Build a Focus System for Better Work/Life Balance as a Web Developer

https://raddevon.com/articles/focus-for-better-work-life-balance-as-a-web-developer/

by raddevon • 8 years ago

148 63 8 years ago

andy_adams2• 8 years ago

Rather than setting a timer + starting/stopping music, I'm a huge advocate of Focus@Will[1], which is basically a combo of the items mentioned in this article: No need to select music (they have an extensive library). You just set a timer and you get a "ding" to start work, which is oddly effective at getting you into the zone.

I've found it also helps to build a list of tasks _before_ you start working for the day. Then you can do your focused sessions 1 after the other, without wondering "What's next?".

[1] https://focusatwill.go2cloud.org/SH3f (Affiliate link. I'm a happy customer and longtime advocate.)

rhizome• 8 years ago

It's not dispositive, but googling "go2cloud.org" does not reinforce legitimacy, i.e. "risky click."

monkeynotes2• 8 years ago

Dammit, I thought YC was a safe place. After signing up I guess I can now expect some spam in my inbox.

monkeynotes2• 8 years ago

Yeah, I'm not gonna supply credit card / paypal for a 'free' trial. That's just greasy. If the product is worth paying for I'd be sure to add my credit card after the trial.

ElijahLynn2• 8 years ago

I am a big fan of Focus@Will, I bought a lifetime subscription on Cyber Monday. However, it is hard to use their application (the streaming stops too much) and it doesn't integrate with Google Home, so I cannot say Focus@Will etc. And therefore end up using Google Music more with "Hey Google Play Focus Music" and it usually plays a station called Electronic Focus (https://play.google.com/music/r/m/Ln4hob7zcot52fkp5xudi2tiub...), which gives me long periods of deep, serene, intense focus.

hagridaaron91• 8 years ago

TL;DR Pomodoro

pmarreck• 8 years ago

Shameless plug for https://www.rescuetime.com/ which is probably the single greatest productivity/focus-encouraging tool I've ever encountered... and all it really does is give you transparency into your own habits

sdrothrock• 8 years ago

transparency into your own habits

Truth. This is why counting calories works for dieting, too; most people aren't aware of how their perceptions differ from reality. There's a huge difference between "I check HN a couple times a day when I bored" and "wow, Rescuetime says I spent 2 hours and 38 minutes of my workday on HN."

mr_spothawk7• 8 years ago

2.5 hours of subsidized web surfing... not bad!

ksk2• 8 years ago

These articles seem to popup with some frequency on HN. Can someone post their results? How has your output/productivity changed before/after using these techniques?

andy_adams2• 8 years ago

I generally have 2 kinds of workdays:

1. Those where I work on whatever is in front of me for however long it takes me.

2. Those where I start the day by listing out the tasks for the day, then use chunks of 45 mins with non-distracting music (no lyrics, simple, constant beats) to knock out the tasks in the order I set them up. I take breaks between.

The days where I adhere strictly to #2 are my most productive. Having a routine and triggers to focus has changed how much I get done. So yes, these things do have an effect.

ksk2• 8 years ago

Well I am not denying that they have an effect. I simply would like to see some metrics that would help quantify the effect. People have pet peeves about using bug fixes or lines of code or whatever, so they're free to use whatever metric they like. After all, there must be something objective that they notice has changed before/after the use of the technique.

VyseofArcadia• 8 years ago

I find it a struggle to use pomodoro in an office environment. Too many meatspace distractions. Pomodoro is best when you are working by yourself on something.

Of course office distractions are a problem in more than just that way. Hard to stay in the zone when things keep yanking you out.

douglaswlance• 8 years ago

I have all notifications off permanently except for texts and calls. If something is really urgent, people know how to get ahold of me. 99.9999% of the time, tasks are async, and don't require immediate attention.

eckza4• 8 years ago

I've not taken measures that drastic, but by severely limiting how many notifications I get on any given day, I've noticed a significant decrease in anxiety.

Notification fatigue is very real.

SatvikBeri• 8 years ago

I'm on the very extreme end of being bothered by notifications, so I set things up so that my wife and coworkers can contact me at work, but no one else can. Conversely, I don't check email outside of work. This works pretty well for me.

mr_spothawk7• 8 years ago

I set my iPhone to 24/7 DND

it took a bit for my friends to get used to it. come to think of it, I haven't heard from them in a while.

eckza4• 8 years ago

I feel like while all of these productivity "hacks" and systems (like Pomodoro) may have some merit, they're completely unnecessary.

It's really not too hard to:

* Work.

* If you lose focus, be mindful of the fact that your attention is wandering, and focus on your work again. This part takes some discipline. Discipline takes time to develop. Be patient.

* If you feel that you cannot focus on your work, get up and walk around. Go to the bathroom. Step outside for a moment. Take yourself out of the work, then return to your desk and immediately dive back in.

* Accept that you're a human - not a robot; that 100% efficiency is unattainable; and that it's a waste of your only life to try to attain 8 hours of productive work in an 8 hour day.

I don't need a timer. I don't need to develop Pavlovian responses to a mysterious ticking noise. I don't want the overhead of "productivity management applications". I just want to put my hands to work, until the work's done, and then do the next thing.

[edit:formatting]

dllthomas• 8 years ago

It's really not too hard

What's hard for others may not match what's hard for you.

Moru3• 8 years ago

This is a wisdom that comes with age. Everyone is different and some have more problems to concentrate and can take different levels of stress. What most see as lazy might be people that has burned out already, just haven't realized it, thinking it's just the way it's supposed to be. Be careful with how you work, you might be able to cope right now but your brain will make sure to break when it gets too much and the cost might be pretty high.

Bukhmanizer• 8 years ago

Also, what counts as "work" might not match up. For some people, "working" means just sitting in front of a computer for a set amount of time. Especially with intellectual work, it's hard to balance the amount of time thinking about how to solve a problem, vs. actually implementing the solution. For all we know the person who says "you just have to have discipline" spends 95% of their time falling into random rabbit holes, and 5% actually coding, and so never gets anything done. Or otherwise, maybe they spend 99% of their time coding, but never actually stop to think about ways to solve the problem better.

I'm not saying that productivity tools solve all your problems, but I find that it makes it easier to choose how much time I spend on each thing.

ambicapter• 8 years ago

Maybe its hard for them because they're being led astray by all these blogophytes looking for a piece of their mind-share.

eckza4• 8 years ago

Fair. 'Hard' was the wrong word.

'Complicated' is a better word. It's not complicated to develop some mindfulness. It just takes time and effort, which may or may not be 'hard'.

SanFranManDan• 8 years ago

It reminds me of how last year (and still ongoing) we saw heaps of meditation apps.

It just seemed completely counter intuitive to me (as a Zen practitioner) to introduce something needlessly complicated on probably the simplest (not the easiest) thing you can do in your life.

There is a significant amount of learning involved in focus and meditation, by and large the people reading and buying these want a short cut and do themselves a disservice. Work is part of your life. Trying to have certain hacks to focus to work then pull up an app for more hacks on how read, then a different app for hacks on how to meditate to cast out the stress of work, misses the connection between why you cant focus in the first place. Not being able to read, work, relax are all symptoms of a problem: you are terrified of being bored.

The Pomodoro method seems like a good start, but in my opinion mindfullness should be applied to every part of your life.

Learning to focus on work will help you focus on work. Learning to be mindful will help you with relationships, sex, reading, work and pretty much every part of your life.

My best advice is to get comfortable being bored. Stare at a blank wall for an hour every few days. It will profoundly change your life.

notyme• 8 years ago

I began appreciating boredom for its on sake after reading this article https://hbr.org/2010/06/why-i-returned-my-ipad years ago and since then I consciously avoid trying to be "productive" during commute, queues etc. Quoting from article: "Being bored is a precious thing, a state of mind we should pursue. Once boredom sets in, our minds begin to wander, looking for something exciting, something interesting to land on. And that’s where creativity arises".

ghostbrainalpha• 8 years ago

I felt very much like this when the work being asked of me was less than 8 hours worth of productivity.

Once the requests started coming in for significantly more than that, I needed a system of rejecting requests and creating project timelines based on very consistent output.

I feel like these two things go hand in hand. But if you only have 4-5 hours of work to do, go ahead and be disorganized. The cost of the productivity system is bigger than benefits you receive.

eckza4• 8 years ago

I feel like you are talking about workflow management and software development lifecycle.

I’m talking about timers and self-help productivity gurus.

ovrdrv3• 8 years ago

I've tried so many hacks, checklists, apps, Pomodoro, web video tutorials and TED talks on productivity, and I couldn't get up to speed with the rest of my senior team. I asked my wife what she does, and she said something very along the lines of what you said. I gave it a shot, and I ended up being the top performer that quarter (and hopefully the ones to come).

Now when someone asks about procrastination I give it to them straight. You're at work to work. Small breaks / breathers will come naturally. Get it finished and mess around on your own time or when you're done with your tasks. You'll only be benefiting yourself and be at the top of your team in no time.

Veen• 8 years ago

I agree. It's curious that so many people believe they find it difficult to concentrate. Clearly, those beliefs can't possibly be accurate, as your story demonstrates. The solution is obviously to just try harder.

smoe• 8 years ago

I tried pomodoro for the focus effect, but I keep using it for a different reason. To avoid the "just one more tweak" trap I sometimes fall into. When the timer is up I decide whether the task is done or not. The latter means I commit another complete block to it, otherwise I move on to the next one. This also works great for non tech things like making music. But don't know if this is "officially" part of the methodology

Distraction wise I have eliminated anything long before that. No notifications except the 3 I actually have to react to immediately, phone in "do not disturb" mode and co-workers learnt that it can take several hours for me to respond to slack messages (but once I do, they get a quality response).

lazyasciiart• 8 years ago

Huh, that sounds like a really useful idea, I'll have to give it a try!

throwaway84742• 8 years ago

To add to this, the best way I found to improve work life balance is when I arrive at work, I’d set the countdown timer on my phone to 8 hours and 30 minutes (to account for lunch) and when it starts beeping, I get up and leave. In the middle of something? Doesn’t matter. Leave it as is and go home. In my case productivity only improved, probably because I slept better and rested more.

forgotmypw• 8 years ago

I think that part of the problem for me was that most jobs took something that could be an art and a craft (computer programming and system-building) and turned it into a grueling, feature-deadline driven assembly line for uninspiring, unpolished, and unremarkable products.

This was a complete productivity killer for me. For a long time, I blamed myself. I tried different techniques, motivations, even prescribed substances. Eventually, I realized that the problem was with what I was doing with my time.

Now that I am programming for myself, I have all the motivation that I need. I am not beholden to deadlines or commitments, I am free to Do It Right, refactor as I see fit, and finish whatever I'm working on with the level of Quality that I am happy with.

I get more done in a two-hour session than I used to in a day and sometimes a week.

sudosteph2• 8 years ago

Wow, that sounds optimal. But if you have impaired executive functioning, that strategy becomes hard to the point of probably impossible.

I've got ADHD, so while I don't expect 8 hours of productive work from myself, if left to my own sense of "focus" and "discipline", I'm lucky to get 20 minutes in. If I'm emotionally or intellectually invested in something, time loses all meaning. And when the only work to be done lacks that pull, I inevitably get drawn to things which are either not work, or are only tangentially work related and get lost in that for hours at a time, even though it didn't feel that way. I can get lost in breaks too.

I make up for it by eventually getting that "oh shit" feeling and hammering everything out in the early hours of the morning when there is nobody online to distract me. The downside to that though is I end up staring at a screen too long, forgetting to eat or drink, and sometimes making myself physically ill from it all.

So pomodoro gives me a great balance. I write down one task to do, start my timer (in this case I use an instrumental soundtrack that goes 25 minutes) and when the music is done, get up, drink water and have a snack (I try to avoid browsing the internet) and get back to it (I don't use the 5 minute break timer, which is sometimes a problem, but if my mind is hooked into my work by then I'm usually eager to get back to it). The other big benefit of pomodoro is that I can use the first session for planning the other sessions, and that is a great way to plan and prioritize for the day without going overboard and spending 2 hours making a to do list that is too long anyhow. Also if I didn't write out what I was doing every day (even if it's written out somewhere else like JIRA) I would just straight up forget when I come back from a break and have to replan it all out again in my head (which would probably be forgotten again).

Pomodoro also helped me get better at shifting contexts, so since most meetings start on the hour, or half-hour, it doesn't feel like a huge interruption to stop anymore (though I find it's good to have a post-meeting pomodoro session that's half "write down what the heck that was about" and half "give your brain an extra break because meetings are hard".) So yeah, I need a timer. I agree that you don't the overhead of applications at all though. Pen and paper and timed soundtrack (or actual physical tomato timer which used to be something people had just laying around) keeps it dead simple.

ryanwaggoner• 8 years ago

Has there ever been an online discussion about a productivity method that didn't have someone come along to post the completely useless advice of "What's the big deal? Just do it."?

If you're one of those people who can work at a high-level of productivity on complex knowledge work without getting distracted or interrupted or losing focus constantly, congratulations.

Most people aren't like you.

And your advice is useless to them, at best.

Most people have a hard time with this and it's getting worse [1]. We didn't evolve to do the kind of work we do today [2], and beyond that, people's brains work differently. Many people with ADHD who started taking medication after years of struggling with focus issues describe it like a light switch in their brain. Why is it so hard to believe that it's a spectrum and that many without a diagnosis of ADHD find it harder to focus than you do?

Those of us who struggle with focus and productivity have heard the vapid advice of "just do it" hundreds or thousands of times. Not only is it worthless advice, it's often actively harmful.

Also, not to point fingers, but some of the people with your attitude (not all or even most) aren't actually all that productive and could stand to take a look at some of these methods.

1. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/121...

2. https://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/jan/18/modern-world...

derefr• 8 years ago

You are, essentially, a person with 20/20 vision saying “what’s the point of glasses?”

The point is that not everyone has the capacity to be even 10% productive without help, let alone 100% productive. Just like some people are still nearsighted even after all the vision correction possible, some people still have trouble focusing even after taking ADHD medication or whatever else.

If such people want to have any chance of doing a single thing with their lives, they need to fight their own brain the way one would fight a war: with strategy, bait and traps and feints, and a hard-eyed evaluation of which battles are worth fighting. That is, essentially, what these “productivity life-hacks” are a euphemism for.

Yokohiii• 8 years ago

Productivity isn't just doing things at all. It also implies to distribute your efforts on various tasks. Some tasks are less interesting then others and you can get lost on the ones you like. You can feel productive for streaks but after a week you realise that you forgot/ignored all the important stuff. This is what pomodoro can deal with.

But most productivity hacks need an decent amount of discipline, which people with some sort of "clinical lazyness" won't have. Building this discipline is a completely different topic.

teaspoons• 8 years ago

Couldn't agree more but I think some people need a prescribed system, because they find it hard to listen to their own intuition. Following your intuition is optimal however, because we're all different.

I want to add one point, which is related to your final points: we all need to move regularly for health. Getting up and running up and down the stairs, round the block, or round the room is essential. It actually improves concentration too. Unlike conversational interruptions, intermittant bursts of exercise don't make you forget where you where, instead they help prevent tunnel-vision and allow your mind to zoom-out briefly to ensure you're going in the right overall direction.

sudosteph2• 8 years ago

Haha, you and I must have drastically different intuitions. My intuition will cause me to see a "5% battery warning", think to myself "OK, I have a few minutes I will finish this line of code and then plug it in" and then proceed to code for 10 minutes until my laptop dies or I see the 1% warning and remember that I need to find a charger. This happens multiple times a week.

Totally agree on using short breaks for exercise or walks though. I usually continue thinking about work on them, but the change of environment can be helpful if in a rut.

chipuni2• 8 years ago

I've found that http://mynoise.net offers better sounds for concentration than most music.

Using https://brainaural.com/ with brainwaves at about 13.5 Hz - 14 Hz also seems to help my concentration. (I have no idea whether it's a placebo, tied to habit.)

rconti• 8 years ago

I haven't tried these sites yet, I'll take a look. Do you use noise-cancelling headphones? The best feature I've found with my QC35 is not so much the noise cancelling but the combination of noise cancelling and audio. Obviously with noise cancelling on, I can hear most of what's going on around me, just a bit dulled. But add in a VERY small amount of quiet music and the rest of the world disappears in a way it doesn't with just NC.. or that requires MUCH louder music without NC.

chipuni2• 8 years ago

I do use noise-cancelling headphones. I use some inexpensive Sony headphones that have basic noise cancelling, and they have helped a LOT in the open office.

Moru3• 8 years ago

I'm curious how work and breaks are set up in other countries. In Sweden we have a long tradition of 2 hour work, short coffee break, 2 hour work. Lunchbreak 30-60 minutes, repeat.

The long break has to be latest after five hours and is not counted towards working time. You are allowed to leave the workplace.

The shorter breaks is included in your work time but has no forced length other than it has to be adapted to the workplace and rythm. It can also be 5 minutes every hour. Up to the company. The longer break is supposed to be minimum 30 minutes but I don't think that is in the law. Unions usually recommend 60 minutes.

Taking a coffee break is almost mandatory, even the boss will look funny at you if you skip it. This is where you talk about the day, plans ahead and other things connected to work or life in general. While of course drinking that all important coffee which is also almost mandatory. This is where most youth learn to drink coffee, at their first job. Most likely learn how to cook it too :-)

Swizec• 8 years ago

Taking a coffee break is almost mandatory, even the boss will look funny at you if you skip it. This is where you talk about the day, plans ahead and other things connected to work or life in general. While of course drinking that all important coffee which is also almost mandatory.

In my experience Americans took this concept and turned it into the brutally utilitarian daily standup. Chop chop no chitchat get to work meetings are a waste of time!

Then they said you know what this is taking too long. Let’s just do standup via Slack.

I miss the morning coffee from my first jobs in Europe.

ClassyJacket• 8 years ago

I'm in Melbourne, Australia where we pride ourselves on the ridiculous number of coffee shops on every block. So I know what you mean.

American coffee from their TV shows has always looked revolting to me... black, stagnating in a pot all day, with cold, unsteamed milk poured in at the last second, or some powdered artificial whitener.

I wish I didn't get a terrible, irritable downer later in the day from caffeine. The boost of happiness it provided every morning made it so much easier to get thru the day (Still slugging thru IT support while I try to find time to get a coding portfolio going. I sometimes find a few hours a week!). That feeling of being lifted, up, everything becoming easier and more exciting and less stressful... One large coffee was a good hour of euphoria, and something to look forward to - 'In an hour I get my coffee!'. If it was a weekend sometimes I would code like a madman.

Unfortunately, the lunatic huddled on the floor I become at 6pm wasn't worth it. It fries my brain worse than any other drug - and a drug it is. It's really quite ridiculous to me that one drug is so acceptable while all others are considered the worst thing you could possibly do.

SyneRyder• 8 years ago

Taking a coffee break is almost mandatory, even the boss will look funny at you if you skip it. This is where you talk about the day, plans ahead and other things connected to work or life in general.

Do those count as 'fika' coffee breaks, then? That's one of my favorite ideas from Swedish culture, even if I don't fully grok (understand) it yet. It feels like fika at work is a reminder that work isn't the end goal, it's the time you spend with others that is valuable.

https://sweden.se/culture-traditions/fika/

Moru3• 8 years ago

Yes, that would be Fika :-)

itamarst• 8 years ago

Focus is nice, but it'll only get you so far. Much more useful is prioritizing your work, and avoiding unnecessary work.

Focusing on bad implementation: a waste of time.

Focusing on bad solution: a waste of time.

Focusing on solving wrong problem: a waste of time.

Choosing the right problem, the right solution, and not wasting time during implementation (e.g. by spinning wheels without asking for help) will give you order of magnitude improvement. Focus will get you smaller improvements, though it is useful.

More here on what it takes to be productive here: https://codewithoutrules.com/2017/10/04/technical-skills-pro...

(And my personal take on staying focused, which is a lot more about goals and less about distractions: https://codewithoutrules.com/2017/08/03/stay-focused/)

alkonaut• 8 years ago

Isn’t the word “Web” in the title completely unnecessary? I couldn’t see anything in the article that was specific for web development compared to any other kind of software developer!

Or is “web developer” used almost as a synonym for “software developer” now, as a way of disambiguating from e.g. a “brand developer” or “property developer”?

moltar• 8 years ago

Ya I was super confused by that too. Scrolled up and down to see if I missed web specific suggestions.

mr_spothawk7• 8 years ago

it's "web" because the recommended app only works on chromebooks

yosito• 8 years ago

I could never be productive in software using the Pomodoro technique. In order to make progress on most of the things I work on, I need 3-4 hour windows of uninterrupted focus where I don't get out of my seat. If I was interrupting myself every x minutes, I wouldn't get anything done.

mr_spothawk7• 8 years ago

for the last few weeks I've been working from a kitchen counter in a small studio apt. it's about the perfect height for a standup desk, within 5 paces of a toilet and the refrigerator. I've managed to set it up with a 2nd monitor & I'm really impressed with the "flow" I've found. in a week or so, I'll move on to the next spot... let's hope it can be as successfully productive.

diegoserranoa• 8 years ago

These are all the usual advices for remote workers (not saying it's bad advice, there's just nothing novel about them). It really depends on how each person is able to manage they're own work.

One a side note, about the phone thing, I read this https://hbr.org/2018/03/having-your-smartphone-nearby-takes-... the other day and I totally agree with it. Having my phone close, even when it is turned off, still causes some level of distraction to me. So lately I just leave my phone in a different room when I'm working and I just check it when I take a break, etc. Obviously this wouldn't apply to, say, an assistant, who will probably need the phone to make/receive calls.

ElijahLynn2• 8 years ago

About the music, I find that noise cancelling headphones in the office are mandatory if I really want to block out distractions. Now that I work from home though, I crank the music up complete with subwoofer, which is a treat I could never get working in an office.

Focus music, plus great sound (w/sub) is so effective for me.

gexla• 8 years ago

Productivity is a personal journey, yet everyone who writes these articles feels they have the holy grail and everyone should know about it. Worse is that most likely a few months down the road, they could (and probably will) write a different post because everything they wrote about previously has changed. The only things which stay the same in my work environment is my text editor and maybe my chair.

wainstead• 8 years ago

As far as what you should listen to, I’d recommend something without vocals.

I highly recommend "Drone Zone" on http://soma.fm

"Deep Space One" and "Space Station Soma" work too.

mr_spothawk7• 8 years ago

"Music for Programming" podcast is pretty solid.

http://www.musicforprogramming.net

mr_spothawk7• 8 years ago

My best productivity hack is: don't try to be productive without a clearly defined goal.

dalu• 8 years ago

idk.. every time I open a page like this I think "what are they going to try and sell me this time"

Everyone is different. For instance I have productivity phases, and non-productivity phases.

I have about 2-3 weeks of hardcore 12-14 hours / day coding sprees and then I just can't even if I try and sit there for hours, nothing good or much happens. So I do other, fun stuff, not work related, useless wastes of time. And then I see something or get reminded of something and BAM I'm back on the coding spree and I dare you to interrupt me. I order food, at most I take a 30min walk out the house for bare minimum health, but the rest of time is dedicated to getting the job done. And then... relaxation phase.

And something else. If my mind feels like it need to wander off, then it should. You don't sprint all the time, you also sit down somewhere and enjoy the scenery. That wandering mind thing means you need a break and maybe should end work soonish and do fun things.

Build a Focus System for Better Work/Life Balance as a Web Developer

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