The Forgotten Factor: How Timing Trumps All Productivity Hacks

Hey There,

Have you ever found yourself wondering how to get things done more efficiently or how to improve your productivity? You're not alone. There are countless books out there that claim to have answers to these questions, but they only seem to cover "what" and "how". What about "when"? As it turns out, timing might be the missing piece to the puzzle.

In his book "When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing", Daniel Pink takes a deep dive into the importance of timing and how it can impact our effectiveness and productivity. And here are some key lessons from the book on maximizing your timing:

1. Myth to be debunked: Our cognitive ability remain static over the day

Our cognitive abilities fluctuate during the day, resulting in peaks and troughs of productivity. Most people experience a morning peak suitable for focus-intensive tasks, an afternoon trough better for routine work, and an evening recovery period for creative thinking. More importantly, these daily fluctuations are more extreme than we realize.

The performance change between the daily high point and the daily low point can be equivalent to the effect on performance of drinking the legal limit of alcohol. —— Russell Foster, neuroscientist and chronobiologist at the University of Oxford

Did you know that scheduling activities according to our natural rhythms can significantly boost our productivity? Most people have a morning peak suitable for focus-intensive tasks and an afternoon trough better for routine work. Interestingly, our innovation and creativity are greatest when we're not at our best, at least with respect to our circadian rhythms. This is known as the "inspiration paradox". So, audit your routines and productivity tricks. Are you making the most of natural cycles and rhythms? Consider scheduling:

• Focus-intensive tasks for your high-energy morning period
• Menial tasks for your low-energy afternoon period
• Creative thinking or brainstorming for your fresher evening hours

2. Take short breaks and make them count!

Research found that short but strategic breaks are crucial to recovering your focus and productivity and Pink offer 5 guiding principles for us when trying to schedule a break:

1. Something beats nothing. High performers work for 52 minutes and then break for 17 minutes. (If it’s too difficult to execute, try using the Pomodoro techique that I shared in my previous newsletter)
2. Moving beats stationary. One study showed that hourly five-minute walking breaks boosted energy levels, sharpened focus, and “improved mood throughout the day and reduced feelings of fatigue in the late afternoon.”
3. Social beats solo. Research in South Korean workplaces shows that social breaks—talking with coworkers about something other than work—are more effective at reducing stress and improving mood than either cognitive breaks (answering e-mail) or nutrition breaks (getting a snack). (hmm I guess this won’t apply to introverts like me tho…)
4. Outside beats inside. People who take short walks outdoors return with better moods and greater replenishment than people who walk indoors.
5. Fully detached beats semi-detached. Tech-free breaks also increase vigor and reduce emotional exhaustion.

3. Wrong timing can snowball into something more serious than what we thought

As you might see how timing in the day could make a huge difference in terms of your productivity. However, the importance of time goes way beyond that and can create a much more long-lasting and profound impact on us than we thought.

A perfect example to illustrate this will be the income difference caused by your time to enter the job market. College grads who entered the workforce during periods of high unemployment, like 1982 and 1983 when rates exceeded 10%, earned on average 2.5% less for the next two decades. That amounts to $100,000 in lost wages over 20 years!

Why? When jobs are scarce, companies pay less and have more candidates to choose from. You start off making less, so even with similar raises, you always earn less than those who entered during "normal" times. You also have less freedom to change roles early on to find the best career fit. So that tiny initial difference snowballs into a major gap over the years.

The same principle applies to medical school interns who begin working in July - a time nicknamed "the July effect" because errors spike as inexperienced doctors practice on live patients. Up to 41% more surgery patients die that month compared to springtime.

Conclusion

To conclude, keep an eye on the time, both in a macro sense to seize the right moments and micro sense to schedule productively within moments. Rinse and repeat the process to continuously improve your timing - and maximize your impact!

Things that I found interesting this week: