This Year Will Be Different, or A Prof's Experiments with Productivity Hacks

As a human development professor, I juggle the usual mix of research, teaching, and service. Fellow faculty members understand this requires balancing a million shifting high-bar expectations and tasks.

Over the years, I’ve made many Fresh Start Falls and New Year Resolutions…Determined to manage myself better, not waste time, be more efficient, enjoy more leisure, get more done, maybe (maybe?) forget work at the end of the day.

Faculty, postdocs, grad students at all stages, you know the feelings…

?? Early career, it’s that panic How Do People Actually Do This?

?? Mid-career, the sinking Wasn’t It Supposed to Get Better After Tenure?

?? Later-career, the nagging Things are Changing So Fast, Can I Keep Up? ?

In the summers, I dabbled with tons of advice… books, project management courses, organize-your-workflow articles, de-cluttering series on Netflix, and blogs, podcasts, and posts.?

Always resolving, this year will different: Better, calmer, more productive.

[More work + more leisure. Yes, I see the illogical challenge there.]

23 in ‘23

As 2023 started, like many people I was feeling weary from, well, 2020, 2021, 2022. I resolved—yet again—to find better strategies to juggle .

Like many of you, I wanted to have more impact. To spend more time on important things and less time managing myself and the million little tasks.

So, resolving to experiment more seriously, I took on Gretchen Rubin's 23 for 23 challenge. I decided to experiment with 23 potentially promising strategies.

Of all the new ways of working—now a huge industry—what might help me? ?

What Worked? What Failed?

This newsletter will be candid reviews of my experiences so far.

Some strategies have been surprisingly transformative. Others might have been great if I had followed through. And a few were disasters I jettisoned fast and will never try again.

What to expect: Candid personal reviews. Hopefully something will useful to your work or life. Perhaps one idea or resource can lighten your load, help you put work aside, or put things in perspective (just call the damn plumber, Jenn, you don't have to write it on 17 lists).

What not to expect: Unquestioning support of the inequitable and sometimes toxic productivity culture. My personal goal is not to create more academic widgets (aka, grants, pubs, student credit hours), but to help us all feel more in control and less panicked.

Up first: Experiment 1: Eat the Frog ??