About a month ago this article came to me in an email. It talks about a way of planning to increase productivity. Parts of it are things I already do, so I know those parts work. The rest may be useful too. Of course, a few things jumped out at me while reading.
The first was that the article was written several years ago, and this guy was just recycling it for his email list. A great idea that saves on time. It also shows the effectiveness of the system because if it didn’t work, he wouldn’t be able to reuse it.
The second thing was less important, though it may underscore some points in the article. The Helmut von Moltke the Elder quote is a misquote. He actually said, “No plan of operations extends with certainty beyond the first encounter with the enemy’s main strength.” Rather than the more friendly and quotable “No plan survives contact with the enemy.” Von Moltke’s other famous quote (and indeed his revolutionary method of reorganizing military leadership) is also useful as it relates to this article: “Strategy is a system of expedients.”
What the author has done is more of the latter quote. Not only has he made productivity a system of expedients, but he has turned it on itself in recycling the blog post. This makes me think that it’s time for me to recycle a few of mine as well. While there is certainly some drivel in the dusty archives, there are some nuggets, too. I’ll try to find more of those than the former.
For the record, I did pause at von Moltke the Elder's monument near the Victory Column in Berlin (which I also wrote about for Atlas Obscura) . I definitely did not make it to the Invalids Cemetery where von Moltke the Younger is buried, but I tried to get there because that's where the Red Baron was buried the second time. I got to see where the Red Baron was finally interred, but I only mention all of this to show that I get distracted by ribbons a lot.