Notes for Productivity - Sam Altman

WHAT YOU WORK ON

  • It doesn’t matter how fast you move if it’s in a worthless direction
  • Develop the confidence to stick with your convictions
  • Leave enough time to think about what to work on
  • One can’t be very productive working on things one don’t care about or don’t like
  • Not liking what you’re doing for a long period of time, seriously consider a major job change
  • You can learn anything you want
  • Try to be around smart, productive, happy, and positive people

PRIORITIZATION

  • Make sure to get the important shit done
  • Don’t waste time on stupid shit
  • make a lot of lists
  • prioritize in a way that generates momentum
  • generally try to avoid meetings and conferences
  • enough space in your schedule to allow for chance encounters and exposure to new people and ideas
  • Having an open network is valuable
  • most meetings are best scheduled for 15-20 minutes, or 2 hours
  • my most productive time of the day, so I don’t let anyone schedule anything then
  • switch tasks, whenever I feel my attention starting to fade
  • It doesn’t matter what system you use or if you squeeze out every second if you’re working on the wrong thing.

PHYSICAL FACTORS

OTHER STUFF

  • Natural light
  • Quiet
  • Knowing that I won’t be interrupted if I don’t want to be
  • Long blocks of time
  • Being comfortable and relaxed
  • Wrote custom software for the annoying things I have to do frequently
  • Keyboard shortcuts that help with my workflow
  • Like most people, I sometimes go through periods of a week or two where I just have no motivation to do anything
  • Oid people and situations that put me in bad moods
  • In general, I think it’s good to overcommit a little bit
  • Train to avoid distractions
  • Don’t neglect your family and friends for the sake of productivity
  • Don’t neglect doing things you love or that clear your head either
  • Productivity in the wrong direction isn’t worth anything at all. Think more about what to work on