Simple Principles vs. Complex Rules
Here’s a good quote cited in Getting Things Done:
Simple, clear purpose and principles give rise to complex and intelligent behavior. Complex rules and regulations give rise to simple and stupid behavior.
Defining the Purpose of a Project Expands Options
In addition to clarifying focus, defining the purpose for a project expands options. This is the opposite of what we might expect — we might expect a clear definition of purpose to be limiting rather than broadening.
And it is limiting in a sense — it directs your thinking and energies towards those things that will produce the outcome you want and away from those things that won’t. But, in doing this, it opens up your sights to a whole host of things that align with our purpose but which you wouldn’t have thought of otherwise. It’s as though the clearing out of options that aren’t aligned with your purpose creates room for a whole host of new things that are aligned with it to “show up.”
Here is how Allen puts it in Getting Things Done (pp 65-66):
Paradoxically, even as purpose brings things into pinpoint focus, it opens up creative thinking about wider possibilities. When you really know the underlying “why” — for the conference, for the staff party, for the elimination of the management position, or for the merger — it expands your thinking about how to make the desired result happen. When people write out their purpose for a project in my seminars, they often claim it’s like a fresh breeze blowing through their mind, clarifying their vision of what they’re doing.
But your purpose must be clear and specific:
Is your purpose clear and specific enough? If you’re truly experiencing the benefits of a purpose focus — motivation, clarity, decision-making criteria, alignment, and creativity — then your purpose probably is specific enough.
But many “purpose statements” are too vague to produce such results. “To have a good department,” for example, might be too broad a goal. After all, what constitutes a “good department”? Is it a group of people who are highly motivated, collaborating in healthy ways, and taking initiative? Or is it a department that comes in under budget?
In other words, if you don’t really know when you’ve met your purpose or when you’re off track, you don’t have a viable directive. The question “How will I know when this is off-purpose?” must have a clear answer.
In sum: Defining your purpose expands options, along with providing motivation, clarity, decision-making criteria, and alignment. But your purpose must be clear and specific. You know if your purpose is specific enough if you can clearly tell from it not just when you are on-purpose, but when you are off-purpose.
Kindle on the iPhone
From the Tools of Change for Publishing blog:
Users of the iPhone and iPod Touch can now tap into Amazon’s Kindle store with the free Kindle for iPhone application. From The New York Times:
“The move comes a week after Amazon started shipping the updated version of its Kindle reading device. It signals that the company may be more interested in becoming the pre-eminent retailer of e-books than in being the top manufacturer of reading devices.”
Amazon is positioning the iPhone app as a gap filler: nibble on book content while waiting at the airport, in line, at a restaurant, etc., but settle in for deep reading with the original Kindle (or, presumably, the printed edition). Toward that end, the Times says Amazon is using a bookmark feature that keeps a reader’s spot as they switch devices.
For those interested in the Kindle 2, you can also see the Kindle 2 here.
Managing Virtual Teams Effectively
Patrick Lencioni has a helpful article this month on managing virtual teams.
He makes three main points:
- Do not underestimate the challenge of being remote
- Know how not to waste the time you do spend together in person
- Master the conference call.
About Matt Perman
Follower of Christ. Husband of one, father of three. Director of strategy at Desiring God. This blog exists to help equip Christians in good works, because that's what productivity is really about.
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