Slow Productivity: The Lost Art of Accomplishment Without Burnout

Every effective entrepreneur I know shares a similar commitment to paying people who know what they’re doing so they don’t have to do the work, at a lower level of quality, all by themselves.

The slow productivity mindset, by contrast, finds advantages to a more languid pace. Frequent cold starts can inject more creativity into your efforts, an effect Miranda seems to have leveraged in the uneven but insistent improvement of In the Heights. It also allowed him to explore and develop as both a creative and a human being. College sophomor

Edith Wharton was also concerned about the intrusion of the small on her bigger pursuits. During the nine-year period when she lived at the Mount, her expansive estate in the Berkshires, Wharton insisted on a rigid routine to protect her writing from the distractions of her frequent visitors. From when she awoke until at least 11:00 a.m., she would

As Tomalin emphasizes, it was Austen’s ability to “abstract herself from the daily life going on around her” that allowed her to find her literary voice.

In most every other area of our economy, not only is productivity a well-defined concept, but it’s often central to how work unfolds. Indeed, much of the astonishing economic growth fueling modernity can be attributed to a more systematic treatment of this fundamental idea. Early uses of the term can be traced back to agriculture, where its meaning

SLOW PRODUCTIVITY A philosophy for organizing knowledge work efforts in a sustainable and meaningful manner, based on the following three principles: 1. Do fewer things. 2. Work at a natural pace. 3. Obsess over quality.

Focusing intensely on a small number of tasks, waiting to finish each before bringing on something new, is objectively a much better way to use our brains to produce valuable output.

I recommend capturing as many categories of regular tasks as possible into an increasingly elaborate autopilot schedule: when you review client requests; when you check in on the contractors updating your website; when you prep for meetings; when you read emails or update project management websites. Containing tasks is not about escaping the small

Like John McPhee waiting on the picnic table for insight on his article structure, Zuiker’s efforts point toward a definition of meaningful and valuable work that doesn’t require a frenetic busyness. Its magic instead becomes apparent at longer timescales, emanating from a pace that seems, in comparison with the relentless demands of high-tech pseu