- Source : https://www.nateliason.com/notes/work-clean-dan-charnas - Auteur: [[Dan Charnas]] - Notes liées : *** # Résumé Author, writer, and creator sharing insights on learning, writing, philosophy, entrepreneurship, and more. # Highlights - Only one profession has developed a comprehensive philosophy on *how to work* , the culinary arts, and that philosophy is *mise-en-place,* a French phrase which means “to put in place.” - There is a difference between working hard and working *clean*. - Focus: How mise-en-place works - Part of developing good MEP is having a plan of how everything will happen, and a map of where everything should be. - Chaos: How we work without MIP - A commitment to process doesn’t mean following tedious procedures, it’s about becoming a high-functioning human being and being happier for it. Good process must not only make the work better but make you better. Excellence arises from refining good process—how can I do this better, or easier, or with less waste? It’s a job, like preparation, that never ends. - Ingredient 1: Planning is Prime - We need to work clean with time, which means: 1. Determining our daily actions 2. Ordering those actions in sequence - For your most important, recurring tasks, log out how long they take so you can make accurate predictions of how long they’ll take in the future. - Figure out your Meeze Point, the optimal number of actions you can put in your daily list before you begin to overload yourself. 1. Select 3 actions to complete for this day. 2. Plan those actions on your calendar 3. If you truly commit those tasks when and as quickly as you planned, you can up to 4 tasks tomorrow 4. Keep increasing until you start to fail at completing your tasks. That’s your meeze point. Arrive everywhere 15 minutes early so you never feel rushed or stressed. - **Recipe for success** : Commit to being honest with time. Plan daily. - Ingredient 2: Arranging Spaces, Perfecting Movements - You don’t need much space if you’re smart about how you use it. - Create checklists so you have recurring recipes for your processes - • Select a task that you do often • Break it down into 10 steps or fewer • Determine if you need a Read-Do (read then do it) or a Do-Confirm (do the items then use the checklist after to confirm) • Test your checklist by using it 3 times • Update the checklist each time you use it, as necessary - **Recipe for success:** Commit to setting your station and reducing impediments to your movements and activities. Remove friction. - Ingredient 3: Cleaning as You Go - Practice “coming to zero”: every hour, take a minute to straighten your physical and digital workspace, no matter what you’re currently doing. Try “knolling”: 1. Scan your environment for anything not in use 2. Put away everything not in use 3. Group all “like” objects 4. Align or square all objects to either the surface they’re on, or the studio itself - **Recipe for success** : Commit to maintaining your system. Always be cleaning. - Ingredient 4: Making First Moves - The first moments cost more than the later ones. - There are two kinds of work. The first is hands on, immersive, and creative, like writing or designing. This is solo, creative work that is usually your most important work. But there is also hands off, process work that enables other people to do work. This seems less important, since it’s more managerial, but since it enables other people to do their work it’s worth doing first. - Begin each day with 30 minutes of scheduled process time, starting, unlocking, and unblocking the work of others - Ingredient 5: Finishing Actions - Do similar jobs at the same time to minimize the switching costs between actions. - Avoid orphaned tasks: tasks that haven’t been tied up in the neatest way possible to enable easy continuation later. - If you can’t finish a task, tie it up for later. Collect all the materials and keep them in one place till you resume. Jot down any thoughts you have that are at the top of your mind that you want to remember. Schedule your session to resume the work. Communicate your progress to a partner or stakeholders to assess what remains to be done and whether help is available. Record all of your breaks during an immersive work section to see where you lose the most time, and to be more strategic about how and when you take breaks. - **Recipe for success:** Commit to delivering. When a task is nearly done, finish it. Always be unblocking. - Ingredient 10: Total Utilization - Conserve space to conserve motion to conserve time. Log where you lose time and resources to see how you might make better use of those resources and time periods. How can you plan better to avoid waste? - **Recipe for success** : Commit to valuing space, time, energy, resources, and people. Waste nothing. - A Day of Working Clean - **Evening: Preparation with the Daily Meeze** Step 1: Cleaning your station 1. Empty and log physical inputs (notes, papers, bag, desktop, notebook, etc.) 2. Clear and log digital inputs (email, messages, note taking software, social media 3. Set the table: straighten everything out and clean it up Step 2: Sharpen your tools 1. Adjust your calendar based on what didn’t get done today, move the relevant things to later in the week 2. Adjust your to-do list so you have an accurate view of what needs to get done Step 3: Plan your day 1. Make a list of the actions and routines already scheduled for tomorrow and what else you want to do tomorrow 2. Identify the immersive vs. process tasks 3. Ballpark how much time you’ll have available 4. Schedule everything on your calendar Step 4: Gather your resources 1. Collect anything you need for tomorrow, load up your bag, lay out your clothes, etc. **Morning: Process** 1. Greet the day by waking up early 2. Do a morning check-in in case anything has come up that means you need to adjust your plan 3. Start with 30 minutes of process time to free other people up. **Afternoon: Presence** 1. React to surprises as they show up, adjusting your schedule and task lists 2. Tie up anything you can’t finish so it’s easy to pick up later - Then start again the next evening!