None Down – About 16 to Go

I started my summer vacation at 8:30pm tonight.  After an extended day at work and a tired bus ride home I crossed the threshold into relaxation and non-employment type productivity. Let’s get to it. Tomorrow. Tonight, I sit!

Perspective

I talked to a writer today about a book he just finished and the new project he is starting.  He writes fiction. His book is about the aftermath of a war torn country and the impact a single photograph had on the lives of some of its survivors.  It sounded pretty interesting, “light” we joked sarcastically. 

He’s in the process of selling the book now which means a shift in the way he structures his work day. Mostly keeping up with contacts and managing relationships with agents, potential agents and developing a New York presence.

I asked him how he starts a project and he said the first 100 pages are the most critical so he pounds those out 3 or 4 times to really get the story rolling. He said he does about 10 pages a day so this first stage goes pretty quickly.

He said the most important thing in these 100 pages is to establish a perspective including the voice and point of view of the narrator. The voice of his last narrator was sarcastic, dead to the world, having seen it all, not surprised by any amount of pain or hurt that comes his way.

It was interesting to hear the perspective of a writer. He obviously works hard and invests the time that is needed to do that work. Time, Talent, Resources.

Fiction is different from non-fiction but I think I still need a perspective. Maybe a hundred pages a few times over is in order. Again – time, talent, resources.

Productivity Hypothesis

A friend and I were talking about the state of productivity in our lives and society in general.  We agreed that we would be better served by doing about half as much in order to do what remains that much better.  But of course there are costs.  The density of our productivity is often budget driven where more productive units produce some kind of productivity revenue.  That revenue may be financial but not necessarily.  Often the productive revenue comes in the form of job advancement or pleasing a funder in order to maintain or advance further funding opportunities. But to what end. My friend and I both saw the inevitable reality of this productivity system spinning out of control. 

I wonder what it would be like if we volunteered to cut our budgets by 20% with the promise that we would only reduce productivity by 10%. I hypothesize that the quality of the remaining 90% would increase by 30% netting an overall increase in productivity value while reducing overall costs.

I’m not confident that this hypothesis will ever be tested because budget decisions are made at a level above my pay grade.