Free to Focus Buchzusammenfassung - das Wichtigste aus Free to Focus

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Zusammenfassung von Free to Focus

Name: Free to Focus
Rating: 4.4 (348 reviews)
Author: Michael Hyatt

Michael Hyatt

A Total Productivity System to Achieve More by Doing Less

4.4 (348 Bewertungen)

18 Min.

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What’s in it for me? Productivity without more activity.

The most important word in our culture is “more” – we are bombarded by more products, more speed, more work and more stress. We’re forever trying to fit more into our already busy schedules. That’s why we crave – you guessed it – more productivity. But how far can we stretch ourselves and our schedules? Michael Hyatt shows us an alternative to this path to self-destruction. In Free to Focus, he argues that we’re aiming for the wrong target – we don’t need to be doing more, just more of the right thing.

This is easier said than done, especially in a workplace teeming with distractions that sap our attention and ability to focus. But Hyatt explains that if we can get a handle on these things, our productivity will soar and we’ll leave work feeling calm and content.

In these blinks, you’ll find out

that time is a zero-sum game;
why getting more sleep means getting more done; and
what to do in a “distraction economy.”

Our concept of productivity is flawed.

Workdays are filled with an endless litany of tasks – there are meetings to attend, presentations to give, reports to write and projects to complete. But our efforts are seldom enough. Sometimes it feels like we’re in a leaky boat, frantically bucketing water over the side. The water builds up, and we start to sink. That’s the moment we start buying into the myth of productivity. We think if we could work a bit faster, we’d be okay. We start to look for life hacks, each promising to give us a few more minutes of time.

But obsessing over speed actually decreases our productivity. That’s because we try to do more with our time, and squander any time saved by cramming more things into our overflowing schedules. Finding a quicker way to write our daily emails, for instance, just means we’ll start preparing tomorrow’s emails sooner.

In another flawed approach to increasing productivity, we start working overtime to finish all our tasks. Sometimes we justify this by telling ourselves the overtime is temporary and things will calm down soon. However, the opposite is true. Jack Nevison, the founder of New Leaf Project Management, compiled the results of several major studies looking into workplace productivity. He found that workers who clock more than 55 hours per week are actually less productive than those working 50 or less, due to stress and mental fatigue.

Our current myths about productivity are unsustainable and inefficient. That’s why, instead of productivity, we should start aiming for freedom.

Freedom can mean many things. The freedom to focus, for example, which means finding the time to focus and accomplish uninterrupted deep work. This is the most important and often most difficult type of work, as it yields more results and involves tough mental labor. Because deep work involves intense focus, it’s draining and is only possible for a limited time each day.

This makes another objective of productivity even more important – that is, the freedom to do nothing. It sounds counterintuitive, but most of our breakthrough ideas actually happen when our minds are at ease. Being productive during the week means we gain the freedom to do nothing in our time off, and that’s when the creative juices really begin to flow.

Scheduling time for rejuvenation isn’t a luxury – it’s necessary.

When our calendar starts to overflow and our to-do lists become longer than shopping lists, we instinctively cut down on recreation and relaxation. For most of us, busy periods mean canceling dinner with a friend or getting a few less hours of sleep. But not only does skimping on rest and leisure damage our emotional health, it’s also completely ineffective.

Many of us believe that time is flexible and our energy levels remain unchanged throughout the day – we think we can extend our workday by 20 percent and accomplish 20 percent more. But time is fixed, and energy levels are finite. We usually get our best work done in the morning, when our minds are fresh, while after lunch we’re slower and less productive. This is daily proof that energy levels are flexible, and focus and willpower are finite resources that must be replenished.

Being productive means identifying unnecessary tasks.

Clearly, productivity should give you more time for rejuvenation, making you more focused and efficient – but how can you achieve this? The first step involves acting like a gardener.

To save time, you need to prune away the nonessential tasks in your workday. Doing less to be more productive may seem strange, but it’s the most important secret to efficiency. Productivity isn’t about doing more of everything – it’s about doing more of the right things. This means identifying key tasks to focus on and trimming away everything else.

To be free to focus, you must learn the power of yes and no.

Today, it’s easy to be overworked and overcommitted – the hard part is having the discipline to prioritize. How is it that some people manage to accomplish so much more than others in the same amount of time? One reason is that highly productive people understand the power of no.

Productivity superstars can say no, both to unnecessary tasks, as we saw in the last blink, and to requests from their colleagues and clients. They know that if they allowed them to, these tasks and requests could take up all their time and energy and prevent them from focusing on truly important work.

Plan your day around a big three and create an ideal week to aim for.

How many of us walk into the office with no plan in place, passively reacting to the day’s developments? But this behavior is setting us up to fail. The author Robin Sharma once wrote, “you will never be able to hit a target that you cannot see.” This makes a lot of sense – what’s the point of being productive if our actions are unstructured and we’re not aiming for anything specific? For productivity to have meaning and for focus to have an outlet, we need direction.

Therefore, it’s essential that we plan our day beforehand. This clearly sets our target and gives us something to aim for. We can do this by planning our day around a big three – three tasks that we must accomplish that day. These are our priorities, and anything else achieved is a bonus. Three might seem like a small number, but we can choose complex tasks. The advantage of this system is that it forces us to prioritize our objectives.

If you can challenge the distraction economy, you’ll reap the rewards.

Instant messaging, push notifications, web surfing and the endless scroll of social media – these things are embedded into our daily lives, and all conspire to rob us of our focus and concentration. And while many of them have brought considerable benefits to our personal and professional lives, they’ve also made it easier than ever to procrastinate.

In fact, we can view the instant gratification culture that technology has fostered as a new type of economy – the distraction economy. Things like phone calls, emails, social media and news sites are all competing for our attention, and this is a valuable commodity – that’s why we call it paying attention!

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Worum geht es in Free to Focus?

In Free to Focus (2019), Michael Hyatt challenges some common myths surrounding productivity and proposes a new way to approach our workday. In a distraction-laden and attention-sapping world, these blinks offer a reality check packed with practical tips.

Wer Free to Focus lesen sollte

Perfectionists who want to increase their efficiency
Professionals craving a better work-life balance
Time-wasters hoping to change their ways

Über den Autor

Michael Hyatt is an American author, podcaster and expert on technology and productivity. He has spent most of his career in the publishing industry and previously worked as chairman and CEO of the publishing house Thomas Nelson.

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