“When” by Daniel H Pink

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  • Positive affect (attitude) tends to rise in the morning, drop in the afternoon, then return in the evening
  • We are more rational in the morning
  • Timing can have a notable affect on math, analytics, and rational work
  • Insight thinking is best during suboptimal times
  • Larks, owls, third birds
    • Fall/Winter births tend to be larks
  • Synchrony effect seeks to align type, task, and time
  • Determine your chronotype
  • Determine the activity type
  • Determine when you should do the work
  • “Vigilance Breaks” are short breaks taken before high-stake activities to make sure every one and every thing is primed and ready
  • Take a 20-30 minute “Restorative Break” every few hours
  • Frequent short breaks can recharge us
  • Lunch with autonomy and detachment is important
  • Napping boosts mental capacity, more boost the older you get
  • Best naps are 10-20 minutes
  • Learn to pause like a pro
  • Start right, start again, start together
  • Slow moving “When” problems can be just as bad as fast moving “What” problems
  • When a competition starts, judges have a baseline assumption; as the competition progresses, they adjust their expectations
  • Midpoints can put us into a slump or spark us
  • Midlife has less of a crisis and more of a slump from mid-thirties to mid-fifties
  • Virtue signaling is most important at the beginning and end
  • “Punctuated equilibrium” is the natural, human inclination to start slow, transition to heads down suddenly (always halfway between the start and deadline)
  • Thinking we are trailing by a little tends to motivate us better than almost anything
  • Interim goals help overcome slumps
  • Stopping work in the middle, when there is a clear starting point, helps prevent stagnation
  • We start editing towards the end of our setting
  • Give bad news first
  • Poignancy mixes a little sad with happy which is more enjoyable overall
  • Codes, garb, and touch
  • Synchronicity binds us to each other

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