A Great Workspace
May 16, 2021If you want to produce great work consistently, it helps to have a nourishing workspace: one that is full of room to work, is free of distraction, and has the tools you need readily available. For most people, this means one that is clean and uncluttered.
Consider that:
- It’s harder to wash the dishes if the sink is brimming with dirty ones.
- It’s more difficult to think creatively if your mind is full of to-do’s.
- It’s more arduous to produce great designs, if you’re constantly missing the materials you need or your software keeps crashing.
- It’s more challenging to keep track of priorities if you have 27 files open at once.
- It takes longer to write great code if your programming library is haphazard.
- It’s harder to think deeply about complex issues if you have email alerts, instant messages and phone notifications interrupting your thoughts.
There are a small number of rare people that seem to thrive off disorganization and chaos. But most of us, to the extent disorganization exists, produce great work despite our messy workspace not because of it.
The alternative is to be the owner of your workspace and design one that is rich with the things that help you do great work, and free of the things that limit it.