The Ultraworking Podcast. Exploring peak performance. Operations, business, biochemistry, math, habits, skills... everything. We aim to make every show very special — and potentially life-changing from time to time.
Turning something is complex as performance into a quantifiable metric isn't easy. We try to explore.
Quick explanation of this human tendency, which if you know it can make it easier to work with the people around you.
The tangibleness of targets and goals in your mind as an important factor.
Sanity checking what ChatGPT thinks are these principles.
What are all of the elements that have to come together, in order to produce high quality work, repeatably?
What can we learn from athletes about how to get our best work done?
Might be worth adding this time management method to the toolkit.
Chris discusses the phenomenon, that most activities do not only affect the short-term results, but also your long-term capacity.
Andi and Chris discuss a paper, looking at the effect of different levels of physical performance on memory.
When behaviors are not the causal factor. but a consequence of something else.
Some preliminary explorations about the concept of leading vs lagging metrics, and how to use them.
Improving communication is a high-value activity. Here are a few things that help.
Chris talks about the phenomenon of threshold effects.
Unlocking the 80/20 in many fields quickly by implementing proving methods. Chris argues that this might be worth trying.
Andi and Chris discuss what goes into having a productive day for each of them. Practical, without much theory.
Lee and Chris discuss a fascinating paper relating the ability to learn programming to learning a second language. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-60661-8
Lee and Chris discuss a valuable tool to make changes in areas that mostly happen subconsciously.
Andi and Chris discuss the findings of a review paper on the cognitive effects of sleep deprivation. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2656292/
Great paper with super interesting and actionable findings. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0361476X1930428X#b0085
Saad and Chris discuss what how mental and sensory noise can affect us and strategies to deal with both.
Chris and Sebastian explore how to evaluate advice, get advice relevant to one's current situation, and implement it.
Andi and Chris discuss their resolutions for 2023, and a simple toolkit for staying consistent.
We investigate the question — when you want to improve some area of your life, should you start by “removing bad stuff” or “adding good stuff”? Interesting question, eh? We explore different lines of this and implications.
People get "fooled by randomness" — you want to be aware of all the places where randomness is happening, notice it, and think clearly so you actually know what's working well vs what's just random.
Someone asks, "How do I do X?" Jocko replies, "Just do X." We analyze this phenomenon.
Apparently, in high stress situations, your perception and self-assessment of your capabilities filters back into your biochemistry. Very interesting implications of this.
The old research said willpower was a finite resource. The new research says that might not be true. What if both are wrong?
Chris and Sebastian explore a fascinating paper looking at the effects of timeouts on psychological momentum.
Sebastian and Chris are back to talk about different ways to think about the cost of things.
Lee and Chris talk about an interesting observation made during a morning run.
Looking at Dr. Sophie Leroy's work on attention residue when switching between tasks. Some interesting science, and some very practical takeaways.
It's worth building the mindset and habit of looking to set up tools for all of the important work you do. These days it's usually possible to do almost everything you do on your computer on your phone, and almost everything you do on your phone on your computer.
Chris found two very useful use cases for OpenAI's new ChatGPT tool, available for free at chat.openai.com - very cool… slightly terrifying. Maybe an important show to listen to.
Chris explores Gall's Law and the evolution of complex systems.
To sleep, or not to sleep, that is the question… a comprehensive answer to an age-old question. “If I'm working late, and both tired but getting a lot done — should I go to bed at a normal hour, or work later and take the penalty associated with that?” Comprehensive answer here. Got a question yourself for us? podcast@ultraworking.com
Chris and Sebastian are back to explore why some situations require an all out effort. Useful tool to evaluate when a situation might have a threshold effect.
Ever hear someone say “we should create a process for this”? Hmm. Sometimes these efforts work and sometimes they fail. In this episode, let's draw a distinction between “process” (of which there are bazillions happening constantly on Planet Earth) and more formal “documentation” (which might or might not match the actual process). Particularly relevant to people in ops, team leaders, etc.
The majority of people start their week, psychologically and in terms of record-keeping, on Monday. They're missing out.
Description: Actions Per Minute (APM) is an incredibly useful way to think about the world. In this show, we introduce the concept and talk about how to increase APM methodically. Referenced: → http://www.ivanmazour.com/the-apm-principle-what-starcraft-teaches-us-about-real-life-success/ → https://www.amazon.com/Unleash-Warrior-Within-Discipline-Confidence/dp/0738215686
“Think lightly about yourself and deeply of the world” — one of the precepts of the death-bed testimony of Miyamoto Musashi (1584-1645), one of the greatest swordsmen in Japanese history along with a skilled painter, caligrapher, writer, and philosopher. Ultraworking's CTO Lee Knowlton joins Sebastian Marshall to talk about Miyamoto Musashi, the Dokkodo, “The Way”, and what modern people could learn from this wonderful document. ~~~ Jumping-off point to more study: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dokkōdō
“Reality Has a Surprising Amount of Detail” by John Salvatier is a gem of a piece. This show looks to make you aware of the phenomenon and its implications for learning a domain as a beginner vs mastering a domain over time. Link to article: http://johnsalvatier.org/blog/2017/reality-has-a-surprising-amount-of-detail
Have you ever thought about why you're interested in the topics you're interested in? Chris and Sebastian explore the research paper “Triggering and maintaining interest in early phases of interest development” by Renninger et al, for practical takeaways on how to build more interest in topics by matching the activities to your personality level. Mentioned on the show… The paper: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2210656118301685 PrinciplesYou: https://principlesyou.com
At least implicitly, every project is either scope to time or scoped to quality. But most people don't do this explicitly and suffer for it. Just learning these phrases will level up your projects a lot.
Discomfort can be pushed through, but actual physical pain as a warning signal should not be disregarded. Ultraworking's Head of Teamwork, Andi Banez, joins Sebastian Marshall to explore.
Ultraworking's Chris Natterer and Sebastian Marshall discuss how Chris switched his keyboard layout and typing style from the default “QWERTY” keyboard to the more-efficient “COLEMAK” layout — with some surprisingly informative universal lessons about learning and skill progression.
During multi-week hyper-busy periods, quick timeboxed lookaheads can be valuable.
Standardized Work Without Kaizen -> Bad. Kaizen Without Standardized Work -> Bad. Standardized Work With Kaizen -> Quite possibly good.
Sensors for personal use, like the Oura Ring and Apple Watch, have gotten way better over the last 10 years. While they're still maybe not "fully ready for primetime" — they can already be used to get interesting information and gains. Chris Natterer and Sebastian Marshall discuss Chris's sensors, metrics, and some science around it.
Gray's Biopsychological Theory of Personality, developed ~1970 to ~1982, posits two different brain systems: A Behavioral Activation System (BAS) which prompts and regulates appetitive motivation, goal-seeking behavior, hope, etc — and a Behavioral Inhibition System (BIS) which prompts and regulates avoidance of negative stimuli. We overview the science some and then make some inferences about what might be going on in the people's brains, as regards to motivation, in the post-pandemic world.
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