Productivity method

Working method: what productivity means, keeping context, turning an idea into a plan and making a workflow last.

Diane

Nov 5, 2026

Capture now, sort later

A decision made at the moment you save slows the capture, and a slow capture gets abandoned. How to separate the act of saving from the decision, with the Windows clipboard history and an inbox you sort once a week.

CMDglows article cover on ongoing projects

Diane

Nov 5, 2026

Finite project or ongoing project: stop managing both the same way

A project has an end, a routine does not. On Windows, tell them apart, run each at its own pace, and stop treating a routine as a failure.

Diane

Nov 5, 2026

Why your folders end up in a mess, and five axes to file by

Every folder answers a question, and mixing those questions is what makes a folder tree unreadable. Richard Saul Wurman's LATCH framework, to use one filing axis per level.

CMDglows article cover about keeping track of your network

Diane

Nov 5, 2026

Your network is not lost for lack of contacts, but for lack of context

You don't forget the people you know. You forget why you know them and when to reach back out. Three questions to decide how much follow-up each person deserves, and a ten-minute context card to write tonight.

One single inbox and a fifteen-minute review block in a Windows calendar

Diane

Nov 5, 2026

Your notes system fails because it makes you decide too early

Every capture that asks for a folder, tags and a priority eventually stops happening. Why deciding at capture time breaks a notes system, and the three-step routine that fixes it on Windows.

A page of notes closed next to a sheet where someone wrote from memory

Diane

Nov 5, 2026

Rereading teaches you almost nothing: the method that works instead

Rereading gives you a feeling of mastery that does not survive the exam. What the research says about retrieval, the numbers that circulate for no good reason, and a fifteen-minute test to run tomorrow.

CMDglows article cover about RICE scoring and priorities

Diane

Nov 5, 2026

RICE scores: why a number does not make your priority objective

RICE looks like it decides for you. What each of its four factors really measures, where the score misleads, and a ten-minute test to check whether your decision holds.

CMDglows article cover on time sold without noticing

Diane

Nov 5, 2026

The time you sell without noticing: why repeated tasks cost more

A two-minute reply you send five times a week costs far more than two minutes. Why sold time goes unseen, and how to turn it into a reusable template in fifteen minutes.

Diane

Nov 5, 2026

Timeboxing that survives Tuesday: a calendar that holds all week

Timeboxing fails less from a bad method than from too much rigidity. Four steps to block your tasks, the review that keeps the system alive, and what to protect around it.

CMDglows article cover about motivation on long projects

Diane

Nov 5, 2026

Why your motivation fades on a long project (and what replaces it)

A long project rarely stalls from lack of willpower. Three ingredients explain most of the slowdown, with one question for each.

A Windows workday split between one protected block and everything else

Diane

Oct 22, 2026

What is productivity, if it isn't doing more?

"I don't have time," "I'm not motivated," "I can do two things at once": three sentences that keep you busy without moving you forward. What productivity really means, and a 90-minute rule you can set up on Windows today.