News You Can Use: 2/14/2018
- Our Obsession With Working Hard Is Ruining Our Productivity
Success is not about hard work. It is absolutely about focus and ensuring you use your time productively. But when we constantly talk about how hard we’re working, we perpetuate the idea that you have to work all the time to succeed in this world, and you just don’t.
What you should be doing is deciding what will really move the needle forward for what you’re trying to accomplish each day and week, and focus on that. Focus. If you get done what you decided you wanted to get done, you get to quit.
https://www.fastcompany.com/40527825/our-obsession-with-working-hard-is-ruining-our-productivity
- The House That Spied on Me
I (the smart home) had the same view of Kashmir’s house that her Internet Service Provider (ISP) has. After Congress voted last year to allow ISPs to spy on and sell their customers’ internet usage data, we were all warned that the ISPs could now sell our browsing activity, or records of what we do on our computers and smartphones. But in fact, they have access to more than that. If you have any smart devices in your home—a TV that connects to the internet, an Echo, a Withings scale—your ISP can see and sell information about that activity too. With my “iotea” router I was seeing the information about Kashmir and her family that Comcast, her ISP, could monitor and sell.
- The 2020 census is in serious trouble
- You can’t buy an ethical smartphone today
Smartphones, and consumer technology more generally, don’t just have the potential to harm the people building them. There is also the enormous environmental damage caused in the handsets’ production, through resource extraction, intensive manufacturing and transport. “If you’re wanting to buy a[n ethical] phone right now, your choices are limited,” says Greenpeace’s Gary Cook, “and Fairphone has done the most in terms of current manufacturers.”
The organization found there’s plenty of environmental blood that can be laid at the door of the smartphone. In the last decade, production of the devices has consumed nearly 968TWh, enough to power India for a year. In 2017, smartphones, and related products, made 50 metric tons of e-waste — discarded smart devices and their accessories — and it’s only going to get worse.
https://www.engadget.com/2018/02/06/ethical-smartphone-conscious-consumption/
- How To Transfer To Another Role Within Your Company
This goes beyond delivering excellent results–it’s important to maintain a positive attitude about what you’re currently doing, even when you’re not 100% excited about it. That being said, if you’re looking to move into a different function that requires an entirely different skill-set, you also need to show you possess those abilities already. How? Take on a couple projects that are relevant to your desired role to showcase what you can do.
Before I made the jump from customer service to business development, I took on extra work to help resolve customer issues related to our partnerships. I became an expert in the product and technical details of the product integrations we had with our partner companies. As a result, the business development team included me in their conversations with partners, and I helped negotiate and resolve the technical aspects of our partnership deals.
https://www.fastcompany.com/40520524/how-to-transfer-to-another-role-within-your-company
Photo: Mayur Gala
News You Can Use: 10/7/2015
- Why Sweden Is Shifting To A 6-Hour Workday
Everyone who works at the company suddenly has more energy. “The biggest response that I couldn’t foresee was the energy level I felt with my colleagues,” he says. “They were happy leaving the office and happy coming back the next day. They didn’t feel drained or fatigued. That has also helped the work groups to work better together now, when we see less conflicts and arguments. People are happier.”
http://www.fastcoexist.com/3051448/why-sweden-is-shifting-to-a-6-hour-work-day
- Where’s the Beef in the Information Supply Chain?
Insert contract clauses into new agreements that allow monitoring and enforcement while creating incentives and penalties for non-compliance regarding CSR areas. Consider having suppliers pay for monitoring and enforcement if necessary as part of requirements if you are a large enough buyer.
https://www.enterpriseirregulars.com/102232/wheres-beef-information-supply-chain/
- WHY DO EMPLOYERS EXPECT MORE OF ENTRY-LEVEL EMPLOYEES THAN EVER BEFORE?
“In my first meeting with the executive director, he was asking me about what classes I had taken, and he asked if I had taken a database class in college, and I did, and he said, ‘Okay, good, then you can oversee this project of designing and implementing a new communication database for us,” he says. “That was the first time I was ever brought into a project I had little or no knowledge about, and was expected to deliver results.”
- IoT will be key technology to optimize inventory management, says IDC
Firms are taking charge of their inventory management and supply chain, and IoT – along with mobile, big data and cloud computing – will help them do that. These technologies are enabling inventory visibility across the network and driving enhanced collaboration throughout the supply chain.
- Zuckerberg, Musk and Gates Have a Not-So-Secret Productivity Hack – Work Constantly
Musk, who divides his week between SpaceX and Tesla Motors, has also perfected the art of multitasking: he sends emails while scanning invoices, holds meetings and takes care of business on his phone at the same time, and even texts with his children on his lap (an admission that gathered no small amount of criticism from the public). While he officially clocks in no more than 15 hours at the office, he has said that he doesn’t ever stop working. With these round-the-clock responsibilities, it seems understandable that the most effective way to save time is by doing everything at once.
Photo: Angelina Litvin