Hi there,
And there you have it, it’s raining, it’s pouring, the summer is adjourning. And that’s what happens when you try to mash big words with clichés. There was a real buzz through my system on the 1st of September, the world seemed to have had a shot of adrenaline. Perhaps the intense news cycle of the week has played a part too.
With the cold vanishing, it’s been an enjoyable week with a couple of interviews (both successful!), catching up with friends and more tidying around the house. A big mission accomplished too, writing up the longest ever finance article I’ve done. It should be out next week so I look forward to hearing your thoughts 🙌.
Highlight of the week: a Thursday out in Birmingham. As part of The Smart Money Show (where we’re publishing my article!), I got the chance to see RBC Brewin Dolphin’s Birmingham office and help out with a roundtable recording. Great conversation - again, will be out soon! - and a fun evening of dinner, chat and singing 😄
A boss wants to send an email, asking for an update on a project with a report. However, she’s short on time, so types it up as bullet points and asks ChatGPT (or perhaps Claude, which I’m growing to like) to convert it into an email and whooshes it off.
Ping! The colleague sees a long email and sighs. Their coffee kick is wearing and they’ve just had a long IT delay. What do they do? Throw the email into another AI, asking to summarise the conversation into bullet points. They skim these and take the necessary actions.
Whether real or not, this example is fascinating to me: social etiquette and norms getting in the way of productivity. If there were an honest, pragmatic conversation between the two, they’d realise they both just want bullet points.
It’s clearing these sorts of low-level inefficiencies that I see as being 1% gains, eliminating friction and (directly) allowing the wheels to move faster.
A similar one I’ve been looking at attacking recently is scheduling. Whether it’s the next catch-up, the next call or even when something needs working on, living by the principle of “if it’s not on the calendar, it doesn’t happen” brings clarity to a complex world. It’s part of the ‘dessert’ from this idea below, having the next time lined up whilst you remember, before you move to the next thing, before it leaves your consciousness.
The particular inefficiency that is relevant here is the ping-pong of working out a suitable time. I’d liken it to two people playing squash with a calendar wall, each aiming for different points in the calendar in a boring back-and-forth.
The solution? An idea from Tim Ferriss, the original productivity guru and author of The 4-Hour Work Week.
Learn to propose - stop asking for opinions and start proposing solutions. Begin with the small things. If someone asks, “Where should we eat?”, “What movie should we watch?”, What should we do tonight?” or anything similar, do not reflect it back with “Well, what do you want?”. Offer a solution. Stop the back and forth and make a decision.
Practice this in both personal and professional environments. Here are a few lines that help (my favourites are the first and last): “Can I make a suggestion?”, “I propose.”, “I’d like to propose.”, “I suggest that.” and “What do you think?”
I personally prefer, “Can I propose…?” but perhaps I should adopt the ‘suggestion’ one more often too.
When discussing this approach with a friend this week, I realised two distinct benefits.
You’re skipping a few steps and getting closer to the end goal quicker. Put differently, you’re saving future time in having to check your calendar for whether the opposite party’s proposed time works for you.
You’re increasing the chances of the first time working. Thinking in a probabilistic way, the time that you are proposing should almost always be a time that works for you (since you’re the one proposing it!). So, in the case this time does work - hurray! You’ve smashed a hole-in-one.1 If not, they propose another time and the match continues.
Conversely, if you let them propose a time, there is fundamentally a higher chance that their time doesn’t work. Put simply, you are in control.
This has been a game-changer: it allows you to shape your calendar, it portrays you as being a high-agency ‘switched on’ individual and, most importantly, does more to avoid the pesky messaging.
Another hack I’ve found useful over the past few months is putting undecided/proposed times into the calendar, with a # in front of them. To give an example, if I’ve suggested meeting a friend for coffee at Friday at 10, as soon as I send the message, I sprint to my Google Calendar and block it off as “# Coffee with __”. This means I don’t accidentally double-book myself, but I know it’s not set in stone. It’s merely “pencilled in”.
The calendar is a lifesaver for optimising our precious resource of time. In a fast-moving, multi-agent world, we must work hard to make the calendar work for us. One way is a few small heuristics that allow you to bend time magically to schedule and slash stress.
Podcast of the week🎙️
AmplifyME Market Maker: The UK’s Fiscal Alarm Bell
Amongst the Rayner scandal (I’m sympathetic by the way, but she had to go), some pretty important financial news went by. It’s superbly explained in this podcast, highly recommended.
What I’m grateful for this week 🙏
The Gym Group call centre lady who discounted my entire next 10 days of the gym, because of my some technical issues I’d had 😁💪
Quote of the week 💬
However difficult life may seem, there is always something you can do, and succeed at - Stephen Hawking
Have a great week ahead - perhaps with a bit more scheduling.
Adi
The limits of my golf knowledge. If you’re reading this and play golf, send me a message - would love to have a go at some point 🏌️♂️🙏