Not too long ago, I asked you what kinds of videos you'd like to see more of here on the Simpletivity channel.
And Mihow had a great suggestion. He said he wanted to see the best books, podcasts, and resources that helped me to be more productive.
So today I wanna share with you seven of my favorite books and podcasts that help me stay on top of my game.
Hello everyone, Scott Friesen here at Simpletivity, helping you to get more done and enjoy less stress.
And let's jump right in with Mr. Daniel H. Pink.
And my first book recommendation is his latest and it's called "When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing".
Now you may be familiar with Daniel Pink. He's the author of books such as "Drive" and also "To Sell is Human". I've read both of those books and a few others and I've thoroughly enjoyed his style of writing.
But until recently he had never tackled the topic of time management or personal productivity. And what I love about "When" is that he backs it up with research and with real data.
So for example, did you know that you should try to avoid hospitals between the hours of 2:00 p.m. and 4:00 p.m.? In fact between two and four in the afternoon, you should probably try to avoid a lot of important things, including important meetings or important phone calls.
That's just a little bit of a teaser. You'll have to find out why by reading it for yourself. But I thoroughly enjoyed "When" by Daniel Pink.
Now I'm gonna be alternating between books and podcasts. So my first podcast recommendation might be a little surprising to some of you because it may seem as though it's not focused on productivity at first glance. I regularly listen to Freakonomics or more specifically Freakonomics Radio which was loosely based or is loosely based on the book by the same name.
Now the authors of Freakanomics go into some really interesting topics. And as you glance at some of these, you may again say, "How does this help you, Scott, to be more productive?"
But if I scroll down just a little bit further, you'll see that there are episodes such as "A Better Way to Eat", "The Zero-Minute Workout", "How Does the Behavior-Change Revolution?", "How Goes the Behavior-Change Revolution?", and "Long-term Thinking in a Start-Up Town". I love that Freakonomics interviews a wide variety of experts and professors, not just economics professors but a wide variety of professionals. And I found that it's given me some really interesting insight into my own business and my own behavior, as I'm thinking of new routines and changing the way that I go about my day.
Freakonomics releases a new episode roughly once a week and they are very very well produced. So you'll certainly, it's certainly worth your time to check out Freakonomics.
All right, back to a book recommendation. And for this I have to go to Mr. Cal Newport. Now Cal Newport's latest book is entitled, "Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World." A lot of it has to do with taking a social media fast but the book that I wanna recommend by Cal Newport is "Deep Work".
Now you've may have heard me talk about "Deep Work" in the past. It's one of my all-time favorite productivity books. "Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World". And it really does come down to how do we keep and achieve the focus we need to be as successful as we can, whether that's in our work or even when that's in our personal lives.
Now Cal Newport is somewhat famously known for having almost no social media presence. I don't believe he has a Twitter or Instagram account. He's not active, even if he does, he's not active in any of those places and that's really surprising for a multiple best-selling author. But if there's one thing that Cal knows a lot about that is focus. And I really enjoyed "Deep Work", immediately started to apply a number of the things that he talks about within his book.
All right back over to a podcast recommendation and for this one I have to go to the Five AM Miracle Podcast by Mr. Jeff Sanders. Now I had the pleasure of interviewing Jeff Sanders a few years ago. And I was actually a guest on his podcast at the same time. And what I love about the Five AM Miracle Podcast is that Jeff is just such a positive guy. He really gets you going, whether you're listening to this early in the morning or some other part of your day, he gives you actionable tips and a great interviewer as well. As you get to hear from a wide variety of professionals on a wide variety of topics. But it really is focused on productivity, on technology. As you see here, the episodes run typically, probably about 45 minutes in length, a pretty typical podcast length. But something that is a great way to either start your day or to keep you on that positive side as you go about your workday.
All right, it's time for another book recommendation and this may just be my favorite on this list. It may be a little bit surprising to many of you that I've included it on this list but it's quickly become one of my all-time favorite books. And that is "Never Split the Difference" by Mr. Chris Voss.
Now first, let me talk a little bit about the author, Chris Voss. I wanna highlight some text here. Chris Voss was the FBI's hostage negotiation representative for the National Security Council's hostage working group. He led international kidnapping negotiating for the Federal Bureau of Investigation for many many years. In essence, if there was ever an American who was taken hostage in a foreign country, Chris Voss was either directly or indirectly involved.
So if we're talking about negotiation, he's certainly the expert we wanna be listening to. But the focus here is not just on the author but the book itself, and it's called, "Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It". And what I love about this is that very early in the book, Mr. Voss talks about, in a hostage negotiation there's no such thing as let's meet halfway, right? There's no such thing as, "Hey, why don't you release one of the hostages and then you can go ahead and kill the other hostage." That's never ever acceptable from a hostage negotiation standpoint. And he uses the things which he learned over his decades of hostage negotiation and applied it in a real-world sense.
Now you may think if you're not in sales, is this book really gonna be helpful to you? And I would say, absolutely. We are negotiating day in and day out, regardless if you're dealing with contracts or not. Even in your personal life, you're negotiating constantly with a spouse, with your children, with your neighbors, with good friends, with family members. But especially within our work world, whether it's clients, whether it's your own boss, or coworkers. The things that are discussed, the things that are provided in this book are invaluable and I was able to apply a number of them in my own business almost immediately. Like I said before, "Never Split the Difference" has quickly become one of my all-time favorite books and I think it will help you with your productivity. You'll be able to accomplish more because you get to start thinking in a slightly different way.
Back over to my last podcast recommendation on this list. We've got one more book recommendation to go but my podcast recommendation is the Productivityist Podcast. Now I know that's a bit of a mouthful at first, Productivityist. Who is the Productivityist? Well it's Mr. Mike Vardy and he's been doing this podcast for a number of years and I like his take and I especially love his interviewing style within the podcast. He releases his podcast typically on a weekly basis and it is an interview format. He interviews a number of authors, a number of other productivity coaches and consultants. But some really great topics, some really great things that you can start to apply right away. And what I love, whether I'm reading a book or whether I'm listening to a podcast is hearing someone else's story, someone else's journey. And a lot of times that's what Mike Vardy focuses on. What was someone else's journey? How did they improve their productivity? And I love grabbing just the key tidbits or the things that really resonate with me and I try to start to apply them in my own life, see what works and see what doesn't. So if you want some helpful tips, a very entertaining podcast, be sure to check out the Productivityist Podcast.
And that brings us to my final recommendation in today's video. And with this I have to go with Angela Duckworth's book, "Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance." Now again, you may be asking yourself, what does this have to do with productivity? Well I think it has all to do with productivity because it has to do with how do we push through certain barriers? What separates the most successful from everyone else? And how can you apply those techniques within your own day today?
You might wanna start off by watching Angela's TED Talk which is very good. It gives you a bit of a summary of the book itself. But again I'm a big fan of books that can back up their claims with real-world research and data. And Angela Duckworth and her team have done a number of studies in a variety of places, some of the most prestigious universities and businesses in a variety of countries. And she's come up with some great insight on how you can be more grit-worth. How you can bear down but also be more successful in the end.
Well there you have it, there are seven of my favorite books and podcasts. Books that I've read recently and podcasts that I continue to listen to, to help me be more productive.
I would love to hear from you. What are some of your recommendations? What are some of your suggestions? I'd love to hear some of your favorite books, some of your favorite podcasts. Maybe there are some other resources that you use.
Be sure to share them with me and share them with others in the comments below.
Remember being productive does not need to be difficult. In fact, it's very simple.
