Life hacks - who knew!?

When I’m late to the party, I apologize, hand the host a gift and bull doze my way in through the door turning left at the buffet.

So here I am – when did life hacks happen?

Was I so busy LIVING life that I missed out on life HACKS? It seems so. Did I miss the creation of lifehacks.org in 2005? It appears to be the case. There are PINTEREST boards about life hacking – amongst my Dame Angela Lansbury pins, they must have passed me by.

When I don’t know something, danger and discovery is imminent.

So, off we go into the world of #lifehacks…

A “life hack” is a shortcut or novel way to increase productivity and efficiency. Everywhere. Initially it came from the computer world, but it has made its way into daily, hourly life.

Whether you want to remove the stem from a strawberry quicker, hide your cash in your handbag from thieves or find an inexpensive way to display a cook book in your kitchen – it’s a mind field, a wealth of information, a complete embarrassment of riches through blogs and sites which you can a) use and b) contribute to.

Who knew?

And if you KNEW, why didn’t you tell me?

Life hacks can be designed by nature or nurture, I’ve found.

Nurture

You identify a need to do something better. You map out the problem, a process, refine & experiment and work it forward.

Nature

One day you’re just mid process: you’re hit by an inspiration moment, you try it, it works, and you remember it.

Who knew?

We probably all did – we just didn’t term it as a “life hack”. To illustrate: is couponing for groceries regarded as a life hack? I don’t see why not, even on an elementary level. I’ve watched “Extreme Couponing” (#donotjudgeme), those guys & girls are ALL about efficiency, productivity and cost savings.

You follow me?

How can we nurture a #lifehack?

1.      Consider what you do a lot of or spend a lot of time on?

2.      Where are the frustrations?

3.      Where can you make a difference in process? There MUST be a chink in the armour – otherwise Henry Ford wouldn’t have made his fortune…

4.      A wise lady once said to me, “think in ink” – so map it out, any way you can.

5.      Once you’ve nailed the part of the cycle that needs to change, take a break – one minute or one day, then return and go crazy with ideas from your mind or those on Google.

6.      Get someone you trust to sense check your proposed hacks (now they need to spot a chink in YOUR armour.)

7.      Try it out! Even A/B test – hack one day, revert to the original the following day and compare the results (all this just to pickle more beetroots, but someone did this and makes lots of money from pickling beets in the most efficient way now…)

8.      Review the test, make any amendments and away you go – you just hacked your own life.

One thing to remember, people in general tend to overestimate the importance of detail - #lifehack is all about the IMMEDIATE detail. It puts you straight into solution mode where you create a hack or tap into someone else’s. It’s still a result. When you have all of these hacks, what’s the right thing to do, write a book about them and make your fortune? Maybe. But first, get some of them out there – in the workplace through internal comms, team meetings, hack & soup (you combo lunch and sharing some), having a team hack board in your place of work where colleagues check out the latest finds etc. For all of you people Managers out there, is this something you can pursue in development reviews and objective settings? Aren’t you doing that already by creating the best & sharpest objectives anyway? Is this a world BEYOND “SMARTER” objectives? #foodforthought.

My final thoughts on the hack of life:

1.      Will we get to a point where #lifehack is taught in our schools? Are we in that place now where it’s a valuable and valued life skill? Could be.

2.      Are we in a place where we immediately need to make assessments for efficiency and productivity whatever our field of expertise is? Seems to be the case.

3.      Can you truly apply #lifehack to your personal and professional life? Million per cent. My guess is, you already ARE.

They sing, “Everything old is new again” and they’re spot on.

How else was a cave man or woman going to survive the winter? They made clothes and learned how to build a fire. They didn’t Google, (am just guessing here), through trial, error and brain power, they life hacked. Right there and then in that cave.

Maybe I wasn’t as late to the party as I thought…