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How to Set Up Your Desk The Ebook: Now Available

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I’ve turned one of the most popular series on this blog into an ebook, which I’m releasing today. The book is How to Set Up Your Desk: A Guide to Fixing a (Surprisingly) Overlooked Productivity Problem, and it’s available for your Kindle.

I believe that being productive starts with your worldview — you need to know your purpose and why it’s important to be productive at all. But once we have that worldview in place, it is crucial to also understand and utilize the best strategies and tactics we can find and develop.

The question of how to set up our desks is an area that affects all of us consistently, yet has received almost no good treatment. The common idea seems to be “just do what works for you.” But far from creating greater freedom, this notion actually creates inefficiency and annoyance. While it is true that we each have our own personal style, it is also true that there are certain fundamental principles applicable to everyone that make for an effective desk setup. If you don’t understand these principles, you will have an annoying, less effective workspace.

In other words, it is possible to have a smooth-running, efficient desk setup that will make make your desk setup both more efficient and more enjoyable to use. And this will increase your productivity, since when we like the way we have things set up, we not only use them more efficiently but are also inclined toward more productive behaviors.

This ebook shows you how to do that with your desk. It shows you how to get it set up right — in a way that serves you and is not annoying, and is based on sound principles that make sense and that you can apply to any situation.

Here are three endorsements:

“Matt Perman has served me so well in applying a Steve Jobs-like approach to my workflow: simple, intuitive, elegant, and efficient. I’ve followed most of his advice about setting up my desk (as well as processing my email), and it works beautifully.”

—Andy Naselli, Assistant Professor of New Testament and Biblical Theology at Bethlehem College and Seminary in Minneapolis; Research Manager for D. A. Carson; Administrator of the theological journal Themelios

“Your desk is probably standing in the way of your effectiveness at work. So are your email, office supplies, and task management systems (or lack thereof). Matt Perman is the master of all of these areas. His well-researched and documented methodologies have revolutionized the effectiveness with which I live out my callings in life.”

—Matt Heerema, Pastor of Stonebrook Community Church; Director of Mere Design Agency

“Sitting here in my office, I am able to look around at a well-ordered and organized system thanks to Matt Perman. This book drastically helped me with my physical workspace, and the results have been tremendous. I will now use this book for all new staff in our department.”

—Chris Misiano, Senior Director of Campus Recreation, Liberty University

This would be a good book for readers of What’s Best Next who want to go deeper on the tactical side, but you don’t have to have read What’s Best Next to benefit from this book. It will help anyone, anywhere, who is interested in implementing, as David Allen has said, “smooth running, silent systems” for greater productivity.

 

Does What's Best Next Give a Sufficient Theology of Productivity for Women?

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Jen Pollock Michel takes me to task on that over at Christianity Today’s her.meneutics blog, which provides news and analysis from the perspective of evangelical women.

But the thing is: she’s right. And, she’s very gracious. She understands the book, enjoyed it, and found it helpful. The whole review is excellent and I highly commend it to you.

She isn’t saying that the book totally misses it on a woman’s perspective. Not at all. But she points to some important correctives. She argues that the first half of the book, where I give a theology of productivity, is right on. Her point is that when I enter into the second, more practical half, I tend to leave behind issues that are most specifically relevant to women. She summarizes this very well:

The first half of What’s Best Next demonstrates clearly that Matt Perman values all work. “Good works are not simply the rare, special, extraordinary, or super spiritual things we do. Rather, they are anything that we do in faith.” I only wish the second half of the book had made more mention of so-called women’s work. (In fact, upon closer examination of the book, I realize how “male” the book really is, not only in terms of its conception of time and work, but in its consultation. All 12 endorsers are male, and of the 20 books in the recommended reading list, only two are written by women.)

Thank you, Jen. You make very good points, and I appreciate that you pointed this out to me in such a gracious way. This is exactly the type of push-back that helps all of us grow — and we especially need it in areas like this, which is something that honestly was not on my radar at all (which is why I am especially thankful for her critique).

I will do better in the future, and will seek to think about productivity in a more holistic way that doesn’t end up narrowing in on things in such a way that areas that are especially important to a woman’s perspective are left out. And, I agree that it would have been better if more of the books I recommended and interacted with had been by women. I will try to broaden my perspective there as well.

This also raises a larger issue. I do think that women have traditionally been under-represented in Christian writing and leadership. And I think that, as men, we share significant responsibility for that because of being too narrowly focused on ourselves and own perspectives. I actually do try to do something about that (though I could do better); I make a special effort to learn when women speak up in the church, not out of some strange affirmative action thinking but because I consistently find it helpful. Everyone is better off when both men and women are encouraged to make all the contributions they are capable of.

The good news is that things are changing. Some of the most helpful and engaging books on leadership and the Christian life right now are more and more being written by women. As a few examples on the Christian life and productivity side, let me commend to you Jen’s own upcoming book Teach Us to Want: Longing, Ambition, and the Life of Faith, which looks fantastic and much-needed; Gloria Furman’s new book Treasuring Christ When Your Hands Are Full: Gospel Meditations for Busy Moms; Aimee Bird’s recent Housewife Theologian: How the Gospel Transforms the Ordinary; Melissa McDonald’s excellent blog The Cross and the Kitchen Sink, with its great tagline “because the cross changes everything but including the kitchen sink”; and, of course, Christianity Today’s her.meneutics blog where you can find more of Jen’s writings along with contributions from many other excellent writers looking at faith and news from the perspective of evangelical women.

And specifically on the leadership side, Jenni Catron is one of the best thinkers on leadership in the church right now, and I highly commend her new book Clout: Unleash Your God-Given Potential, with a foreword by Patrick Lencioni, one of the greatest management thinkers of our day.

So women are making an incredible contribution in the church today to Christian thought. That is an excellent thing that we need to celebrate. And Jen’s review of What’s Best Next shows how someone like me still needs to grow in this, and how easy it is to not even realize how often we unconsciously overlook the need to, as Jen puts it in her post, “understand a women’s perspective in the time management conversation” — or whatever else we are writing on.

So, thanks again, Jen, for your review.

Read the whole thing.

 

Why What's Best Next is Relevant to Scholars and Students

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Here is an absolutely fantastic and helpful review of What’s Best Next by David Leonard, assistant professor of philosophy and apologetics at Luther Rice University.

David first nails the essence of the book in the opening paragraph: how productivity is about putting the needs of others first. This is not something we often think of when we think of productivity, but it is both biblical and the way to become most productive and make the highest impact.

Then he gets into the specific angle of the review: how What’s Best Next is applicable to scholars and students. He relates it to Andreas Köstenberger’s incredible book Excellence: The Character of God and the Pursuit of Scholarly Virtue, writing:

Whereas Andreas Köstenberger, for example, has challenged scholars to pursue their work with excellence, in terms of demonstrating boldness amidst the pressures of “academic respectability” and displaying integrity in their scholarly activities, Perman highlights for readers the practical steps that might be taken to clear the way for such excellence to be achieved.

To put it differently, if an excellence is roughly identical to a virtue, then it seems the aim of What’s Best Next is to enable Christians to be virtuous stewards of their time and resources, a theme which overlaps nicely with Köstenberger’s emphasis.  Christian scholars, no doubt, would do well to reflect on these connections.

This connection to Kostenberger’s book is right on. Kostenberger shows the importance of excellence; What’s Best Next gives some practical steps for making excellence happen in every area of life. And, as Leonard shows, this has great application for scholars and students, as well as those in the marketplace, leading churches, leading non-profits, and leading in their communities.

Leonard’s review also interacts with some of the most unique parts of the book as well, such as how allowing people to surf the internet for fun at work makes people more productive, not less.

Read the whole thing.

The Traditional View of Productivity vs. Gospel-Driven Productivity

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Traditional View (TV): Do more in less time.
Gospel-Driven Productivity (GDP): Do the right things, and you can care a lot less about efficiency.

TV: Use the right techniques.
GDP: Be the right kind of person. Then, use smart techniques.

TV: Seek peace of mind and fulfillment.
GDP: Seek to do good for others first, and make a contribution. Peace and fulfillment will follow (and so will suffering!—but of a different kind).

TV: Minimize work and maximize money.
GDP: Do hard things and find joy in your work as a fulfillment of your calling. Maximize meaning, not money.

Transformational Productivity vs. Transactional Productivity

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Stephen Covey, in his stellar book First Things First:

For most people, the large majority of waking time is spent communicating or interacting with people — or dealing with the results of poor communication or interaction.

Effective interdependence is core to the issue of time management. But the traditional literature essentially deals with it in a transactional way. This transactional approach grows out of the mechanical, controlling, managing “things” paradigm. People are essentially seen as bionic units to whom we can delegate to get more done, or as interruptions to be handled efficiently so that we can get back to our schedule.

But fourth-generation interdependence is not transactional; it’s transformational. It literally changes those who are party to it. It takes into consideration the full reality of the uniqueness and capacity of each individual and the rich, serendipitous potential of creating synergistic third alternatives [see note below on why these aren’t just buzzwords] that are far better than individuals could ever come up with on their own.

Fourth-generation interdependence is the richness of relationships, the adventure of discovery, the spontaneity and deep fulfillment of putting people ahead of schedules, and the joy of creating together what did not exist before.

In other words: Just as leadership can be transactional or transformational, so also our approach to productivity can be transactional or transformational.

In leadership, the transactional view sees people merely as means to an end. They are a tool to accomplish a task, rather than also being valued in themselves. In a transactional view, people are viewed as expendable. If this person can’t do it, then that person will. Instead of adjusting jobs to fit people, people are “adjusted” to fit a standardized view of a job (all in the name of “efficiency,” of course; note: this hardly every works out well for people!) People with a transactional view say things like “why is this taking you so long? I’m not paying you to learn, I’m paying you to get a job done.” Truly horrible. I mean that.

In transformational leadership, people are not seen as a means to an end. People are valued as well as tasks. People are seen as important and valuable in their own right. Thus, the goal becomes not simply to get tasks done, but to build people up in the accomplishment of tasks. This is the only view of leadership consistent with the Scriptures, which teach us that people are created in the image of God, and thus are always to be treated with respect, value, and love.

As with leadership, so also with productivity. In the transactional view of productivity, we think of others either as tools to help us get more done, or interruptions who are getting in our way. This is disrespectful and unbiblical, just as transactional leadership is.

The correct view of productivity is transformational. People are not merely means to help us get more done, or obstacles to doing what we really want. Rather, relationships are seen as part of what it means to be productive at all. True productivity comes from working with others, and doing so in a way that recognizes and values their individuality and seeks to help them grow through the process of creating something great together.

The essence of the transformational view of productivity or leadership or anything else is this: see people as people who are valuable for their own sakes, having been created in the image of God, and thus even when you have tasks to accomplish, make the aim not to “get things done through others” but rather to “build people up in the accomplishment of the tasks.” Value people as well as tasks, and more than tasks. For it is the effect you have on people that is the true measure of your productivity.

Here’s the note I mentioned: Covey is often criticized for using terms like “synergy” and “paradigm” too much. I think that’s a very wrong-headed criticism. Sure, lots of people use those terms not knowing what they are talking about. That’s annoying.

But when someone who actually understands such terms uses them, it’s not something to criticize; it’s something to pay attention to. If we criticize people every time they use a word that has become “common,” we undermine all teaching. For teaching is about making important concepts universal. If we then make fun of those concepts because they have become so common, haven’t we then undermined the whole enterprise of teaching?

Naming Your Computer Files Well

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It is so completely strange to me that really odd naming conventions for computer files continue to persist to this day.

I have probably over 10,000 documents on my computer (Word documents, spreadsheets, keynote presentations, PDFs, and so forth). If I followed the usual naming conventions that most people seem to use, I would be totally lost. I’d never be able to find anything.

For example, one of the things I do in my consulting is write business plans for people. Sometimes, when the client takes the first attempt at writing the business plan, the file will be named something like “plan234.doc.”

???

It’s as though we think we need to intentionally give our computer files cryptic, obscure, hard-to-grasp names. This, in turn, makes it really hard to find the file when you are going to work on it, since it’s not like it’s the only file you have.

Far better to call it what it is. In this case, the best file name would be: “Business Plan for [Name of Company].doc.” Then, you know what the document is right away when you see it in your files. You don’t have to guess or, worst of all, open it in order to know for sure what it is.

I see this type of mistake made over and over again: people continually give their computer files names that are hard to decipher. I don’t know if the aim is to save space or what; if the aim is to save space, the need to do that went away about 20 years ago. It used to be that file names had to be kept very short, because we were limited to just a few characters. Those days are over.

And, spaces are OK!

In one of the call-out boxes in What’s Best Next, I summarize these principles as one of the immediately-applicable productivity tips I give. Here’s the box:

How to Name Your Computer Files Well

  1. Give the file a name that actually means something.
  2. Don’t abbreviate (it makes no sense and makes it harder to know what the file is at a glance!)
  3. Make the file name the same as the title of the document in the file.

Good name: “Bookstore Procedure Manual.” Bad name: “Bkstr_2305.”

If someone says: “The type of file name you suggest is too obvious,” my response is: That’s the point! If you don’t make it obvious, you’ll forget what the file actually is down the road or the next day. By making it obvious, you save time.

The principle for naming your computer files well is the same as the principle for making websites effective: “Don’t make me think.” That is, minimize your cognitive workload by making the file name something obvious. The aim is to know right away, at a glance, what the file actually is so you don’t have to spend time trying to figure out which file you are looking for after all.

Seven Principles for Setting Goals that Work

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My guest post today at Michael Hyatt’s blog.

Stephen Covey would often talk about people climbing the ladder so fast that they would get to the top, only to discover that their ladder was leaning against the wrong wall.

So how do we set goals that actually take us to a place we want to be? I give seven principles. The first is that a good goal always starts by asking not “what do I want to do,” but “what needs to be done?” That’s the question that orients you toward contribution and service, which is the core principle for being effective in any area.

Read the whole thing.

The Relationship Between Processing Workflow and How My Creative Process Works

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I’m getting my email to zero right now (a bit late in the day), and came across a great example of how productivity is not just about getting as many things done as quickly as you can, but generating ideas and even taking some potential rabbit trails.

So, here’s how I work. I’m going through my messages one by one, determining the next actions and what responses are needed to each. One of these emails is yesterday’s blog post by Seth Godin on a new marketing class he is offering at Skillshare.

So, what’s the next action on that email? Just read it, decide I don’t have time for the class, and move on? That would be the efficiency model of productivity, which I reject.

Instead, with this email I sat back and asked myself some questions and observations like these:

  • What does Seth’s blog post here teach us about how we should craft and present ideas in general? Godin is clearly a master at this. A blog post from him announcing a new course he is offering is not just an opportunity to decide whether to take the course or not; it’s an opportunity to learn about communication. 
  • So in that vein, I notice that he talks about the course “changing the way you think about marketing.” Is that way of speaking just a way to get attention? Talk about change, so people will listen? Godin is a person of integrity; he speaks what he believes, rather than making things up just to get a response. Further, in my experience (confirmed more and more every day), things absolutely do need to be changed. This is actually the task of leadership: changing things. We live in a fallen world. So much is indeed sub-par and not helping people. To talk in terms of change is not just a way to “market” an idea. Things really do need to be changed. So I make a mental note that here is yet more confirmation that it is right to talk in terms of changing things, and that it is helpful to do so (the way Godin crafted his post certainly got me thinking in a constructive way).
  • Godin links the wrong words in his post! You should never say “click here.” The words you link need to be information carrying. That is both more helpful and more effective. So, Godin is great, but not perfect (I’m sure he also has reasons for breaking this rule — but he’s wrong!).

So, though I am not going to enroll in his course, the value of this email from Godin’s blog is far beyond the fact that it notified me about the course. It helped build my thinking, and gave me an opportunity to think about how I do things and how I craft ideas.

That is a huge impact, and an impact that cannot be measured by the response rate to the actual post. That shows how productivity is about much more than tangible outcomes; intangibles (affecting how people think) are just as important — and, in fact, something that actually will result in tangible outcomes and great effectiveness down the road.

And this process also shows how productivity methods, like getting your email to zero every day, are not about rigid structure and just getting things off your list. Rather, they provide a framework in which exploration can happen. If we think of productivity as just getting things checked off our lists faster, we will miss the most important and enriching moments of life.

 

Is What's Best Next a Statement or a Question?

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That’s one of the questions from my interview today on the book with Matt Mitchell.

Matt asked fantastic questions, and I really enjoyed doing the interview. You can read the interview at his blog, where I talk about why the book took so long, how productivity relates to sanctification and Christian discipleship, how it builds on but also differs from GTD, and much more.

And, here’s my answer to the first question, on whether “what’s best next” should be taken as a statement or a question:

1.  What does the title, What’s Best Next, mean?  Is that a statement or a question or both? 

It’s first of all a statement. This book is about that which is best next, which is doing the will of the Lord (Ephesians 5:15-17).

So, what is the will of the Lord? We all know that what Jesus wants from us is love. So that’s what’s best next — love — and that’s the heart of the book. All of our productivity needs to be grounded in love — first, in terms of our motive (the good of the other person) but also in terms of how we make decisions at all.

And that’s what’s often overlooked: love is not just our motive in what we do, but is also supposed to be the guiding principle by which we decide what to do. What is best for the other person? That’s the question love asks, and therefore that’s the guiding principle of productivity. You don’t make choices based on what’s best for yourself next, but you make the welfare of the other person the motive and criterion for deciding what to do.

And so “what’s best next” is, second of all, also a question as well. We have so many things coming our way today. We have almost limitless options and opportunities now, and a massive amount of information to deal with every day. How do we make good decisions in the midst of this age of unlimited options? “What’s best next” is a question we can use to help guide us. The point is: you don’t need to do everything that’s next. You just need to do what’s best next.

The core principle of productivity is to do what’s most important first. So when you have a thousand things to do, stop and ask “what’s best next?” Then do that. Likewise, don’t do what’s easiest next; do what’s best next. This is a question we can continually use to guide us.

Read the whole thing.

The Table of Contents for What's Best Next

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Here’s the table of contents for the book, What’s Best Next: How the Gospel Transforms the Way You Get Things Done.

Table of Contents 1

Table of Contents 2

Table of Contents 3

Table of Contents 4

You can also find out more about the book on the page for it here on the blog, and of course it is available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble (especially useful today, as Amazon is sold out), and WTS Books (which has a fantastic deal on bulk orders–buy 5 or more at 50% off).