,224 --> 00:47:45,167 “but I’ve got to get back to that.” 1282 00:47:45,167 --> 00:47:47,291 Or you can say, “I only have five minutes.” 1283 00:47:47,291 --> 00:47:48,425 The great thing about that is 1284 00:47:48,425 --> 00:47:51,680 that later you have the privilege of extending that if you so choose. 1285 00:47:51,680 --> 00:47:52,811 But when the five minutes are up, you can say, 1286 00:47:52,811 --> 00:47:54,088 “Well, I said at the beginning I only had five minutes, 1287 00:47:54,088 --> 00:47:55,297 and I really have to go now.” 1288 00:47:55,297 --> 00:47:58,273 So it’s a very socially polite way to bound the amount of time 1289 00:47:58,273 --> 00:47:59,725 on the interaction. 1290 00:47:59,725 --> 00:48:01,627 If somebody’s in your office, and they don’t get it-- 1291 00:48:01,627 --> 00:48:03,361 now I’m not saying that as a computer scientist 1292 00:48:03,361 --> 00:48:05,920 I have an inordinate amount of time to interact— 1293 00:48:05,920 --> 00:48:08,988 opportunity to interact with people with no social skills, 1294 00:48:08,988 --> 00:48:13,848 [audience laughs] 1295 00:48:13,848 --> 00:48:18,420 But, if you have someone in your office who is just not getting it, 1296 00:48:18,420 --> 00:48:21,935 what you do is you stand up, you walk to the door, 1297 00:48:21,935 --> 00:48:23,380 you compliment them. 1298 00:48:23,380 --> 00:48:26,522 For some reason, this is a crucial part of the process. 1299 00:48:26,522 --> 00:48:29,634 You thank them, and you shake their hand. 1300 00:48:29,634 --> 00:48:31,866 And if they still don’t leave, 1301 00:48:31,866 --> 00:48:34,617 which is pretty much a guarantee that you’re dealing 1302 00:48:34,617 --> 00:48:37,364 with someone from my tribe, 1303 00:48:37,364 --> 00:48:39,978 then you’re in the doorway, you just keep going. 1304 00:48:39,978 --> 00:48:44,158 [audience laughs] 1305 00:48:44,158 --> 00:48:45,787 What I have found is that people don’t like it 1306 00:48:45,787 --> 00:48:48,351 when you look at your watch while you’re talking with them. 1307 00:48:48,351 --> 00:48:51,392 So what I do is I put a wall on the clock right behind them, 1308 00:48:51,392 --> 00:48:53,865 so it’s just off access from their eyes, 1309 00:48:53,865 --> 00:48:55,532 and I can just kind of glance over a little bit 1310 00:48:55,532 --> 00:48:56,857 when I need to see what time it is. 1311 00:48:56,857 --> 00:48:58,521 It’s a very nice way to get me information 1312 00:48:58,521 --> 00:49:00,851 without being rude to them. 1313 00:49:00,851 --> 00:49:01,746 Time journals. 1314 00:49:01,746 --> 00:49:02,713 Time is the commodity, 1315 00:49:02,713 --> 00:49:05,839 you better find out where your time is going. 1316 00:49:05,839 --> 00:49:09,399 So monitor yourself, and update it throughout the day. 1317 00:49:09,399 --> 00:49:10,667 You can’t wait until the end of the day and say, 1318 00:49:10,667 --> 00:49:12,131 “What was I doing at 10:30?” 1319 00:49:12,131 --> 00:49:13,311 because our memories aren’t that good. 1320 00:49:13,311 --> 00:49:16,105 So what you do, and I really hope that technology 1321 00:49:16,105 --> 00:49:17,807 within, you know, another five years or so, 1322 00:49:17,807 --> 00:49:19,417 will be so good that the time journals 1323 00:49:19,417 --> 00:49:22,503 can be created automatically, or at least some facsimile of it. 1324 00:49:22,503 --> 00:49:25,261 But until then, what we do is we monitor it ourselves. 1325 00:49:25,261 --> 00:49:27,482 So this is what an empty time journal would look like. 1326 00:49:27,482 --> 00:49:28,452 The details aren’t important, 1327 00:49:28,452 --> 00:49:30,410 but the key thing is that when you fill it in, 1328 00:49:30,410 --> 00:49:32,940 you’ve got a bunch of categories, and what I was doing. 1329 00:49:32,940 --> 00:49:35,032 And you can do this very informally, 1330 00:49:35,032 --> 00:49:39,074 but you get a lot of real data about where your time went. 1331 00:49:39,074 --> 00:49:40,209 And it’s always very different. 1332 00:49:40,209 --> 00:49:42,088 Anybody who has done monetary budgeting, 1333 00:49:42,088 --> 00:49:43,022 you look at it and you go, "Wow! 1334 00:49:43,022 --> 00:49:45,386 "I didn't know I was spending that much on dry cleaning.” 1335 00:49:45,386 --> 00:49:48,566 Or restaurants or-- it’s always a fascinating surprise. 1336 00:49:48,566 --> 00:49:51,486 And you always spend more than you think. 1337 00:49:51,486 --> 00:49:52,512 But with time budgets, 1338 00:49:52,512 --> 00:49:54,909 you find out that the time is just going wildly differently 1339 00:49:54,909 --> 00:49:57,063 than you would have imagined. 1340 00:49:57,063 --> 00:49:58,250 The best example of this I know 1341 00:49:58,250 --> 00:50:00,591 is Turing Award winner Fred Brooks’s time clocks. 1342 00:50:00,591 --> 00:50:03,801 He’s a brilliant computer scientist, but he also has this great array 1343 00:50:03,801 --> 00:50:04,945 of clocks in his office, 1344 00:50:04,945 --> 00:50:06,638 and when you go in and talk to him, he says, 1345 00:50:06,638 --> 00:50:08,597 “Is this meeting about research or teaching?” 1346 00:50:08,597 --> 00:50:09,864 or whatever, 1347 00:50:09,864 --> 00:50:11,319 and then he flips the appropriate switch, 1348 00:50:11,319 --> 00:50:14,063 And at the end of the week, he knows exactly where his time went. 1349 00:50:14,063 --> 00:50:15,250 [audience laughs] 1350 00:50:15,250 --> 00:50:20,204 The man is a genius! 1351 00:50:20,204 --> 00:50:22,472 When I meet with students, 1352 00:50:22,472 --> 00:50:25,446 and this is, I think, just as appropriate for people in the workplace, 1353 00:50:25,446 --> 00:50:26,481 I say, “What’s your schedule?” 1354 00:50:26,481 --> 00:50:29,969 You have a set of fixed meetings every time, every week. 1355 00:50:29,969 --> 00:50:32,040 And, what you have to do is, you have to look at those 1356 00:50:32,040 --> 00:50:35,568 and identify the open blocks where you’re going to waste time, 1357 00:50:35,568 --> 00:50:37,712 and I can tell your going to waste time just by looking at. 1358 00:50:37,712 --> 00:50:40,641 So in this case, you’ve got a class where, uh, 1359 00:50:40,641 --> 00:50:42,600 you’ve got a class at a certain point, 1360 00:50:42,600 --> 00:50:43,972 and then you’ve got a gap until the next class, 1361 00:50:43,972 --> 00:50:46,027 so I’ve identified those here. 1362 00:50:46,027 --> 00:50:48,006 And the gaps between classes 1363 00:50:48,006 --> 00:50:50,600 that in this case last an hour or an hour and a half, 1364 00:50:50,600 --> 00:50:52,685 this is just prime time to be wasted. 1365 00:50:52,685 --> 00:50:56,111 So what I always taught my students was, make up a fake class. 1366 00:50:56,111 --> 00:50:58,548 The fake class is go to one specific place 1367 00:50:58,548 --> 00:51:00,241 in the library during that hour, 1368 00:51:00,241 --> 00:51:01,721 and when you’re sitting there 1369 00:51:01,721 --> 00:51:03,757 with just you in the library and your books, 1370 00:51:03,757 --> 00:51:06,886 there’s a pretty good chance you might actually study. 1371 00:51:06,886 --> 00:51:09,280 So, don’t go and hang out with friends for an hour, 1372 00:51:09,280 --> 00:51:11,548 just make that a fake class, make your own little study hall. 1373 00:51:11,548 --> 00:51:12,454 It’s a simple trick, 1374 00:51:12,454 --> 00:51:13,826 but it’s amazing how effective it is 1375 00:51:13,826 --> 00:51:17,181 when somebody just explicitly does it. 1376 00:51:17,181 --> 00:51:18,645 When you’ve got your time journal data, 1377 00:51:18,645 --> 00:51:19,763 what do you figure out from that? 1378 00:51:19,763 --> 00:51:21,954 What am I doing that doesn't need to be done? 1379 00:51:21,954 --> 00:51:23,051 What can someone else do? 1380 00:51:23,051 --> 00:51:24,953 I love every day sort of saying, 1381 00:51:24,953 --> 00:51:26,620 “What am I doing that I could delegate 1382 00:51:26,620 --> 00:51:28,687 “to somebody else?” 1383 00:51:28,687 --> 00:51:30,021 My sister is again laughing 1384 00:51:30,021 --> 00:51:33,953 because she knows who that person was in our youth. 1385 00:51:33,953 --> 00:51:35,713 What can I do more efficiently? 1386 00:51:35,713 --> 00:51:37,916 And, how am I wasting other people’s time? 1387 00:51:37,916 --> 00:51:39,155 When you get good at time management, 1388 00:51:39,155 --> 00:51:40,920 you realize that it’s a collaborative thing. 1389 00:51:40,920 --> 00:51:42,757 I want to make everybody more efficient. 1390 00:51:42,757 --> 00:51:44,566 It’s not a selfish thing, it’s not me against you. 1391 00:51:44,566 --> 00:51:49,316 It’s how do we all collectively get more done. 1392 00:51:49,316 --> 00:51:50,909 As you push on the time journal stuff, 1393 00:51:50,909 --> 00:51:53,581 you start to find that you don’t make yourself 1394 00:51:53,581 --> 00:51:55,185 more efficient at work 1395 00:51:55,185 --> 00:51:58,126 so you can become some sort of uber worker person. 1396 00:51:58,126 --> 00:52:01,813 You become more efficient at work so you can leave at 5, 1397 00:52:01,813 --> 00:52:05,972 and go home and be with the people that you love. 1398 00:52:05,972 --> 00:52:08,587 People call this work-life balance. 1399 00:52:08,587 --> 00:52:11,892 For the junior faculty, you may have heard of it 1400 00:52:11,892 --> 00:52:13,029 [audience laughs] 1401 00:52:13,029 --> 00:52:16,498 in some sort of mythical sense. 1402 00:52:16,498 --> 00:52:18,941 But it is possible. 1403 00:52:18,941 --> 00:52:21,217 I found that I worked less— 1404 00:52:21,217 --> 00:52:23,671 I worked fewer hours after I got married, 1405 00:52:23,671 --> 00:52:25,317 and I got more done. 1406 00:52:25,317 --> 00:52:27,186 And I was alway fascinated in graduate school 1407 00:52:27,186 --> 00:52:30,320 that the people who graduated fastest with their PhD’s 1408 00:52:30,320 --> 00:52:33,098 were the people who had a spouse and kids. 1409 00:52:33,098 --> 00:52:35,623 And I said, how can that be, that’s like a built-in boat anchor. 1410 00:52:35,623 --> 00:52:36,245 [audience laughs] 1411 00:52:36,245 --> 00:52:37,040 All right. 1412 00:52:37,040 --> 00:52:39,580 You know, you got all these other demands on your time, 1413 00:52:39,580 --> 00:52:40,788 and I’m, like, a single guy, 1414 00:52:40,788 --> 00:52:43,078 and I got all the time in the world, and that’s the problem. 1415 00:52:43,078 --> 00:52:45,847 I approach it like I got all the time in the world, 1416 00:52:45,847 --> 00:52:47,715 so my time isn’t precious. 1417 00:52:47,715 --> 00:52:49,551 When you got a spouse and little kids, 1418 00:52:49,551 --> 00:52:51,844 your spouse is likely to say things to you like, 1419 00:52:51,844 --> 00:52:53,636 “You better not be in at that grad school 1420 00:52:53,636 --> 00:52:55,013 “more than 40 hours a week.” 1421 00:52:55,013 --> 00:52:56,072 So when you come in, 1422 00:52:56,072 --> 00:52:57,423 you’re not sitting around playing computer games, 1423 00:52:57,423 --> 00:52:59,015 not that I ever did that. 1424 00:52:59,015 --> 00:53:00,507 [audience laughs] 1425 00:53:00,507 --> 00:53:02,670 But when you come in, you’re comin' in, and you’re doing work. 1426 00:53:02,670 --> 00:53:04,047 And I found, like most people, 1427 00:53:04,047 --> 00:53:06,085 that once I got married and had kids, 1428 00:53:06,085 --> 00:53:08,161 my whole view of time management really got— 1429 00:53:08,161 --> 00:53:10,446 I mean, we were playing for real stakes now. 1430 00:53:10,446 --> 00:53:12,257 Because now there are people who’s lives are impacted 1431 00:53:12,257 --> 00:53:15,446 if I’m spending too much time at work. 1432 00:53:15,446 --> 00:53:16,579 The other thing about time management, 1433 00:53:16,579 --> 00:53:19,244 it makes you really start to look through a crystalline lens 1434 00:53:19,244 --> 00:53:21,007 and figure out what’s important and what’s not. 1435 00:53:21,007 --> 00:53:23,445 I love this picture. 1436 00:53:23,445 --> 00:53:25,682 I’ve blanked out her name, but this says, 1437 00:53:25,682 --> 00:53:26,733 “Blah-blah-blah-blah—,” 1438 00:53:26,733 --> 00:53:28,529 this is a pregnant woman, and it says, 1439 00:53:28,529 --> 00:53:31,458 “She is worrying about the effect on her unborn child 1440 00:53:31,458 --> 00:53:33,467 “from the sound of jackhammers.” 1441 00:53:33,467 --> 00:53:35,695 So they're doing construction, and the people here are laughing 1442 00:53:35,695 --> 00:53:37,387 because they can see that this woman, 1443 00:53:37,387 --> 00:53:38,704 who’s so concerned about the jackhammers 1444 00:53:38,704 --> 00:53:42,257 affecting her unborn child, is holding a lit cigarette. 1445 00:53:42,257 --> 00:53:44,180 [audience laughs] 1446 00:53:44,180 --> 00:53:45,766 You gotta get really good at saying, 1447 00:53:45,766 --> 00:53:48,474 “I gotta focus my time and energy on the things that matter.” 1448 00:53:48,474 --> 00:53:50,034 And not worry about the things that don’t. 1449 00:53:50,034 --> 00:53:53,611 Now I’m not a medical doctor, and I don’t play one on TV, 1450 00:53:53,611 --> 00:53:55,818 but I’m willing to bet that if I were the fetus, 1451 00:53:55,818 --> 00:53:56,323 I’d be saying, 1452 00:53:56,323 --> 00:53:58,093 [yelling] “Put the cigarette out, mom! 1453 00:53:58,093 --> 00:53:59,868 I can do deal with the noise!” 1454 00:53:59,868 --> 00:54:04,173 [audience laughs] 1455 00:54:04,173 --> 00:54:05,880 Alrighty, so in terms of— 1456 00:54:05,880 --> 00:54:09,282 I want to tell you a little story about effective versus efficient. 1457 00:54:09,282 --> 00:54:11,578 I actually was going to give this talk a couple of weeks ago, 1458 00:54:11,578 --> 00:54:13,103 and I talked with Gabe about it, 1459 00:54:13,103 --> 00:54:16,952 and we were going to come up here as a surprise for my wife. 1460 00:54:16,952 --> 00:54:19,123 Her favorite musical group in the whole world is “The Police,” 1461 00:54:19,123 --> 00:54:22,266 and has been for a long, long time, they’re a wonderful group. 1462 00:54:22,266 --> 00:54:23,374 And so we said, 1463 00:54:23,374 --> 00:54:25,036 “Hey, we’re going to drive her up to Charlottesville and seem them.” 1464 00:54:25,036 --> 00:54:26,227 We managed to get some tickets. 1465 00:54:26,227 --> 00:54:28,096 And I said, “Well honey, as long as we’re up there, 1466 00:54:28,096 --> 00:54:29,317 “I promised Gabe a long time ago 1467 00:54:29,317 --> 00:54:30,664 “that I wanted to give my time management talk,” 1468 00:54:30,664 --> 00:54:32,951 and she said okay, because it’s about a three-hour drive, 1469 00:54:32,951 --> 00:54:35,762 so it's very efficient to couple these two trips together. 1470 00:54:35,762 --> 00:54:36,642 And about two days later she said, 1471 00:54:36,642 --> 00:54:39,395 “You know honey, I know how you are with talks. 1472 00:54:39,395 --> 00:54:41,192 "And before you give one, for a couple of days, 1473 00:54:41,192 --> 00:54:43,101 you start to obsess.” 1474 00:54:43,101 --> 00:54:46,015 [mouthing words, no sound] 1475 00:54:46,015 --> 00:54:48,809 And, as we talked through it, she said, 1476 00:54:48,809 --> 00:54:50,699 “So we’re going to go up on this couple’s time away"-- 1477 00:54:50,699 --> 00:54:52,344 we’d gotten a sitter to watch the kids, 1478 00:54:52,344 --> 00:54:55,065 “and this couple’s time away is going to be eaten up 1479 00:54:55,065 --> 00:54:57,987 by you obsessing over and preparing this talk.” 1480 00:54:57,987 --> 00:54:59,011 And, I thought about it, and I said, 1481 00:54:59,011 --> 00:55:00,882 “Okay, so obviously the right solution 1482 00:55:00,882 --> 00:55:03,245 “is we should keep our couple’s time our couple’s time. 1483 00:55:03,245 --> 00:55:04,762 “We’ll go up, we’ll see the concert, 1484 00:55:04,762 --> 00:55:06,195 “you know, we’ll have our time together, 1485 00:55:06,195 --> 00:55:07,445 “and I’ll just schedule a different day, 1486 00:55:07,445 --> 00:55:09,822 “and I’ll go up on a one-day trip and I’ll do the talk.” 1487 00:55:09,822 --> 00:55:12,403 And she said, “Wow, that was easy!” 1488 00:55:12,403 --> 00:55:14,835 Right, once you frame it in the right way, and you say, 1489 00:55:14,835 --> 00:55:18,952 “Yeah, the cost here is that I have to do the drive a second time.” 1490 00:55:18,952 --> 00:55:21,811 But it turns out I’m doing the drive with my nephew, Christopher, 1491 00:55:21,811 --> 00:55:23,517 and we talk, and my mom turns out 1492 00:55:23,517 --> 00:55:25,331 so the time wasn’t even dead-time, 1493 00:55:25,331 --> 00:55:26,321 so there was no loss at all. 1494 00:55:26,321 --> 00:55:27,980 But the key thing was we said, 1495 00:55:27,980 --> 00:55:29,138 “It’s not about efficiency, 1496 00:55:29,138 --> 00:55:32,384 "it’s about effectiveness and best overall outcome.” 1497 00:55:32,384 --> 00:55:33,384 And of course one of the nice things 1498 00:55:33,384 --> 00:55:35,066 was that we did get to go to “The Police” concert, 1499 00:55:35,066 --> 00:55:36,995 and I really want to thank Gabe and Jim Aylor, 1500 00:55:36,995 --> 00:55:38,676 because we REALLY went to the concert. 1501 00:55:38,676 --> 00:55:40,051 [audience laughs] 1502 00:55:40,051 --> 00:55:42,436 And my wife was very happy. 1503 00:55:42,436 --> 00:55:43,716 [audience laughs] 1504 00:55:43,716 --> 00:55:45,484 I’m the guy in the back, saying, 1505 00:55:45,484 --> 00:55:47,826 “She’s not paying any attention to me today!” 1506 00:55:47,826 --> 00:55:50,464 [audience laughs] 1507 00:55:50,464 --> 00:55:51,600 But it was wonderful. 1508 00:55:51,600 --> 00:55:53,874 And he is charming gentleman in person, 1509 00:55:53,874 --> 00:55:56,469 he is absolutely charming. 1510 00:55:56,469 --> 00:55:57,744 So let’s talk about procrastination. 1511 00:55:57,744 --> 00:56:00,347 There’s an old saying: “Procrastination is the thief of time.” 1512 00:56:00,347 --> 00:56:01,700 Procrastination is hard. 1513 00:56:01,700 --> 00:56:04,000 And I have a little bit of an insight here for you. 1514 00:56:04,000 --> 00:56:07,051 We don’t usually procrastinate because we’re lazy. 1515 00:56:07,051 --> 00:56:09,349 Sometimes people rationalize their procrastination. 1516 00:56:09,349 --> 00:56:11,562 They say, “Well, gee, if I wait long enough, 1517 00:56:11,562 --> 00:56:14,148 “maybe I won’t have to do it.” 1518 00:56:14,148 --> 00:56:15,093 Right? 1519 00:56:15,093 --> 00:56:19,431 That’s true, sometimes you get lucky, all right. 1520 00:56:19,431 --> 00:56:22,496 But--and other people say, “Gee, if I start on it now, 1521 00:56:22,496 --> 00:56:24,081 I’m just going to spend all the time on it. 1522 00:56:24,081 --> 00:56:27,448 “If I only give myself the last two days, I’ll do it in two days, 1523 00:56:27,448 --> 00:56:30,091 “because as the work expands to fill the time available— 1524 00:56:30,091 --> 00:56:31,282 Parkinson’s Law.” 1525 00:56:31,282 --> 00:56:33,636 That’s marginally true. 1526 00:56:33,636 --> 00:56:37,411 But I think the key balance here is to understand that doing things 1527 00:56:37,411 --> 00:56:40,733 at the last minute is really expensive. 1528 00:56:40,733 --> 00:56:43,670 And it’s just much more expensive than doing it just 1529 00:56:43,670 --> 00:56:45,446 before the last minute. 1530 00:56:45,446 --> 00:56:48,309 So if you’re doing something, and you can still mail it 1531 00:56:48,309 --> 00:56:50,164 through the US mail, you have suddenly avoided 1532 00:56:50,164 --> 00:56:52,479 the “Oh my god, I’ve gotta do the whole FedEx thing!” 1533 00:56:52,479 --> 00:56:53,921 Now, I love Fed-Ex. 1534 00:56:53,921 --> 00:56:58,417 FedEx supports our whole universal habit of procrastination. 1535 00:56:58,417 --> 00:57:00,960 But it also allows us to get stuff there when it really has 1536 00:57:00,960 --> 00:57:03,028 to be there in a hurry, so that's a wonderful thing. 1537 00:57:03,028 --> 00:57:06,022 But I think you have to, you have to realize that 1538 00:57:06,022 --> 00:57:07,558 if you push things right up to the deadline, 1539 00:57:07,558 --> 00:57:09,632 that’s where all the stress comes from, 1540 00:57:09,632 --> 00:57:11,973 because now you can’t reach people. 1541 00:57:11,973 --> 00:57:14,277 If somebody is out of the office for just one day, 1542 00:57:14,277 --> 00:57:15,375 your whole plan is upset, 1543 00:57:15,375 --> 00:57:17,912 so you really have to work hard on this kind of stuff. 1544 00:57:17,912 --> 00:57:19,534 The other thing is that deadlines are really important. 1545 00:57:19,534 --> 00:57:21,148 We are all essentially deadline-driven, 1546 00:57:21,148 --> 00:57:23,184 so if you have something that isn’t due for a long time, 1547 00:57:23,184 --> 00:57:26,246 make up a fake deadline, and act like it’s real. 1548 00:57:26,246 --> 00:57:27,857 And that's wonderful because those are the deadlines, 1549 00:57:27,857 --> 00:57:30,150 when push comes to shove, you can slip 'em by a couple of days, 1550 00:57:30,150 --> 00:57:33,590 and it’s all right, so they’re less stressful. 1551 00:57:33,590 --> 00:57:35,172 If you are procrastinating, 1552 00:57:35,172 --> 00:57:38,252 you’ve gotta find some way to get back into your comfort zone. 1553 00:57:38,252 --> 00:57:40,248 Identify why you’re not enthusiastic. 1554 00:57:40,248 --> 00:57:41,532 Whenever I procrastinate on something, 1555 00:57:41,532 --> 00:57:43,656 there’s always a deep psychological reason. 1556 00:57:43,656 --> 00:57:45,624 Usually it’s I’m afraid of being embarrassed 1557 00:57:45,624 --> 00:57:47,681 because I don’t think I’ll do well, 1558 00:57:47,681 --> 00:57:49,603 or I'm afraid I'm going to fail at it. 1559 00:57:49,603 --> 00:57:53,899 And, sometimes it involves asking somebody for something. 1560 00:57:53,899 --> 00:57:56,322 And one of the most magical things I’ve learned in my life 1561 00:57:56,322 --> 00:57:59,599 is that sometimes you just have to ask 1562 00:57:59,599 --> 00:58:01,234 and wonderful things happen. 1563 00:58:01,234 --> 00:58:02,541 But you just have to, 1564 00:58:02,541 --> 00:58:05,924 you know, step out and do that. 1565 00:58:05,924 --> 00:58:09,343 I won the parent lottery, I have just wonderful parents. 1566 00:58:09,343 --> 00:58:12,193 And my dad unfortunately passed away not too long ago. 1567 00:58:12,193 --> 00:58:13,644 But this is one of my favorite photographs, 1568 00:58:13,644 --> 00:58:15,262 because my dad was such a smart guy, 1569 00:58:15,262 --> 00:58:17,545 I could almost never surprise him or impress him, 1570 00:58:17,545 --> 00:58:19,320 because he was just that good. 1571 00:58:19,320 --> 00:58:21,426 But we were down on a family vacation at Disney World, 1572 00:58:21,426 --> 00:58:22,470 and the Monorails were going by, 1573 00:58:22,470 --> 00:58:23,847 and we were going to board the Monorail, 1574 00:58:23,847 --> 00:58:26,363 and we noticed that in the front, up here in the cabin, 1575 00:58:26,363 --> 00:58:27,968 I don’t know if you can see it in this picture, 1576 00:58:27,968 --> 00:58:29,701 but there’s a engineer who drives the Monorail, 1577 00:58:29,701 --> 00:58:31,963 and there were actually guests up in there with him, 1578 00:58:31,963 --> 00:58:33,456 which is kind of unusual. 1579 00:58:33,456 --> 00:58:35,021 My dad and I were talking about that, 1580 00:58:35,021 --> 00:58:36,393 and I knew, 1581 00:58:36,393 --> 00:58:38,127 because I’ve done some consulting for Disney. 1582 00:58:38,127 --> 00:58:38,719 My dad’s saying, 1583 00:58:38,719 --> 00:58:41,739 "They probably have to be special VIPs, or something like that.” 1584 00:58:41,739 --> 00:58:42,984 I said, “There is a trick. 1585 00:58:42,984 --> 00:58:45,924 “There is a special way you get into that cabin.” 1586 00:58:45,924 --> 00:58:47,009 And he said, “Really, what is it?” 1587 00:58:47,009 --> 00:58:48,577 And I said, “I’ll show you. Dylan, come with me.” 1588 00:58:48,577 --> 00:58:49,915 And Dylan, who’s— 1589 00:58:49,915 --> 00:58:51,465 the back of his head you can see there, 1590 00:58:51,465 --> 00:58:52,859 we walk up, and I whisper to Dylan, 1591 00:58:52,859 --> 00:58:55,505 [whispering] “Ask the man if we can ride in the front.” 1592 00:58:55,505 --> 00:58:56,170 [audience laughs] 1593 00:58:56,170 --> 00:58:58,482 And we go to the attendant, and the attendant says, 1594 00:58:58,482 --> 00:58:59,214 “Why, yes you can.” 1595 00:58:59,214 --> 00:59:01,448 And he opens the gate, and my dad is just like…. 1596 00:59:01,448 --> 00:59:02,747 [audience laughs] 1597 00:59:02,747 --> 00:59:06,665 “I told you there was a trick, I didn’t say it was hard.” 1598 00:59:06,665 --> 00:59:09,953 And sometimes all you have to do is ask. 1599 00:59:09,953 --> 00:59:11,793 And it’s that easy. 1600 00:59:11,793 --> 00:59:12,871 Let’s talk about delegation. 1601 00:59:12,871 --> 00:59:14,835 Nobody operates individually anymore. 1602 00:59:14,835 --> 00:59:18,615 And you can accomplish a lot more when you have help. 1603 00:59:18,615 --> 00:59:20,972 However, most people delegate very poorly. 1604 00:59:20,972 --> 00:59:22,524 They treat delegation as dumping. 1605 00:59:22,524 --> 00:59:25,738 “I don’t have time to do this, you take care of it.” 1606 00:59:25,738 --> 00:59:28,575 You know, and then they micromanage, and it's just a disaster. 1607 00:59:28,575 --> 00:59:29,310 The first thing if you’re going to 1608 00:59:29,310 --> 00:59:31,173 delegate something to a subordinate 1609 00:59:31,173 --> 00:59:33,505 is you grant them authority with responsibility. 1610 00:59:33,505 --> 00:59:34,717 You don’t tell somebody, 1611 00:59:34,717 --> 00:59:37,099 “Go take care of this, but if you need to spend any money, 1612 00:59:37,099 --> 00:59:38,696 you gotta come back to me for approval.” 1613 00:59:38,696 --> 00:59:40,682 Uh-uh, that’s not empowering them. 1614 00:59:40,682 --> 00:59:42,053 That’s telling them that you don't trust them. 1615 00:59:42,053 --> 00:59:43,387 If I trust you enough to do the work, 1616 00:59:43,387 --> 00:59:45,432 I trust you enough to give you the resources, 1617 00:59:45,432 --> 00:59:46,604 and the budget, and the time, 1618 00:59:46,604 --> 00:59:48,535 and whatever else you need to get it done. 1619 00:59:48,535 --> 00:59:50,184 You give them the whole package. 1620 00:59:50,184 --> 00:59:51,605 The other thing is, delegate 1621 00:59:51,605 --> 00:59:54,027 but always do the ugliest job yourself. 1622 00:59:54,027 --> 00:59:56,497 So when we need to vacuum the lab before a demo, 1623 00:59:56,497 --> 00:59:59,307 I bring in the vacuum cleaner, and I vacuum it. 1624 00:59:59,307 --> 01:00:02,111 All right, do the dirtiest job yourself, so it’s very clear 1625 01:00:02,111 --> 01:00:04,967 that you’re willing to still get the dirt on your hands. 1626 01:00:04,967 --> 01:00:06,330 Treat your people well. 1627 01:00:06,330 --> 01:00:07,545 People are the greatest resource, 1628 01:00:07,545 --> 01:00:10,265 and if you are fortunate enough to have people who report to you, 1629 01:00:10,265 --> 01:00:11,765 treat them dignity, respect, 1630 01:00:11,765 --> 01:00:13,997 and, you know, to sound a little bit corny, 1631 01:00:13,997 --> 01:00:15,676 the kind of love that they should have 1632 01:00:15,676 --> 01:00:17,374 from someone who cares about them 1633 01:00:17,374 --> 01:00:18,809 and their professional development. 1634 01:00:18,809 --> 01:00:20,183 And for crying out loud, 1635 01:00:20,183 --> 01:00:23,335 staff and secretaries are your lifeline. 1636 01:00:23,335 --> 01:00:24,826 If you don’t think you should treat them well 1637 01:00:24,826 --> 01:00:26,405 because it’s the decent thing to do, 1638 01:00:26,405 --> 01:00:28,316 at least treat them well because if you don’t, 1639 01:00:28,316 --> 01:00:30,143 they will get you. 1640 01:00:30,143 --> 01:00:31,388 [audience laughs] 1641 01:00:31,388 --> 01:00:33,304 And they will get you good. 1642 01:00:33,304 --> 01:00:36,008 And you will deserve it, and I will applaud them. 1643 01:00:36,008 --> 01:00:39,545 [audience laughs] 1644 01:00:39,545 --> 01:00:41,594 My giving a talk on time management 1645 01:00:41,594 --> 01:00:43,840 with Alf Weaver in the audience— where is Alf? 1646 01:00:43,840 --> 01:00:45,205 There he is. 1647 01:00:45,205 --> 01:00:47,485 That’s like talking about surviving the Jonestown flood 1648 01:00:47,485 --> 01:00:49,961 if Noah's in the audience. 1649 01:00:49,961 --> 01:00:51,706 One of the things Alf Weaver taught me, 1650 01:00:51,706 --> 01:00:54,370 is whether it’s to a colleague, or to a subordinate, 1651 01:00:54,370 --> 01:00:57,737 if you want to get something done, you cannot be vague. 1652 01:00:57,739 --> 01:01:01,081 And he said, “You give somebody a specific thing to do, 1653 01:01:01,081 --> 01:01:02,930 “a specific date and time. 1654 01:01:02,930 --> 01:01:05,369 “‘Thursday’ is not a specific time. 1655 01:01:05,369 --> 01:01:09,379 “‘Thursday at 3:22 gets somebody’s attention. 1656 01:01:09,379 --> 01:01:12,879 “And you give them a specific penalty or reward that will happen 1657 01:01:12,879 --> 01:01:14,709 if that deadline for that thing is not met.” 1658 01:01:14,709 --> 01:01:15,773 And then he paused, and he said, 1659 01:01:15,773 --> 01:01:18,687 “And remember, the penalty or the reward has to be for them...” 1660 01:01:18,687 --> 01:01:19,319 [audience laughs] 1661 01:01:19,319 --> 01:01:21,077 "not you!" 1662 01:01:21,077 --> 01:01:23,137 “I will be screwed over if you don’t meet that deadline!” 1663 01:01:23,147 --> 01:01:24,960 “Oh, bummer.” 1664 01:01:24,960 --> 01:01:26,434 [audience laughs] 1665 01:01:26,434 --> 01:01:31,453 This is an important point to not get wrong. 1666 01:01:31,453 --> 01:01:33,356 Challenge people. 1667 01:01:33,356 --> 01:01:35,214 I’ve been told that one of the tricks 1668 01:01:35,214 --> 01:01:38,409 is you delegate until they complain. 1669 01:01:38,409 --> 01:01:39,887 I don’t know about until they complain, 1670 01:01:39,887 --> 01:01:42,373 but what I’ve found is that under-delegation is a problem. 1671 01:01:42,373 --> 01:01:45,259 People are usually yearning for the opportunity to do more, 1672 01:01:45,259 --> 01:01:46,606 they want to be challenged. 1673 01:01:46,606 --> 01:01:48,493 They want to prove to you and themselves 1674 01:01:48,493 --> 01:01:51,927 they can be more capable, so let them. 1675 01:01:51,927 --> 01:01:53,948 Communication has to be clear. 1676 01:01:53,948 --> 01:01:56,300 So many times people get upset with their bosses 1677 01:01:56,300 --> 01:01:57,923 because there’s a misunderstanding, 1678 01:01:57,923 --> 01:01:59,589 and particularly in a time of email, 1679 01:01:59,589 --> 01:02:01,327 it’s so easy to communicate via email, 1680 01:02:01,327 --> 01:02:03,200 even if you’ve had a face-to-face conversation, 1681 01:02:03,200 --> 01:02:05,910 send a two-line email, just to be specific afterwards. 1682 01:02:05,910 --> 01:02:07,979 And it’s not like we’re trying to be all lawyer-like, 1683 01:02:07,979 --> 01:02:10,057 it’s just that as Judge Wapner said, 1684 01:02:10,057 --> 01:02:12,897 “Get it in writing,” if you remember “The People’s Court.” 1685 01:02:12,897 --> 01:02:13,938 And Judge Wapner said, 1686 01:02:13,938 --> 01:02:15,312 “If there isn’t a problem, it’s not a problem, 1687 01:02:15,312 --> 01:02:18,130 “it didn’t take you much time, but if there ever is a problem— 1688 01:02:18,130 --> 01:02:19,715 “well, wait a second, there won’t be a problem 1689 01:02:19,715 --> 01:02:21,611 “because there’s a written record.” 1690 01:02:21,611 --> 01:02:23,432 And that’s the magic, there won’t be a confusion, 1691 01:02:23,432 --> 01:02:26,149 because you can’t disagree about the written word. 1692 01:02:26,149 --> 01:02:28,787 Don’t give people how you want them do it, 1693 01:02:28,787 --> 01:02:30,141 tell them what you want them to do. 1694 01:02:30,141 --> 01:02:31,815 Give them objectives, not procedures. 1695 01:02:31,815 --> 01:02:35,004 Let them surprise you with a way of solving a problem 1696 01:02:35,004 --> 01:02:36,735 you would never have imagined. 1697 01:02:36,735 --> 01:02:41,230 Sometimes those solutions are mind-blowing, good or bad. 1698 01:02:41,230 --> 01:02:43,741 But they’re really much more fun than just having them 1699 01:02:43,741 --> 01:02:45,099 do it the way you would’ve done it. 1700 01:02:45,099 --> 01:02:47,110 And you know what, if you’re in a university, 1701 01:02:47,110 --> 01:02:49,540 your job should be to have people smarter than you, 1702 01:02:49,540 --> 01:02:50,706 i.e. your students, 1703 01:02:50,706 --> 01:02:53,413 and they will come up with stuff you would never thought of. 1704 01:02:53,413 --> 01:02:55,821 Also, tell people the relative importance of each task. 1705 01:02:55,821 --> 01:02:57,605 I mean, so many people say, my boss is an ogre, 1706 01:02:57,605 --> 01:02:59,361 they gave me five things to do. 1707 01:02:59,361 --> 01:03:02,139 I’m like, “Well did they tell you which one was most important?” 1708 01:03:02,139 --> 01:03:04,695 “Oh yeah. Hmm, I guess I could ask that.” 1709 01:03:04,695 --> 01:03:06,320 Knowing that if you have five things, 1710 01:03:06,320 --> 01:03:08,417 which are the ones to get done is really important 1711 01:03:08,417 --> 01:03:11,163 because if you’re flying blind, you got a 20% chance 1712 01:03:11,163 --> 01:03:14,216 of gettin' them done in the right order. 1713 01:03:14,216 --> 01:03:17,037 And delegation can never be done too young. 1714 01:03:17,037 --> 01:03:19,388 [audience laughs] 1715 01:03:19,388 --> 01:03:25,466 Does everyone see the difference in the two pictures? 1716 01:03:25,466 --> 01:03:28,974 This is my daughter Chloe, I love her to death, 1717 01:03:28,974 --> 01:03:31,669 but I want her to grow up to be a wonderful person, 1718 01:03:31,669 --> 01:03:34,415 and I know the sooner she holds her own bottle, 1719 01:03:34,415 --> 01:03:37,559 the better. 1720 01:03:37,559 --> 01:03:39,419 Sociology: beware upward delegations. 1721 01:03:39,419 --> 01:03:42,127 Sometimes you try to delegate, people try to hand it back to you. 1722 01:03:42,127 --> 01:03:43,892 One of the best things I ever saw was someone 1723 01:03:43,892 --> 01:03:45,576 who had a secretary trying to say, 1724 01:03:45,576 --> 01:03:47,401 “I can’t do this, you’ll have to take it back.” 1725 01:03:47,402 --> 01:03:49,202 And he just put his hands behind his back, 1726 01:03:49,202 --> 01:03:51,808 and took a step backwards. 1727 01:03:51,808 --> 01:03:53,442 And then he waited. 1728 01:03:53,442 --> 01:03:55,722 And then eventually the secretary said, 1729 01:03:55,722 --> 01:03:58,594 “Or maybe I could find this other solution.” 1730 01:03:58,594 --> 01:03:59,573 And he said, “That’s wonderful! 1731 01:03:59,573 --> 01:04:02,103 “I’m so proud you thought of that.” 1732 01:04:02,103 --> 01:04:05,064 It was just an elegant gesture. 1733 01:04:05,064 --> 01:04:06,540 Reinforce behavior you want repeated. 1734 01:04:06,540 --> 01:04:08,673 One of my favorite stories in The One-Minute Manager 1735 01:04:08,673 --> 01:04:09,743 is he talks about, did you ever wonder 1736 01:04:09,743 --> 01:04:12,674 how they got the killer whales to jump through the hoop? 1737 01:04:12,674 --> 01:04:15,233 If they did it like modern American office managers, 1738 01:04:15,233 --> 01:04:16,682 they would yell at the killer whale, 1739 01:04:16,682 --> 01:04:18,256 “Jump through the hoop!” 1740 01:04:18,256 --> 01:04:20,430 And every time the killer whale didn't jump through the hoop, 1741 01:04:20,430 --> 01:04:21,509 they’d hit it with a stick. 1742 01:04:21,509 --> 01:04:23,442 [audience laughs] 1743 01:04:23,442 --> 01:04:23,715 Right? 1744 01:04:23,715 --> 01:04:26,228 I mean, this is how we train people in the office place. 1745 01:04:26,228 --> 01:04:27,774 Read the book if you want to see how they actually do it, 1746 01:04:27,774 --> 01:04:29,657 because I’m curious. 1747 01:04:29,657 --> 01:04:32,404 I know now, but it’s really cool how they get them to do it. 1748 01:04:32,404 --> 01:04:34,062 So reinforce behavior you want repeated. 1749 01:04:34,062 --> 01:04:35,861 When people do things that you like, 1750 01:04:37,317 --> 01:04:37,567 praise them and thank them. 1751 01:04:37,567 --> 01:04:40,160 That’s worth more than any amount of monetary reward, 1752 01:04:40,160 --> 01:04:41,495 or a little plaque. 1753 01:04:41,495 --> 01:04:43,999 People really like to just be told straight up, 1754 01:04:43,999 --> 01:04:47,065 “Thank you, I really appreciate that you did a good job.” 1755 01:04:47,065 --> 01:04:48,166 The other thing is that 1756 01:04:48,166 --> 01:04:49,727 if you don't want things delegated back up to you, 1757 01:04:49,727 --> 01:04:51,152 don’t learn how to do them! 1758 01:04:51,152 --> 01:04:52,620 I take great pride, I don’t know how 1759 01:04:52,620 --> 01:04:54,714 to run photocopiers and fax machines, 1760 01:04:54,714 --> 01:04:56,899 and I ain’t going to learn! 1761 01:04:56,899 --> 01:05:00,535 That’s certainly not how I’m going to spend my remaining time. 1762 01:05:00,535 --> 01:05:02,724 Meetings: the average executive spends more than 40% 1763 01:05:02,724 --> 01:05:03,930 of his or her time in a meeting. 1764 01:05:03,930 --> 01:05:05,663 My advice is when you have a meeting, 1765 01:05:05,663 --> 01:05:07,713 lock the door, unplug the phone, 1766 01:05:07,713 --> 01:05:10,340 and take everybody’s BlackBerrys. 1767 01:05:10,340 --> 01:05:12,386 Because if it’s worth our time, it’s worth our time. 1768 01:05:12,386 --> 01:05:15,247 If it’s not worth our time, it’s not worth our time, 1769 01:05:15,247 --> 01:05:17,097 but I don’t have any interest in being in a room 1770 01:05:17,097 --> 01:05:20,248 with six people who are all half there. 1771 01:05:20,248 --> 01:05:21,943 Because that’s very inefficient. 1772 01:05:21,943 --> 01:05:24,108 I don’t think meetings should ever last more than an hour, 1773 01:05:24,108 --> 01:05:25,593 with very rare exception. 1774 01:05:25,593 --> 01:05:26,883 And I think that there should be an agenda. 1775 01:05:26,883 --> 01:05:28,646 I got into a great habit a couple of years ago 1776 01:05:28,646 --> 01:05:29,449 when I just started saying, 1777 01:05:29,449 --> 01:05:31,953 “If there’s no agenda, I won’t attend.” 1778 01:05:31,953 --> 01:05:32,857 And the great thing about that is 1779 01:05:32,857 --> 01:05:34,634 whoever called the meeting had to actually think 1780 01:05:34,634 --> 01:05:37,162 before they showed up about why we were supposed to be there, 1781 01:05:37,162 --> 01:05:38,313 because otherwise it’s like, “Well, why are we here?” 1782 01:05:38,313 --> 01:05:40,949 Because we had a meeting, it’s on all of our calendars. 1783 01:05:40,949 --> 01:05:43,329 It’s just a classic Dilbert moment. 1784 01:05:43,329 --> 01:05:46,251 So, most important thing about meetings, 1785 01:05:46,251 --> 01:05:49,040 and again, this comes from The One-Minute Manager, 1786 01:05:49,040 --> 01:05:50,082 one-minute minutes. 1787 01:05:50,082 --> 01:05:51,223 At the end of the meeting, 1788 01:05:51,223 --> 01:05:53,510 somebody has to have been assigned the scribe, 1789 01:05:53,510 --> 01:05:57,570 and they write down in one minute or less what decisions got made, 1790 01:05:57,570 --> 01:06:00,021 and who is responsible for what by when. 1791 01:06:00,021 --> 01:06:01,192 And then email it out to everybody, 1792 01:06:01,192 --> 01:06:02,387 because if you don’t do that, 1793 01:06:02,387 --> 01:06:04,212 you have your next weekly meeting next week, 1794 01:06:04,212 --> 01:06:07,136 and you all sitting around going, “Now who was going to do this?” 1795 01:06:07,136 --> 01:06:08,235 It’s very inefficient. 1796 01:06:08,235 --> 01:06:11,765 And it’s so fast to just do these one-minute minutes. 1797 01:06:11,765 --> 01:06:13,349 Let’s talk about technology. 1798 01:06:13,349 --> 01:06:14,580 People—you know, I’m a computer scientist, 1799 01:06:14,580 --> 01:06:17,785 so they say which gadget will make me more time efficient? 1800 01:06:17,785 --> 01:06:20,551 And I don’t have an answer for that, it’s all idiosyncratic. 1801 01:06:20,551 --> 01:06:21,981 But I will tell you that my favorite comment 1802 01:06:21,981 --> 01:06:23,411 about technology comes from a janitor 1803 01:06:23,411 --> 01:06:25,821 at the University of Central Florida, who said, 1804 01:06:25,821 --> 01:06:28,916 “Computers are faster, they just take longer.” 1805 01:06:28,916 --> 01:06:32,347 [audience laughs] 1806 01:06:32,347 --> 01:06:34,578 That’s zen, right there. 1807 01:06:34,578 --> 01:06:36,316 So, that’s another way of saying, 1808 01:06:36,316 --> 01:06:38,209 only use technology that’s worth it. 1809 01:06:38,209 --> 01:06:39,327 And worth it is, 1810 01:06:39,327 --> 01:06:41,381 end to end, did it make me more efficient? 1811 01:06:41,381 --> 01:06:45,479 And that depends on how you work, and we’re all different. 1812 01:06:45,479 --> 01:06:47,820 And remember that technology is getting insane. 1813 01:06:47,820 --> 01:06:49,783 I walked into McDonald’s, and I ordered, you know, 1814 01:06:49,783 --> 01:06:51,232 Happy Meal number 2, and they said, 1815 01:06:51,232 --> 01:06:53,410 “Would you like a cell phone with that?” 1816 01:06:53,410 --> 01:06:55,481 [audience laughs] 1817 01:06:55,481 --> 01:06:58,827 I went to the grocery store to buy 16 slices of american cheese, 1818 01:06:58,827 --> 01:07:02,070 and you get Grolier’s encyclopedia, so with 16 slices of cheese, 1819 01:07:02,070 --> 01:07:04,496 you get all of man’s knowledge for free. 1820 01:07:04,496 --> 01:07:10,332 [audience laughs] 1821 01:07:10,332 --> 01:07:13,272 That’s just spooky scary. 1822 01:07:13,272 --> 01:07:16,904 And remember that technology really has to be something 1823 01:07:16,904 --> 01:07:18,063 that makes your life better. 1824 01:07:18,063 --> 01:07:19,315 You guys may have seen this. 1825 01:07:19,315 --> 01:07:26,809 I just find it very humorous. 1826 01:07:26,809 --> 01:07:28,007 [bang!] 1827 01:07:28,007 --> 01:07:32,784 [audience laughs] 1828 01:07:32,784 --> 01:07:34,531 [bang! bang!] 1829 01:07:34,531 --> 01:07:39,539 [bang! bang! bang! crash!] 1830 01:07:39,539 --> 01:07:45,398 So, only use technology that helps you. 1831 01:07:45,398 --> 01:07:47,071 I find that technology is good 1832 01:07:47,071 --> 01:07:49,663 if it allows you to do things in a new way. 1833 01:07:49,663 --> 01:07:52,282 Just doing the same things a little bit faster 1834 01:07:52,282 --> 01:07:53,293 with technology is nice, 1835 01:07:53,293 --> 01:07:55,515 but when technology changes the work flow…. 1836 01:07:55,515 --> 01:07:57,355 So I was carving pumpkins a few years ago, 1837 01:07:57,355 --> 01:07:58,889 and this is F.M., a good friend of mine, 1838 01:07:58,889 --> 01:08:00,531 and I don’t know if you can see it, 1839 01:08:00,531 --> 01:08:02,389 but down by her right knee is a pattern, 1840 01:08:02,389 --> 01:08:04,017 and you lay this pattern over the pumpkin, 1841 01:08:04,017 --> 01:08:05,886 and you get this little special carving knife, 1842 01:08:05,886 --> 01:08:06,708 and you can, 1843 01:08:06,708 --> 01:08:09,710 instead of these amateurish pumpkins, like I made, 1844 01:08:09,710 --> 01:08:12,583 you get this sort of “howling at the moon,” 1845 01:08:12,583 --> 01:08:14,670 And her husband Jeff and I thought this was really cool, 1846 01:08:14,670 --> 01:08:18,452 but in a sign of a reactionary burning man kind of a moment, 1847 01:08:18,452 --> 01:08:21,999 we grabbed our power drills, 1848 01:08:21,999 --> 01:08:25,538 and we carved our pumpkins that way! 1849 01:08:25,538 --> 01:08:27,856 Use technology if it changes the way you do things, 1850 01:08:27,856 --> 01:08:28,833 because you get— 1851 01:08:28,833 --> 01:08:31,004 and believe me, the results of a power drill, 1852 01:08:31,004 --> 01:08:34,284 you get these little— oh, it’s just gorgeous. 1853 01:08:34,284 --> 01:08:35,351 Let’s talk briefly about email, 1854 01:08:35,351 --> 01:08:37,627 because email is such a large part of all our lives. 1855 01:08:37,627 --> 01:08:40,032 First off, don’t ever delete any of it. 1856 01:08:40,032 --> 01:08:40,827 Save all of it. 1857 01:08:40,827 --> 01:08:42,868 I started doing this ten years ago. 1858 01:08:42,878 --> 01:08:45,666 An interesting thing is that all the historians talk about, 1859 01:08:45,666 --> 01:08:49,559 “Oh, it’s such a shame we don’t have people keeping diaries, 1860 01:08:49,559 --> 01:08:50,486 “we don’t know what their day is like.” 1861 01:08:50,486 --> 01:08:52,714 I’m like, “You fools!” 1862 01:08:52,714 --> 01:08:55,744 We have just entered a society, circa about ten years ago, 1863 01:08:55,744 --> 01:08:57,083 and I’m a living example of it, 1864 01:08:57,083 --> 01:08:59,503 every piece of my correspondence 1865 01:08:59,503 --> 01:09:02,774 is not only saved, it’s searchable. 1866 01:09:02,774 --> 01:09:05,803 So if I were, you know, a person of merit, a historian— 1867 01:09:05,803 --> 01:09:07,527 which is a BIG stretch— 1868 01:09:07,527 --> 01:09:11,140 a historian could actually look at my patterns of communication 1869 01:09:11,140 --> 01:09:13,760 much better than the most compulsive diary writer. 1870 01:09:13,760 --> 01:09:17,119 Now we could talk about whether or not I’m being introspective, 1871 01:09:17,119 --> 01:09:18,462 that’s about content, 1872 01:09:18,462 --> 01:09:21,283 but in terms of quantity, it’s great. 1873 01:09:21,283 --> 01:09:22,584 And of course, you can save your email, 1874 01:09:22,584 --> 01:09:24,336 and you can search it, and it’s just wonderful 1875 01:09:24,336 --> 01:09:26,693 because you can pull back stuff from five years ago. 1876 01:09:26,693 --> 01:09:29,784 So never delete your email. 1877 01:09:29,784 --> 01:09:31,428 Here’s a big email trick. 1878 01:09:31,428 --> 01:09:35,833 If you want to get something done, do not send the email to five people. 1879 01:09:35,833 --> 01:09:38,018 “Hey, could somebody take care of this?” 1880 01:09:38,018 --> 01:09:39,487 Every one of those five recipients 1881 01:09:39,487 --> 01:09:41,577 is thinking one, and only one thing, 1882 01:09:41,577 --> 01:09:43,019 “I deleted it first!” 1883 01:09:43,019 --> 01:09:46,201 [audience laughs] 1884 01:09:46,201 --> 01:09:49,584 “So, the other four people, will take care of this, I don’t have to.” 1885 01:09:49,584 --> 01:09:51,809 So you send it to one, and only one, person. 1886 01:09:51,809 --> 01:09:53,267 But if you really want it to be done, 1887 01:09:53,267 --> 01:09:55,348 send it to somebody who can do it, tell them— 1888 01:09:55,348 --> 01:09:56,485 again, Alf Weaver— 1889 01:09:56,485 --> 01:09:58,457 specific things, specific time, 1890 01:09:58,457 --> 01:10:01,200 and then the penalty can be more subtle, 1891 01:10:01,200 --> 01:10:04,424 like you just CC their boss. 1892 01:10:04,424 --> 01:10:06,028 All right. 1893 01:10:06,028 --> 01:10:07,694 And the other thing-- and I’ve had to teach— 1894 01:10:07,694 --> 01:10:10,399 I had this conversation with every student in my entire career, 1895 01:10:10,399 --> 01:10:11,651 because they send email, 1896 01:10:11,651 --> 01:10:14,105 and then they just wait for the person to respond. 1897 01:10:14,105 --> 01:10:17,233 I say, “If the person has not responded within 48 hours, 1898 01:10:17,233 --> 01:10:18,751 "it’s okay to nag them. 1899 01:10:18,751 --> 01:10:20,733 “And the reason it’s okay to nag them, 1900 01:10:20,733 --> 01:10:22,865 “because if they haven’t responded within 48 hours, 1901 01:10:22,865 --> 01:10:27,217 “the chance that they are ever going to respond is zero.” 1902 01:10:27,217 --> 01:10:29,658 I mean, maybe not zero, maybe that small. 1903 01:10:29,658 --> 01:10:30,522 But in my experience, 1904 01:10:30,522 --> 01:10:32,739 if people don’t respond to you within 48 hours, 1905 01:10:32,739 --> 01:10:34,457 you’ll probably never hear from them, 1906 01:10:34,457 --> 01:10:37,673 so just start nagging ‘em. 1907 01:10:37,673 --> 01:10:41,527 Let’s talk about the care and feeding of bosses. 1908 01:10:41,527 --> 01:10:44,943 There’s a phrase, “Managing from beneath.” 1909 01:10:44,943 --> 01:10:46,626 Because we all know that all bosses are idiots. 1910 01:10:46,626 --> 01:10:48,085 That’s certainly the expression, you know 1911 01:10:48,085 --> 01:10:50,985 the sense I’ve gotten from everybody who has a boss. 1912 01:10:50,985 --> 01:10:52,658 When you have a boss, write things down, 1913 01:10:52,658 --> 01:10:54,317 do that clear communication thing. 1914 01:10:54,317 --> 01:10:56,110 Ask them, “When is our next meeting? 1915 01:10:56,110 --> 01:10:58,084 “What do you want me to have done by then?”, 1916 01:10:58,084 --> 01:10:59,905 so you’ve got sort of a contract. 1917 01:10:59,905 --> 01:11:01,961 “Who can I turn to for help, besides you, 1918 01:11:01,961 --> 01:11:03,550 “because I don’t want to bother you.” 1919 01:11:03,550 --> 01:11:07,573 And remember, your boss wants a result, not an excuse. 1920 01:11:07,573 --> 01:11:09,080 General advice on vacations. 1921 01:11:09,080 --> 01:11:11,244 Phone callers should get two options: 1922 01:11:11,244 --> 01:11:13,029 the first one is, when you’re on vacation, 1923 01:11:13,029 --> 01:11:16,062 the first option is, “Contact John Smith, not me. 1924 01:11:16,062 --> 01:11:16,752 “I’m out of the office, 1925 01:11:16,752 --> 01:11:18,897 “but this person can help you now if it’s urgent.” 1926 01:11:18,897 --> 01:11:21,363 Or, “Call back when I’m back.” 1927 01:11:21,363 --> 01:11:22,416 Why? Because you don’t want to come back 1928 01:11:22,416 --> 01:11:25,101 to a long sequence of phone messages saying, you know, 1929 01:11:25,101 --> 01:11:26,680 “Hey Randy, can you help me get care of this?” 1930 01:11:26,680 --> 01:11:27,770 And you call them back, and you know, 1931 01:11:27,770 --> 01:11:28,775 you’ve been on vacation for a week, 1932 01:11:28,775 --> 01:11:30,431 they already solved it. 1933 01:11:30,431 --> 01:11:32,268 And the other thing is that it's not a vacation 1934 01:11:32,268 --> 01:11:34,959 if you’re reading email. 1935 01:11:34,959 --> 01:11:35,543 All right. 1936 01:11:35,543 --> 01:11:36,424 Trust me on that. 1937 01:11:36,424 --> 01:11:39,026 It’s not a vacation if you’re reading email. 1938 01:11:39,026 --> 01:11:40,748 I can stay in my house all weekend, 1939 01:11:40,748 --> 01:11:42,810 and not read email, and it’s a vacation. 1940 01:11:42,810 --> 01:11:45,312 But if I go to Hawaii, and I’ve got a BlackBerry, 1941 01:11:45,312 --> 01:11:47,819 I’m not on vacation. 1942 01:11:47,819 --> 01:11:48,541 And I know this, 1943 01:11:48,541 --> 01:11:50,277 when I got married, my wife and I got married, 1944 01:11:50,277 --> 01:11:52,651 we left our reception in a hot air balloon, 1945 01:11:52,651 --> 01:11:55,690 which did not have wireless on it. 1946 01:11:55,690 --> 01:11:59,267 And dean Jim Morris at the time— 1947 01:11:59,267 --> 01:12:00,327 we took a month-long honeymoon, 1948 01:12:00,327 --> 01:12:03,592 which was great, but not really long enough. 1949 01:12:03,592 --> 01:12:05,131 And Jim Morris said— I said, 1950 01:12:05,131 --> 01:12:06,089 “I’m not going to be reachable for a month.” 1951 01:12:06,089 --> 01:12:07,511 And Jim said, “That’s not acceptable.” 1952 01:12:07,511 --> 01:12:09,203 I said, “What do you mean, ‘it’s not acceptable’?” 1953 01:12:09,203 --> 01:12:12,897 He said “Well, I pay you, so that’s the ‘not acceptable’ part.” 1954 01:12:12,897 --> 01:12:15,819 And I said, “Okay. So there has to be a way to reach me?” 1955 01:12:15,819 --> 01:12:16,448 And he said, “Yes.” 1956 01:12:16,448 --> 01:12:18,268 I said, “Okay, so you call my office, 1957 01:12:18,268 --> 01:12:19,766 “there would be a phone answering machine message 1958 01:12:19,766 --> 01:12:22,196 “that said, ‘Hi, this is Randy. I’m on vacation. 1959 01:12:22,196 --> 01:12:24,484 “I waited until 39 to get married. 1960 01:12:24,484 --> 01:12:27,064 “And so we’re going for a month. 1961 01:12:27,064 --> 01:12:28,711 “And, I hope you don’t have a problem with that. 1962 01:12:28,711 --> 01:12:30,712 “But apparently my boss does, 1963 01:12:30,712 --> 01:12:32,317 "so he says I have to be reachable. 1964 01:12:32,317 --> 01:12:33,687 “So here’s how you can reach me. 1965 01:12:33,687 --> 01:12:36,400 “My wife’s parents live in blah-blah-blah town, 1966 01:12:36,400 --> 01:12:37,290 “here’s their names. 1967 01:12:37,290 --> 01:12:39,753 “If you call directory assistance, you can get their number.” 1968 01:12:39,753 --> 01:12:40,946 [audience laughs] 1969 01:12:40,946 --> 01:12:44,237 “And then if you can convince my new in-laws 1970 01:12:44,237 --> 01:12:46,909 “that your emergency merits interrupting 1971 01:12:46,909 --> 01:12:50,060 “their only daughter’s honeymoon, they have our number.” 1972 01:12:50,060 --> 01:12:54,313 [audience laughs] 1973 01:12:54,313 --> 01:12:55,660 Here’s some of my most important advice. 1974 01:12:55,660 --> 01:12:57,246 We close with some of the best stuff. 1975 01:12:57,246 --> 01:12:58,550 Kill your television. 1976 01:12:58,550 --> 01:13:00,467 People who study this say the average American 1977 01:13:00,467 --> 01:13:05,255 watches 28 hours of television a week. 1978 01:13:05,255 --> 01:13:08,485 That’s almost 3/4 of a full-time job. 1979 01:13:08,485 --> 01:13:12,082 So, if you really want to get time back in your life, 1980 01:13:12,082 --> 01:13:13,228 you don’t have to kill your television, 1981 01:13:13,228 --> 01:13:15,625 but just unplug it, put it in the closet, 1982 01:13:15,625 --> 01:13:17,461 and put a blanket over it. 1983 01:13:17,461 --> 01:13:20,908 See how long it takes you to get the shakes. 1984 01:13:20,908 --> 01:13:21,988 Turn money into time, 1985 01:13:21,988 --> 01:13:23,879 especially junior faculty members 1986 01:13:23,879 --> 01:13:26,068 or other people who have young children, 1987 01:13:26,068 --> 01:13:29,986 this is the time to throw money at the problem. 1988 01:13:29,986 --> 01:13:31,757 Hire somebody else to mow your lawn, 1989 01:13:31,757 --> 01:13:35,242 do whatever you need to do, but exchange time for— 1990 01:13:35,242 --> 01:13:37,835 exchange money for time at every opportunity 1991 01:13:37,835 --> 01:13:39,277 when you have very young children, 1992 01:13:39,277 --> 01:13:40,970 because you just don’t have enough time. 1993 01:13:40,970 --> 01:13:42,354 It’s just too hard. 1994 01:13:42,354 --> 01:13:43,888 And the other thing is, eat and sleep and exercise. 1995 01:13:43,888 --> 01:13:48,030 Above all else, you always have time to sleep. 1996 01:13:48,030 --> 01:13:52,451 Because if you get sleep-deprived, everything falls apart. 1997 01:13:52,451 --> 01:13:54,524 Other general advice, never break a promise, 1998 01:13:54,524 --> 01:13:56,100 but renegotiate them if need be. 1999 01:13:56,100 --> 01:13:58,347 If you’ve said, “I'll have this done by Tuesday at noon, 2000 01:13:58,347 --> 01:14:01,386 “you can call the person on Friday and say I’m still good to my word, 2001 01:14:01,386 --> 01:14:03,072 “but I’m really jacked up. 2002 01:14:03,072 --> 01:14:04,908 “And I’m going to have to stay and work over the weekend 2003 01:14:04,908 --> 01:14:07,197 “to meet that Tuesday deadline. 2004 01:14:07,197 --> 01:14:08,690 “Is there anyway there’s any slack on that?” 2005 01:14:08,690 --> 01:14:11,015 And a lot of times they’ll say, “Thursday’s fine, 2006 01:14:11,015 --> 01:14:14,568 “because I really needed it Thursday, but I told you Tuesday.” 2007 01:14:14,568 --> 01:14:15,822 Or they’ll say, ”Oh, it’s no problem, 2008 01:14:15,822 --> 01:14:17,197 “I can have Jim do that instead of you. 2009 01:14:17,197 --> 01:14:18,339 “He has some free time.” 2010 01:14:18,339 --> 01:14:20,143 Now if they say, "No, there’s no wiggle room here”, 2011 01:14:20,143 --> 01:14:22,582 you say, “That’s okay, no problem, I’m still good to my word.” 2012 01:14:22,582 --> 01:14:23,460 All right. 2013 01:14:23,460 --> 01:14:24,596 If you haven’t got time to do it right, 2014 01:14:24,596 --> 01:14:27,407 you don’t have time to do it wrong, that’s self-evident. 2015 01:14:27,407 --> 01:14:29,323 Recognize that most things are pass-fail. 2016 01:14:29,323 --> 01:14:30,972 People spend way too much time— 2017 01:14:30,972 --> 01:14:33,924 there’s a reason we have the expression, “good enough.” 2018 01:14:33,924 --> 01:14:36,953 It’s because the thing is "good enough." 2019 01:14:36,953 --> 01:14:38,767 And the last thing is, get feedbacks loops. 2020 01:14:38,767 --> 01:14:41,330 Ask people in confidence. 2021 01:14:41,330 --> 01:14:43,435 Because if someone will tell you 2022 01:14:43,435 --> 01:14:45,502 what you’re doing right or doing wrong, 2023 01:14:45,502 --> 01:14:47,556 and they’ll tell you the truth, 2024 01:14:47,556 --> 01:14:51,286 that’s worth more than anything else in the whole world. 2025 01:14:51,286 --> 01:14:52,718 I recommend these two books. 2026 01:14:52,718 --> 01:14:54,660 Time management is not a late-breaking field. 2027 01:14:54,660 --> 01:14:59,655 Both these books are old books, but I recommend them highly. 2028 01:14:59,655 --> 01:15:03,606 And it’s traditional to close a talk like this with, 2029 01:15:03,606 --> 01:15:04,900 “Here’s the things I told you about.” 2030 01:15:04,900 --> 01:15:06,596 I’m not going to tell you the things I told you about. 2031 01:15:06,596 --> 01:15:07,463 I’m going to tell you the things 2032 01:15:07,463 --> 01:15:10,968 that you can operationally go out and do today. 2033 01:15:10,968 --> 01:15:13,798 One, if you don’t have a DayTimer or personal digital assistant, 2034 01:15:13,798 --> 01:15:15,585 you know, a PalmPilot or whatever, 2035 01:15:15,585 --> 01:15:17,133 go get one. 2036 01:15:17,133 --> 01:15:18,808 Put your to-do list in priority order, 2037 01:15:18,808 --> 01:15:20,789 you can use the four quadrants, or do what I do, 2038 01:15:20,789 --> 01:15:24,171 just put a number zero to nine, but sort it by priority. 2039 01:15:24,171 --> 01:15:25,262 And do a time journal. 2040 01:15:25,262 --> 01:15:26,677 If that’s really too much effort, 2041 01:15:26,677 --> 01:15:30,415 just count the number of hours you watch of television 2042 01:15:30,415 --> 01:15:32,001 in the next week. 2043 01:15:32,001 --> 01:15:34,040 That’s my gift to you. 2044 01:15:34,040 --> 01:15:35,488 [audience laughs] 2045 01:15:35,488 --> 01:15:36,448 And the last thing is, 2046 01:15:36,448 --> 01:15:40,600 once you’ve got your DayTimer, make a note for 30 days from today— 2047 01:15:40,600 --> 01:15:43,194 it’s okay if that one goes “ding” to remind you— 2048 01:15:43,194 --> 01:15:46,181 and revisit this talk in 30 days, it’ll be up on the web, 2049 01:15:46,181 --> 01:15:47,354 courtesy of Gabe. 2050 01:15:47,354 --> 01:15:51,012 And ask, "What have I changed?" 2051 01:15:51,012 --> 01:15:53,234 And if I haven’t changed anything, 2052 01:15:53,234 --> 01:15:55,655 then we still had a pleasant hour together. 2053 01:15:55,655 --> 01:15:57,340 If you have changed things, 2054 01:15:57,340 --> 01:16:00,055 then you’ll probably have a lot more time 2055 01:16:00,055 --> 01:16:03,585 to spend with the ones you love. 2056 01:16:03,585 --> 01:16:05,177 And that’s important. 2057 01:16:05,177 --> 01:16:07,290 Time is all we have. 2058 01:16:07,290 --> 01:16:09,778 And you may find one day, 2059 01:16:09,778 --> 01:16:12,333 you have less than you think. 2060 01:16:12,333 --> 01:16:13,355 Thank you. 2061 01:16:13,355 --> 01:16:17,675 [audience applauds]