Contest Update

When we revamped the contest last week there were still 1320 chances up for grabs.  With all the recent entries, there are now only 857  left.

As a quick reminder, here are the four ways you can enter:

1. Full Review - 10 chances to win
2. Link to Site & Contest - 5 chances to win
3. Subscribe to RSS - 1 chance win
4. Subscribe to Email - 1 chance to win

So the easiest way to get two chances of winning is to subscribe to this blog via email and in your RSS reader.

Checkout the full details of the contest in this previous post.

Ideal Backup Solution–OS X Version

Yesterday we talked about the ideal backup solution. Today we are going to look at how to implement this solution on OS X. The disk utility with OS X allows you to create a live copy of your hard drive that can be started up and run just like it is your computer. You can even create the backup while using your computer.

As far as I know, this process will only work when you are using a firewire hard drive. I haven’t had any luck booting OS X to a USB drive, so while you may be able to make a backup with a USB connection, I don’t think you can make the backup bootable.

The Disk Utility application stored in your Application > Utilities folder. It is simple to use, but you have to pay attention to make sure you are copying your data in the correct direction–you don’t want to accidentally copy an old backup over your working data.

1. Launch Disk Utility

When you launch Disk Utility, it will show you a list of the available drives on your computer. In the example, I have my internal hard drive (a 74.5 GB hitachi) with a single partition called Macintosh HD. My 232 GB LaCie drive contains three partitions. The Backup partition is where I want to put my data, so I select it.

2. Select Restore

In the right hand side of the application, I’m going to select the Restore tab. I’m going to “restore” my internal drive into the Backup partition on my external drive. This will make the Backup partition into an exact copy of my local drive–even changing its name to Macintosh HD. While it is called “restore” it is really just creating a copy of the drive.

3. Determine Which Drive Will Be Copied

With the Restore tab selected I simply drag Machintosh HD into the source and Backup into the destination and tell it to erase the destination. WARNING: Always double check carefully to make sure my source and destination are correct and that I’m not accidentally going to overwrite important data.

Let me repeat that. Always double check to make sure your source and destination are correct. You want to copy from your local drive to your external drive. Once you’ve done one backup, the partition on the external drive has the same name as your internal drive, so you have to make sure you are putting things in the correct spot–even if the names are the same.  Take a close look at your local hard drive icon to make sure you have the right one in the right place.

4. Start the Restore

Clicking on the Restore button starts the process. It isn’t particularly fast. Ideally you should make the partition to which you are restoring as close in size to the original in order for the transfer to be as efficient as possible. (If you want to find ways to speed up the backup, do a search for information about “block level” copying in OS X to external drives.)

While it is possible to use your computer while doing this backup, I would recommend closing out of all your programs and letting the computer do the backup without running anything else. It reduces the chance that something might go wrong or that something might be backed up in a state that relies on internal memory to be valid.  I have never had this happen, but it is a good precaution.

Booting the Drive on Another Computer

If you ever need to bootup the drive on another computer simply tell that computer to start using the external drive as the startup drive. This is done from the System Preferences using the Startup Disk icon.

Once you reboot the system, it should boot up using the external hard drive as if it is the system you backed up originally.

Moving the Drive Contents Back to Your Original Computer

Once you get your computer repaired, you will probably want to move the contents of your external drive back to your computer. You can continue to use it from the external hard drive until you have some time to let it run for a few hours. To move the data back, follow the instructions again, but this time restore the disk from the external drive to the internal drive.

To restore from your hard drive, you’ll simply perform the restore process, but this time moving the data from your external drive back to your computer’s internal drive.

Automation and Rotation

The best backup is one that happens automatically. It is possible to schedule this type of backup from the command line. I would suggest using two partitions and alternating between which one you backup to. That way you’ll have a fall back if something goes wrong.

I generally do the backup manually about once every few weeks, but I have other ways of backing up files that change frequently.  Whenever we are getting ready to travel, I will do a backup so I have the current state of my computer in case it gets lost or stolen.

Other Operating Systems

You can probably do similar backups with other operating systems. Most of the time you’ll need to buy some type of disk imaging software like Ghost. If you know of an easy way to create hot backup in Windows or Linux, please let me know in the comments.

Ideal Backup Solution

When most people approach their computer backup, they focus on how to create the backup and don’t really think about how to use it if it is ever required. I backup in several different ways, but in this post I want to outline the backup strategy that I am most likely to make use of in case my laptop is stolen, submerged, lost, dropped, kicked, eaten, or incinerated. I’m just going to outline the theory behind this backup strategy regardless of the OS. In a later post, I’ll show you how to actually implement it on OS X.

The Goal

If we approach backup with the end in mind, it makes us take a different approach than. So lets define the desired outcome. In our case the desired outcome is to minimize downtime. I regularly talk with people suffering from a crashed hard drive. In my work, being down for even a short period of time can easily cost me hundreds of dollars in billable hours and thousands of dollars in future business.

So our backup strategy is going to be designed around getting back up and running as quickly as possible. If our computer hard drive crashes, we need to be able to be up and running without a lengthy restore process. We can’t afford to pull out our backup and go through a 2 hour restore process, it needs to be instant.

Backup Method

We need to be able to run directly from the backup in order to come back up instantly. This automatically disqualifies any type of backup that isn’t on a hard drive. We also need to be able to have access to more than just our data. We need to have our application, settings, files, desktop–everything backed up in a way that we can instantly bring our information back up.

The only way to accomplish this is to keep a hard drive that is an exact mirror of our working computer. That way we won’t be missing anything.

Restore Process

In order to meet our requirements, we need to eliminate the traditional restore process. This means our backup needs to be bootable so it can be plugged into another computer and booted, so the software and data are exactly like our original machine. We can’t take the time to copy our backed up version back to a local hard drive on our machine.

Benefits of this Type of Backup

The benefits of this type of backup are significant. If the hard drive dies on your existing machine, you have a way to immediately go back to work, while you wait for a replacement hard drive. If your computer has to go into the shop, you can continue to work without messing with the configuration on another machine without missing a beat. When your computer comes back, you can easily transfer all your data back to it without interrupting any of your work process.

In our next post about backup, we’ll look at how to make this work in OS X.

Tuesday’s Tip: Organized for Happiness

I have two tool boxes.  On is a large box with a bunch of tools thrown in it.  It has a wide selection, but they are all just stored in the main compartment.  My other toolbox is much smaller.  It has an individual place to hold each tool.  For some reason I hate using the large toolbox and love  using the smaller one.

I think this is a function of organization.  Since each tool has an exact location, it just feels better to use the organized toolkit.  Also I find that with the smaller toolbox, I am much more likely to put everything back, because it has a specific place for each tool.  With the larger box, I’ll leave a tool sitting out or in the trunk of my car or where ever else it happens to be.

It isn’t so much that one toolbox is better than the other.  They both have plenty of tools, but there is a significant difference in how I feel about using them.  If you don’t like going to your office, it might because you need to take the time to organize it properly.  If you can make your office, your computer, or whatever your daily toolset consists of beautifully organized you can increase the pleasure you get out of using it.

I would write more, but I have suddenly become inspired to organize my desk and office.

Integration is More Important than Features

I am working with a client that has about 10 employees. They are starting to hit a wall when it comes to productivity. The problem is that while each of their systems has a bunch of nice features, none of them integrate with each other. As a result, they spend most of their time moving information back and forth. The more their business grows, the slower their back office processes become.

Here is an example: when someone buys something from the online store, that information has to be manually entered into the accounting software. The customer information must be manually entered into the customer relationship management system. If a customer gets a refund, the accountant handles the refund, but then the information must manually be entered in the online store to adjust the inventory levels.

While all of their software is considered “best of breed,” none of it talks with the other parts of the process. When it comes to their productivity, they would be better off with fewer features and better integration.

Your Integrated Solution

When you design your personal work flow, make sure that integration is your top priority. For example, when you add a personal contact to your address book, does it automatically show up on your cellphone? If your spouse adds an appointment to the calendar on her computer, does it automatically show up in your PDA?

If you choose your solutions based on integration instead of features, you’ll increase your productivity–even if you have to sacrifice some features. If you choose your solutions based on features and ignore the integration aspect, the time savings benefits will be greatly reduced.

When you are looking for ways to increase your productivity, look for the right process–not the right tools. The best time management software/gadget/planner in the world is only as good as the process it enables. A well designed integrated process with average tools is much more productive than the best tools, but no integrated process.

Simple Way to Speed up Elevators

Last week we looked at a beautifully simple solution to reduce crime in low income housing areas. I wanted to give a few more examples.

A contractor had built a skyscraper downtown in a large city. The new occupants were moving in and the contractor and new owners were finishing up dealing with little issues in finalizing all the little details of the contract. As the number of people in the building increased the office workers started complaining about the elevators being too slow.

Trying to make changes to the elevator would have been a pretty expensive modification. The people who had designed the building came in, timed the elevators, and determined that they were operating as expected. However, this did little to reduce the number of complaints and the designers set about trying to fix the problem. The looked at the cost of installing additional equipment to speed up the elevators. They also considered segregating some of the elevators as “express elevators” to only reach certain floors.

However, one bright individual stopped concentrating on the elevators and started paying attention to the people as they waited. After studying them for a while he made a suggestion. Install mirrors outside the elevators on each floor. His suggestion was implemented and the complaints disappeared.

The mirrors did nothing to increase the speed of the elevators. They did give the riders something to do while they waited for the elevator to arrive. They could look at themselves in the mirror. This seemingly minor changed solved the real problem–people were bored.

Sometimes we overlook simple solutions because we are trying to solve the wrong problem.

Prepare for the Worst to Save Time

It isn’t uncommon for small crises to turn into a huge time drain if you haven’t planned ahead. I’m not saying that you should spend an inordinate amount of time trying to plan for every possible emergency, but there are some very basic level precautions that are worth the small amount of effort they require.

Here are a couple crises to consider:

1. Your wallet gets stolen while you are traveling to another city.
2. Your car gets a flat tire.
3. Your cellphone gets its memory erased.

These are all fairly minor issues if you are prepared, they can become catastrophes issues if you are not prepared.  For example, if your cellphone memory gets erased, as long as you have a backup of all the important names and numbers, it isn’t that big of deal.  However if you have no type of backup, you could potentially lose contact information that would be very difficult if not impossible to recreate again.

I recently had a flat tire on my car.  It shouldn’t have been any big deal, I just took it to a service station to have it fixed.  Unfortunately, my car has one fancy locking nut on each wheel that can’t be taken off by a regular tire iron.  After a search of the entire vehicle we gave up and the mechanic had to find a way to force the lug nut off. I lost an extra 30 to 45 minutes of time because I wasn’t prepared.

Our lives are full of numbers.  Credit card numbers, insurance numbers, bank account numbers, etc. Most of the time, we can get these numbers off our credit card, bank statement, or insurance policy.  However,  the time that these numbers really become vital is when those policies, statements or cards are destroyed or stolen.

Before my wife and I headed down to Mexico, we made a list of all the important numbers in our life, printed it off, and put it in a safe deposit box where our family could get to it if it was ever necessary.  We didn’t even save the file–just the printed copy.  The list contains all of our bank accounts, credit card numbers, retirement numbers, health insurance numbers, life insurance numbers, passport numbers, drivers license numbers, and online banking passwords.  It also contains the telephone numbers for all of the banks and companies that might need to be contacted.

If I was to die, it gives my wife a single place to go for all the necessary insurance and financial information she would need. The few hours of putting this together would save her a few days of digging through files.  It also gives us a simple way to recover information for much less drastic emergencies such as having our wallets stolen while traveling.

The point is, you can invest a few minutes today that can save you hours and hours down the road.

What Is Your Current Work Zone?

If you are really focused on expanding your capabilities, your salary is probably a secondary motivation when it comes to employment. Your major motivation is going to be your learning opportunities. The graph below shows how learning opportunities change over time.

At the beginning of any job, you will have many opportunities to learn. This section is marked by the green zone. Every day will involve new experiences and learning new things. As time goes on this tends to level out as shown by the yellow zone. Sometimes the yellow zone is only temporary and you will be given new responsibilities that will have new learning opportunities and you’ll basically start the cycle over again.

However, if this doesn’t happen and you remain at a reduced learning rate for a period of time, you’ll move into the red zone. The red zone is particularly dangerous because it means you are becoming accustomed to a lack of personal growth and a lack of challenges. If you stay in this zone for too long, you will actually reduce your capabilities to take on challenging assignments.

So when should you look for a new job? While you are in the green zone, you will be facing a lot of challenges. Some of these will be difficult and sometimes you might even fail. This is not an indication that you should move on. It means you are still growing. One mistake I see people make is leaving jobs where they are still learning just because it isn’t easy.

When you get into the yellow zone, it is time to start re-evaluate things. You need to honestly access the chances of you getting different responsibilities that would move you back into the green zone. You also must consider your potential for salary growth. If you are at the high end of the pay scale, continued growth may not translated into growth in pay. When you get to the yellow zone, you may need to sit down with your employer and talk about your future at the company to get a feel for what opportunities might become available if you stick around.

At a previous employer, I had been in the yellow zone for about a year. I finally sat down with my boss and asked. “What are the new challenges I’m going to get to experience in the next 6 months?” He told me that there wasn’t really anything they wanted me to do other than just keep things running they way they were. A few days later I submitted my resignation. For me the challenge was getting things to the point where my department was running smoothly. Simply maintaining the status quo would have been easy. The organization was pretty flexible with work schedules as long as things were getting done, so simply maintaining things would have translated into a lot of free time for me. The idea of not having new challenges scared me because I looked around and saw a number of other employees who were basically on cruise control. They had nice non-stressful jobs, but it had been years since they had ever attempted anything challenging. My fear was that I would become like that.

I took a job with another company where I figured I had about a 60% chance of being able to be successful and a 40% chance of failing. The first few months were extremely difficult, but I learned a tremendous amount. More importantly I raised the bar on what I was capable of doing. This experience has served me well. There are many small and large successes I’ve had in life that I can directly trace back to the decision to leave the easy job and take on that would challenge me.

iPod Contest Update

In January we gave away an iPod Shuffle to one of our email subscribers. In February we started another iPod giveaway contest where you could win an iPod Shuffle by reviewing this site. Once we got 150 reviews we were going to give away the Shuffle. So far we have 18 reviews and they have been very valuable in the redesign of this site, but I’d like to speed things up a bit. We are going to expand the ways you can enter.

We are going to have 5,000 chances to win and you will be able to enter in 4 different ways:

1. Full Review - 10 chances to win
2. Link to Site & Contest - 5 chances to win
3. Subscribe to RSS - 1 chance win
4. Subscribe to Email - 1 chance to win

If you have already subscribed to RSS or Email you are automatically entered in the contest. So that means of the 5,000 chances about 3,500 are already assigned to subscribers (Email and RSS), 180 are already taken by existing reviews. So that leaves 1320 chances still up for grabs. You can enter once using each of the 4 different ways.

The sooner we give away each of the remaining 1320 chances the sooner will give away the Shuffle.

Here are the details of how to enter for each method:

Full Review - 10 chances to win

Post a review on your blog or website. Must be 300+ words and contain links to 1.

1. This page about the contest.
2. www.productivity501.com
3. Two articles on the site.

You can see examples of this by looking at some of the other reviews linked to in the side bar. Once your post is live, email contests@productivity501.com with the URL. If you do a full review, you’ll also get a permanent link back to your site from the original contest page and it will be listed under the Reviewers on the front page of the site for awhile.

Link to Contest - 5 chances to win

Create a post telling about this contest with a link to this page and the front page. Email contests@productivity501.com with the URL. So something like:

Checkout Produtivity501’s iPod Shuffle Contest.

Subscribe to RSS - 1 chance win

Subscribe to the RSS feed in your favorite feed reader. When we run the random process to select a winner, if it falls on an RSS entry, we’ll embed a message in the bottom of the RSS feed with instructions on how to claim the prize. It might be something like:

Be the 5th person to email the codeword SUNFISH to <secret-email>@productivity501.com to win an iPod Shuffle.

Subscribe to Email - 1 chance to win

Use the form in the sidebar to subscribe to the email feed.

Maximizing Benefits

John posted an article about Multiple Positives which he defines as doing activities in a way that give you multiple benefits. This got me to thinking about ways that I’ve been able to stack things together in order to get the most benefit. In general, I consider multitasking to be a bad habit. However, there are times where “multibenefiting” is highly profitable. The difference is that with “multibenefiting” you are concentrating on a richer outcome. With multitasking the focus is just on doing things at the same time–even when the outcome is less productive.

Here are some examples:

1. Mowing the Yard with a Book

I hate mowing.  To make things a little more bearable, I started listening to audio business books while pushing the mower around the yard. So when it came time to cut the grass, I was getting exercise, taking care of the yard and learning about businesses at the same time. This kept it enjoyable so I actually wanted to go mow to listen to the rest of my book.

2. Exercise with a Television Series

I like to exercise, but if I’m bored I won’t stick with it. A few years ago my wife bought me a ski machine (for $5 at a yard sale). I really like using it, but after about 15 minutes it is very difficult for me to stay focused. I’ve found a perfect solution. I like watching a few weekly shows, but since we don’t own a television I rarely see them when they are broadcast. I’ll get a set worth of shows on DVD and only watch them when I exercise.

This has worked pretty well for me. I don’t spend any time watching commercials and since most shows are designed to grab your attention for the next week, it is easy to come back to exercise the next day.

When a new television series comes out that looks interesting I automatically think “I’ll have to get that to exercise next year”.

3. Working for Education

Before I started my own company, I took jobs not based on how much they paid, but based on their educational opportunities. This led to leave a job for another that paid $30,000 less. The lower paying job provided more reimbursement and time off to pursue a second masters degree.

By looking for ways to maximize the benefits of my employment, I’ve been able to derive much more value than my coworkers. If a coworker and I both made $40,000 per year it may seem like we make the same amount. But if I took advantage of $10,000 per year toward college classes, weeks of time off for study and my degree will allow me to charge $145 per hour for my services in the future the total value I’m getting is much greater than my coworker. In this case I was getting the benefits of a job (a salary) along with the benefits of a free education.

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