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A recent article in The New Yorker, "Was Email a Mistake?," triggered a conversation around the veracity of email in the Digital Age. The author, computer science professor Cal Newport, discussed this on a recent interview on NPR. This is our response to the question, was email a mistake? (If you’re reading this in a podcast directory/app, please visit https://productivitycast.net/063 for clickable links and the full show notes and transcript of this cast.) Enjoy! Give us feedback! And, thanks for listening! If you'd like to continue discussing managing digital notebooks from this episode, please click here to leave a comment down below (this jumps you to the bottom of the post). In this Cast | Was Email a Mistake? A Response Ray Sidney-Smith Augusto Pinaud Art Gelwicks Francis Wade Show Notes | Was Email a Mistake? A Response Resources we mention, including links to them, will be provided here. Please listen to the episode for context. Was Email a Mistake? Write Email With Maximum Efficiency Using This Military System Scrum Microsoft Outlook Spike Feedly Stoop Inbox “Bursty” Communication Can Help Remote Teams Thrive Raw Text Transcript Raw, unedited and machine-produced text transcript so there may be substantial errors, but you can search for specific points in the episode to jump to, or to reference back to at a later date and time, by keywords or key phrases. The time coding is mm:ss (e.g., 0:04 starts at 4 seconds into the cast’s audio). Read More Voiceover Artist 0:00 Are you ready to manage your work and personal world better to live a fulfilling productive life, then you've come to the right place productivity cast, the weekly show about all things productivity. Here, your host Ray Sidney-Smith and Augusto Pinaud with Francis Wade and Art Gelwicks. Raymond Sidney-Smith 0:17 And Welcome back, everybody to productivity cast, the weekly show about all things personal productivity, I'm Ray Sidney Smith. Augusto Pinaud 0:23 I am Augusto Pinaud. Francis Wade 0:24I'm Francis Wade. Art Gelwicks 0:25 And I'm Art Gelwicks. Raymond Sidney-Smith 0:26 And today we are going to be discussing email. And this is a topic that is perennial, but more importantly, Cal Newport, Professor Newport. he's a he's a professor of mathematics Computer Science at Georgetown University. And he recently wrote an article in which he discusses his topic was email a mistake. And he brings up several different angles at which he attacks email. And I wanted for us to have a discussion around really what he's talking about, and whether or not that's real, was email truly a mistake. And to start us off, I want us to kind of just take a litmus test just go around. And what was your initial impressions about the article? And where do you stand on your usage of email? are you stopping use of your email? Are you mediating email with other modalities in order to be productive? How are you using email today? Do you believe email was a mistake? Augusto Pinaud 1:34 I don't think email is a mistake, we may argue that the way we are using email and how it went out of control is a mistake. But it's not the email that will be equivalent to say, well, the fax was a mistake. It wasn't it was just a matter of what happened with email. I think email came in a moment where we were trying, we were in the verge of going global. And it broke, it brought a vehicle that allows to communicate with anybody, regardless where they are on a semi effective way. And dad in combination with other technologies that came at a time as a Blackberry, and people begin saying, Oh, I can really be more quote unquote, effective if I adopt these tools. The problem was, there was not really a solid execution plan, and we just got on the horse and let it run and hopefully turn into a monster, to be honest with you. Art Gelwicks 2:32 Email is a natural evolution of this back and forth method ...

Most don't think about it, but aside from finding the best productivity planner for ourselves, the very paper planner (a/k/a agenda, diary, journal, scheduler, notebook) didn't even exist until roughly 90 years. What did humankind do for the prior millennia upon millennia?! It wasn't until Gustav Grossmann came around with his own 200-page manifesto and leatherbound planning notebook in the 1930s, that the modern organizer was born. Today, we who pay attention to our productive lives take it for granted at the plethora of options for planners on the market, as well as learning how to use them effectively. In this week's episode, the ProductivityCast team discusses the factors that make the best productivity planner the right one for you. (If you’re reading this in a podcast directory/app, please visit https://productivitycast.net/062 for clickable links and the full show notes and transcript of this cast.) Enjoy! Give us feedback! And, thanks for listening! If you'd like to continue discussing managing digital notebooks from this episode, please click here to leave a comment down below (this jumps you to the bottom of the post). In this Cast | The Best Productivity Planner Ray Sidney-Smith Augusto Pinaud Art Gelwicks Francis Wade Show Notes | The Best Productivity Planner Resources we mention, including links to them, will be provided here. Please listen to the episode for context. History of Day Planner Levenger Circa system FranklinPlanner Staples Arc system Day Runner Apple Reminders Remember the Milk OmniFocus The Bullet Journal Method: Track the Past, Order the Present, Design the Future by Ryder Carroll Casts referencing BuJo: 035 What Is the Bullet Journal? How Does It Work? – ProductivityCast051 Managing Digital Notebooks047 Reflections on Getting Things Done (GTD): What I Wish I Knew When I Started GTD, Part Two – ProductivityCast024 Can Productivity Be Fun? – ProductivityCast022 Productivity Pet Peeves – ProductivityCast016 The Power of Reflection – ProductivityCast013 Getting Unstuck! – ProductivityCast Time Design (Time/System)  FranklinPlanner Panda Planner Freedom Journal Productivity Journal Five-Minute Journal Volt Planner NeuroPlanner The High Performance Planner (Brendon Burchard) Commit 30 Planner Revo Journal (caveat: site was not loading, or loading very slowly, when we were trying to visit it: http://revojournal.com/) Travelers notebook Raw Text Transcript Raw, unedited and machine-produced text transcript so there may be substantial errors, but you can search for specific points in the episode to jump to, or to reference back to at a later date and time, by keywords or key phrases. The time coding is mm:ss (e.g., 0:04 starts at 4 seconds into the cast’s audio). Read More Voiceover Artist 0:00 Are you ready to manage your work and personal world better to live a fulfilling productive life, then you've come to the right place productivity cast, the weekly show about all things productivity. Here, your host Ray Sidney-Smith and Augusto Pinaud with Francis Wade and Art Gelwicks. Raymond Sidney-Smith 0:17 And Welcome back, everybody to productivity cast, the weekly show about all things personal productivity, I'm Ray Sidney Smith. Francis Wade 0:20I'm Francis Wade. Augusto Pinaud 0:23 I am Augusto Pinaud. Art Gelwicks 0:24 And I'm Art Gelwicks. Raymond Sidney-Smith 0:25 Welcome, gentlemen to this episode of productivitycast. And today we are going to be talking about something that a lot of people use every day. But they probably don't give very much attention to it. And so the people who are listening to this podcast you listening to this podcast, are you probably more aware of the concept than not. But I thought what we would do today is we would talk about the productivity planner, the what we would call a personal organizer, or a day planner,

If you haven’t heard about Kanban before (which many of our productivity enthusiasts had not, so you’re not alone!) started as a lean manufacturing process by Taiichi Ohno. It has since branched off into a process management and improvement method used by many in the productivity community (especially in the Lean, Six Sigma and Agile communities). In practical terms, with Personal Kanban, you create a visual process management system (Kanban means “billboard” in Japanese) for what you’re going to do, what you're currently working on, and how much you want to do (or what’s been done). There are many tools out there that help manage these kinds of boards and different styles for facilitating the boards. That's what we discuss in this latest episode of ProductivityCast! N.B. Ray mentioned mistakenly kanban was developed in the 1960s/70s but it was actually developed in the 1940s/50s. (If you’re reading this in a podcast directory/app, please visit https://productivitycast.net/061 for clickable links, the full show notes and transcript of this cast.) Enjoy! Give us feedback! And, thanks for listening! If you'd like to continue discussing managing digital notebooks from this episode, please click here to leave a comment down below (this jumps you to the bottom of the post). In this Cast | Personal Kanban Ray Sidney-Smith Augusto Pinaud Art Gelwicks Francis Wade Show Notes | Personal Kanban Resources we mention, including links to them, will be provided here. Please listen to the episode for context. Personal Kanban: Mapping Work | Navigating Life by Tonianne DeMaria Barry and Jim Benson Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown The Bullet Journal Method: Track the Past, Order the Present, Design the Future by Ryder Carroll Rules of Personal Kanban Visualize your workLimit your work-in-progress Post-It Notes Trello MeisterTask Wekan Microsoft Planner Notion Being Productive podcast hosted by Art Gelwicks Raw Text Transcript Raw, unedited and machine-produced text transcript so there may be substantial errors, but you can search for specific points in the episode to jump to, or to reference back to at a later date and time, by keywords or key phrases. The time coding is mm:ss (e.g., 0:04 starts at 4 seconds into the cast’s audio). Read More Voiceover Artist 0:00 Are you ready to manage your work and personal world better to live a fulfilling productive life, then you've come to the right place productivity cast, the weekly show about all things productivity. Here, your host Ray Sidney-Smith and Augusto Pinaud with Francis Wade and Art Gelwicks. Raymond Sidney-Smith 0:17 And Welcome back, everybody to productivity cast, the weekly show about all things personal productivity, I'm Ray Sidney Smith. Francis Wade 0:23I'm Francis Wade. Augusto Pinaud 0:24 I am Augusto Pinaud. Art Gelwicks 0:25 And I'm Art Gelwicks. Raymond Sidney-Smith 0:26 And we are back this week with an episode on a topic that I really enjoy talking about. Because it's such an interesting flavor of a productivity system. What we're going to do today is we're going to talk about personal kanban, which is both a methodology and a book very similar to getting things done by David Allen. And so Personal Kanban mapping work navigating life as a book by Tony and Mario Berry and Jim Benson. And the history of it is actually found in combine the TGO, no lean manufacturing process that was developed back in I believe, the 60s or 70s, I could be wrong about that. But the idea here is that it has since branched off into a process management and proven methodology. The ideas behind Kanban have since branched off into process management and improvement methods used by many in the productivity community, especially in the Lean Six Sigma and agile communities.

Are you always hearing excuses from others about why they didn't get something done? Or, are you coming to terms with making excuses yourself for commitments you are making and breaking? In this cast, we discuss the particulars of excuses (and making justifications, and perhaps appropriates "reasons") for not getting a task or project completed. (If you’re reading this in a podcast directory/app, please visit https://productivitycast.net/060 for clickable links and the full show notes and transcript of this cast.) Enjoy! Give us feedback! And, thanks for listening! If you'd like to continue discussing managing digital notebooks from this episode, please click here to leave a comment down below (this jumps you to the bottom of the post). In this Cast | Excuses, Excuses, Excuses Ray Sidney-Smith Augusto Pinaud Francis Wade Show Notes | Excuses, Excuses, Excuses Resources we mention, including links to them, will be provided here. Please listen to the episode for context. The Difference Between a Reason and an Excuse (Because the world does not need another thumb sucker) QBQ! The Question Behind the Question: Practicing Personal Accountability at Work and in Life by John G. Miller How to Get Control of Your Time and Your Life by Alan Lakein “Responsibility” - Werner Erhard Dunning-Kruger Effect First, Break All the Rules: What the World's Greatest Managers Do Differently by Gallup and Marcus Buckingham Raw Text Transcript | Excuses, Excuses, Excuses Raw, unedited and machine-produced text transcript so there may be substantial errors, but you can search for specific points in the episode to jump to, or to reference back to at a later date and time, by keywords or key phrases. The time coding is mm:ss (e.g., 0:04 starts at 4 seconds into the cast’s audio). Read More Voiceover Artist 0:00 Are you ready to manage your work and personal world better to live a fulfilling productive life, then you've come to the right place productivity cast, the weekly show about all things productivity. Here, your host Ray Sidney-Smith and Augusto Pinaud with Francis Wade and Art Gelwicks. Raymond Sidney-Smith 0:17 And Welcome back, everybody to productivity cast, the weekly show about all things personal productivity, I'm Ray Sidney Smith. Augusto Pinaud 0:24 I am Augusto Pinaud. Francis Wade 0:25I'm Francis Wade. Raymond Sidney-Smith 0:26 And we are back this week to talk about a topic that we have been really excited about, or I've been really excited about talking about, which is the idea of excuses. So many times, we ourselves experienced the idea of making excuses for getting things done. And we hear excuses from others about what they should have, would have could have done and didn't. And so I know that Augusto Francis and myself, we hear this quite often in our world of dealing with people in their productive lives. And so we've heard a lot of excuses. That's, that's all we're going to say there. And so what we wanted to do in this episode was to talk about the idea of what is the difference between excuses and reasons for not getting what you said, you're going to get done, done. And then talking about some of the excuses we we do internally, that is the excuses that we give ourselves when we are not getting things done, and how to overcome those, hopefully, a couple of tips on how to do that. And then how to deal with excuses from others, whether they be at home or in the workplace, how do we respond to excuses so that we can all be more productive along any project path, whether or goal that we might have. So let's get started with the idea that there is a difference between reason and an excuse. I'm going to start off with an interesting gentleman, he wrote a medium article called the difference between a reason and an excuse because the world does not need another thumb sucker by Gary Ryan Blaine. And I'm not going to fully read all of these.