Take Control of Your Productivity

Fail Successfully

If there’s one thing that’s frustrated me from reading dozens of productivity books over the last two decades, it’s that no one told me how to fail.

Failure is common when you start a new system. What I’ve written is the first time I’ve seen a framework for transitioning from old to new, and the reason it’s here is because it’s a common time to fail. But it can also happen anytime afterward. Maybe your system has become much less efficient. Or something specific derailed you, and you’ve stopped reviewing it, referring to it, and updating it. I’ve read platitudes for how to deal with that, but never techniques.

The corollary is that nearly every productivity author has presented himself as the Platonic ideal of hitting deadlines ...