Cracking Ali Abdaal's Productivity Masterclass
- imran ali
- Oct 26, 2022
- 6 min read
The world has transformed into a wonderful place to live in, with technology advancing to the point where the majority of our problems are only a click away. Want to know who plays the lead actress in a film? Google it. Are you hungry? There are food delivery apps like Grubhub and DoorDash that can help you get food delivered right to your door. Want to meet up with friends? WhatsApp them. However, life has been both simple and challenging at the same time. Businesses in the technology sector are intentionally addictive. This is why we spend the entire day mindlessly scrolling through Instagram. These minor distractions cost us our focus. We do have time, but what we really lack is focus, which is why I chose to enrol in Ali Abdaal's productivity masterclass, available on Skillshare. Today's article will include a summary of the major highlights of the course.
Productivity Equation
Productivity depends on 4 key components:
Amount of output
Time
Usefulness of output
Fun factor
After understanding these basic productivity components, we can design our lives to yield the best output from ourselves. Each day we have to become:
Pilot Being in pilot mode, we set up the course of action—deciding which tasks (outputs) are to be performed and the allocated time for each task.
Plane Once figured out, we should spend most of the time directing energy on the completion of tasks.
Engineer The job of an engineer is to make the operations smoother that is to check the machine is operating with minimal wear and tear. Similarly, in this role, we have to build systems to make sure the performed tasks don’t cause burnout.
3 Myths of Productivity
Myth of Motivation
We, humans, follow the common path of motivation that leads our thoughts to actions. However, the ideal path should not depend on our motivation (our thought should become actions directly). Motivation is a sort of feeling; feeling that disappears and depends on the context.
Action is not just the effect of motivation; it's also the cause of it. — The subtle art of not giving a F*ck
Ryan Holiday, who has published 12 books in a decade, often repeats the famous quote that emphasizes stopping waiting for the right time to get started, instead lower the bar and get started because:
The first draft of anything is shit. — Ernest Hemingway
Because our brains have evolved to favour immediate rewards over long-term ones after thousands of generations in an environment that rewards immediate results. Our goal must be to trick the brain by adding little pleasure with actions that are worth performing and punishing actions that are not to be performed. As James Clear says, "What is rewarded is repeated and what is punished is avoided."
For eg., if you want to hit the gym every day, add pleasure to it by treating yourself with a massage or some self-care routine to make the actions worth doing. Similarly, add punishment to actions that you want to avoid, for eg. if any of the tasks on your to-do list are overdue then fine yourself. Because the fear of losing money is incredible, this motivates us to finish off the tasks on our to-do list.
Myth of Multitasking
The idea of multitasking has been sold by the smartphone industry for so long that has been internalized by us. We believe multi-tasking is the way to go, even though it makes us feel powerless, stressed and burnt out. The fact, on the other hand, is that we are least productive when we do more than one task at a time.
To do two things at once is to do neither. — Publius Syrus
Whenever we multitask, some attention remains on the previously performed task. This is called attention residue. One of the lessons from Elon Musk’s biography is that he minimizes task switching and this is one of the reasons he successfully manages Tesla, SpaceX, Solar City, Starlink and a few more companies together.
Therefore, our ideal routine must allow us to focus on a single task like completing an assignment or making a YouTube video or writing a blog or updating a resume followed by any other task on the to-do list. Performing tasks in such a way help us achieve the flow state; a state where we are the most productive and focused. Flow state is achievable by working on tasks that are difficult enough to grab our attention; the tasks that force us into a stretch zone rather than a comfort or panic zone. Secondly, we should stop distractions - actively choose to design our environment with the least distractions to help us focus on things that are actually important in the longer term.
I don't have time
This is often repeated sentences by any of us. However, this is so untrue because every time we say I don't have time we actively choose to not do the task and do something else.
Time is what we want most but what we use worst. — William Penn
In reality, we never have time to do anything we make time for things that are important to us hence we must stop using this phrase because it feeds our brain that time can be used as an excuse to procrastinate.
Three laws of productivity
Pareto's Law
A very famous 80/20 rule, this principle states that 80% of the results come from 20% of the efforts. For e.g., 80% of the exam comes from 20% of the core syllabus or 80% of this blog comes from 20% of the notes that I took while taking the masterclass.
This principle applies to almost everything and in order to learn a new skill or do your work we need to find what the 20% is that drives 80% of the results in that scenario. Think of it as a leverage point.
Newtons First Law of motion
In physics, the law states that an object is at rest or travelling at a constant velocity unless it's acted on by an external imbalanced force. The law applies to our lives as well, it is very difficult to start studying or doing an assignment or writing an article (we stay at rest, struggling to find the motivation). However, when we take an action (external imbalanced force) then we continue to do the task. One of the best ways to get started is to apply a 2-min rule as mentioned in atomic habits i.e., to start an action make it easier by breaking it down into very very easy tasks; for e.g., if a person wants to go to the gym, then he must directly get into the gym outfit after reaching home or if a person wants to start reading then he must open a book and read a single page.
Parkinson’s Law
Work expands to fill the time we allocate to it
Too much time for any task promotes procrastination. To be more productive we can set artificial deadlines because it helps brain to prioritize the tasks that are important. In the book, Zero to One, Peter Thiel asks, “How can you achieve your 10-year plan in the next 6 months?”
While Ali Abdaal said setting an artificial deadline helps but in my case that was really not helpful - I always fall short of the time I allocate to the task and one of the most likely reasons for it is to deliberately set very narrow deadlines. This might be because the common psychological trap that we fall into is thinking that our future selves are more competent than we are today. Anyway I hope to learn more about being more lenient with myself and giving myself exactly the right amount of time that is needed to get the task done. The same problem has been mentioned by Thomas frank in his work:
We tend to underestimate the time we need to do the task therefore we can use the Fudge ratio, a multiplier of 1.5 to our initial estimate is a good point to start with.
Productive Downtime
In our daily routines, we all have plenty amount of downtime, where we mindlessly scroll through Instagram. Instead of succumbing to our addictions, we should use these brief windows of time to accomplish our goals. Making a daily highlight is an effective strategy for making the most of downtime. In the pilot mode (check productivity equation), we must create a day highlight in which we choose one task that must be completed today (a strategy mentioned in the book “Make Time”). Doing so forces us to actively choose what to do when we get a break. We all need a certain amount of downtime therefore we should not always try to be productive. However, we should also experiment; perhaps we don't need as much downtime as we think we do.
Utilizing the GTD system is another resource that aids in making the most of downtime (check out the article to learn more about the system). By properly interacting with the system, we can see what tasks and projects we need to work on next.
Power of habit
A 1% improvement each day adds up to 37 times better performance in a year, proving the value of developing habits and discipline to carry out tasks. We need to work on altering our identities and strengthening our identity of being a productive person.
My views
In my opinion, this Skillshare course is worthwhile to take because it teaches you how to be efficient and productive. But I wouldn't advise anyone to purchase a Skillshare subscription just for this course. Since James Clear's Atomic Habits is the best productivity book I've ever read, I would advise beginners to purchase that book rather than the course.
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