I want to share this text, The 1-hour workday, which a friend posted on Facebook recently (see, it can be good for something!).

In the text an academic discuss his trick to keep productive (in the sense of writing papers) in the middle of all other university tasks, such as classes, meetings, reviews, activities. His trick is to set aside one hour per day, usually the first hour of his workday, to do nothing but write.

This idea resonated a lot with me because, first, I’m in the very same situation as the author was: Assistant professor, pitiful paper production (compared with my phd days), overwhelmed with non-writing tasks. But not only that, it makes sense that writing, as any other skill, thrives when practiced daily, and withers when not used. I think it may not be a coincidence that my high productive early-phd period coincides with a period where I was writing a lot in this blog.

This is a time of change for me. I’m in the later half of my tenure track, feeling the “publish or perish” pressure like never before. At the same time, last week two of the projects I was counting on for the tenure track papers took a terrible setback. I am getting by with a little help from my friends, and I am doubling down on old productivity tools, such as the Kanban. But right now, anything that can take me any closer to jump over that barrier will be tried.

And who knows? Maybe this will eventually get me back to updating this place :-P