1. Manufacturing Pressure
The speaker suggests deliberately creating pressure when struggling to act. His examples include setting a deadline, telling friends about a goal and making financial commitments.
Hear it at 0:41 →Engineering video
0:58 · 10 January 2023
A Senior Developer's Best Productivity Hack
Key concepts in this video:
Transcript
The best productivity hack I found as a developer is pressure. If you know me personally, you'll know that I'm a major procrastinator. Ever since my university days, I did things just before the deadline hit. And nothing changed when I got my first developer job. I would research, code a bit, research again, and wait until the end of the sprint to close my tickets. Many times I've been told that I'm chaotic and unorganized.
It wasn't until one day I was reading an online article, that's it. There are two kinds of people, people that are scared by pressure, like deadlines, and people who do better under pressure. And I'm like, dude, that's me. Isn't it that I work well under pressure, I only work under pressure. Without it, I simply procrastinate and do nothing. But when your bills are paid, it's hard to have that pressure.
We were all putting a bit more effort in improving our skills as developers when we just started out. So if you're like me, when you feel like you are not productive, the hack is to manufacture that pressure. For example, set a high deadline, so you won't have time pressure. Or tell all your friends about it, so you'll have peer pressure. Or just move into more expensive house so you have financial pressure.
I can guarantee you'll magically become more productive in an instant.