My best (and worst) strategies for dealing with high-demand work
Michael Schmid - @Schnitzel - michael@amazee.com
About Me
LadyBird
instagram.com/southernswissy/
About me
- Apprenticeship in IT in Switzerland
Learned what "work" really means
- First Lieutenant Swiss Air Force
Learned what it means to lead people
- CTO Amazee Group
Still learning :)
CTO Amazee Group
- Board Member Amazee + Amazee subsidaries
Steering, big questions
- CTO Group
Security, IT, Strategy, etc.
- CTO amazee.io & + Mgmt
System Engineering, Architect, Leadership
Acknowledgements
- Things that work for me might not work for you
- Things that might work now won't work in 1 year
- I really love my job and I'm aware that this is a huge privilege
“The only constant in life is change”
-Heraclitus
"When everything seems to be going against you, remember that the airplane takes off against the wind, not with it."
- Henry Ford
A "normal" day
The day starts with the evening before
- Check calendar before going to bed
Understand what tomorrow will bring
- Alarm: 1h before first meeting (30mins in extreme cases)
Give me some time to get ready
- Prepare clothes
Sleep
Falling asleep
- Relax with controlled breathing
- Feel your pulse
- 4 pulses breath in through nose
- 7 pulses hold your breath
- 8 pulses breath out through mouth
- Fall asleep
- Count from 100 down
Sleep
- Phone on silent:
- Notifications turned off in Phone & Slack
- Phone calls only (Pagerduty and Family)
- 6 hour minimum (less doesn't work)
- Usually 7h
- Weekends 8-9h
A "normal" day II
Wake Up Routine
- Every day the same:
- Snooze alarm
- Read some light twitter
- NO Slack, NO E-Mails
- Get Up, Shower
- Feed Dog
- Make Coffee
- Open Notebook: Welcome Work
- Breakfast
- Can't go without, but no real time
- Alternative: Soylent
Let your calendar rule your life
- Use it like your assistant, want something from me? Ask the calendar
- calendly.com (or similar) for external requests
- Block off time if you need focus time
Add little breaks
- 5min breaks in between meetings
Short rewards:- Watch a YouTube Video
- Make a coffee
- Play with the dog
- Forced getting up:
- Drink a lot of water, will happen by itself :)
- Drink a lot of water, will happen by itself :)
- 30min-45min breaks for Lunch
Bigger reward:- 30min YouTube Video, TV Series, etc.
- Eat lunch with Family, Go out with Dog, etc.
Focus!
- Music
- Pretty much all day long
- Comfy Headphones with Noise Cancelling
- Different music playlists
- Liked Songs - regular work
- Motivational music - if you feel down
- Spotify suggestions - new music
- Instrumental only - writing
Focus!
- Luxafor
- small color indicator
- RED: Talk to me via chat
- YELLOW: busy
- GREEN/Off: not busy
Notification
Overload
- No notifications for e-mails
- Nothing has been that important that it couldn't wait an hour
- Urgent stuff happens via Slack & Pagerduty
- Check emails in between meetings
- Mark each one as read that you read
- Follow up right away if you have time
- Snooze if no time
- Separate Private from Company E-Mail
- Trying Inbox Zero every couple of months and failing 🤪
Slack
- Be strict with notifications in Slack
- Most channels mention only
- A few important ones notifications for everything
- Disable Thread Notifications if not needed anymore
- Group channels by importance
- Read all the time (customer and internal)
- Important Internal (Read if you have time)
- Important Customer (Read if you have time)
- Others (read if you are bored)
- Use Slackbot remind like with emails
iMessages, Whatsapp, etc.
- Mute during the day as much as possible
100% Focus
- turn off everything
- only reachable via PagerDuty
Retrospectives
Retrospectives
- Choose a specific time you will remember:
- Shower on Saturday
- Lunch on Friday
- Workout on Sunday
- Ask yourself:
- Did the positive things out-way the negative things?
No week will ever be perfect - Did I succeed in changing the last weeks goal?
Decide if you want a new goal or the same one - What will I change for next week
Choose something tiny & small!
- Did the positive things out-way the negative things?
Thank you!
My best (and worst) strategies for dealing with high-demand work
By Michael Schmid
My best (and worst) strategies for dealing with high-demand work
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