Hello! I'm Tim from Make Work Work Better, and welcome to my brilliantly-named newsletter, The Make Work Work Letter.
Make Work Work Better exists to transform Workplace Wellbeing, by focussing on the working practices and processes that lead to stress and burnout. I'll be using the newsletter to compile thoughts, material and links around this mission as well as recommendations and tips on working and living smarter, not harder.
I've been trying to optimise my own workflow of late. I start a new contract in October which will monopolise my time, so am trying to take my own advice and reduce the non-value-adding activities in my day-to-day.
The biggest time-sink was editing my podcast. I'm reasonably competent and comfortable editing audio (I used to do it with actual tape and a razor blade Back In The Day), but it still felt like I was spending too long doing it. Enter Descript, which is Actual Magic. It transcribes the audio, and then allows you to edit the podcast by editing the transcript just like a text document. It is mind-blowingly clever, and that's before you take into account the automatic 'um' removal, gap shortening, and the freaky 'overdub' feature that will sample your voice and allow you to CHANGE THE GODDAMN WORDS YOU SAID BY TYPING NEW ONES. It's reduced my editing time to about a quarter of what it was, and also sped up creating the show notes.
I'm annoyed that the iOS 15 update broke a bunch of the Shortcuts that I use on a daily basis and that I had to spend an hour Googling how to fix them, but on the plus side you can now have different outfits for your Memoji. As someone who really dislikes wearing a jumper, this is big news. I've not dug in properly to see what productivity enhancements can be had from the new features yet, but will no doubt get to that in time.
I had forgotten about this Instagram account where someone scans their sandwiches. I love it.
A little bit of a sneak peek for you newsletter subscribers - next week I'm announcing a new partnership with Next Steps Consulting to take the Well-Working Index and our ISO 45003 offer to the next level. Next Steps and I have similar philosophies, just working with different toolsets and approaches, so it's a really exciting time. There will, of course be videos and other content dropping over the next couple of weeks, so keep your eyes peeled for that.
Do Yourself A Favour... with Vicki Lovegrove
The guest on Episode 5 of our sister podcast was designer and coach Vicki Lovegrove, who I met because we both have vinyl collections.
What do you wish you'd learned sooner?
So I spent a bit of lockdown, like a lot of people, learning something new. I learned a technique called Havening, which is used a lot with people who've experienced trauma and PTSD and things like that.
Havening Technique s- Better Living Through Neuroscience
What book or concept made a difference to the way you thought about life?
So hard, Cause I've got so many books and I reread them over and over and over. But what popped into my head was a book that I got when I was in sixth form at school. And it was the Beatles illustrated lyrics. It's Beatles fan art. It's been edited by Alan Aldridge who did a lot of artwork for them. It's all different lyrics, which have been illustrated by Beatles fans. And some of it's awful. It's, it's quite racy in places.
What tool or tools do you use every day?
Every bag I own has at least two Berol Fineliner pens in it. So that's what I've had to go with really.
What was the last really useful thing you bought or acquired?
The last useful thing I've bought was a Ring doorbell, which I then really enjoyed setting up and using the app and getting that going. I've bought some cameras to go with it and it's so easy to use. It's a great brand. Visually it's a brilliant brand and the product design is lovely.
Complete the sentence: Do yourself a favour and...?
Find a Coach.
I think everybody who's in business or everybody who works really, they should have somebody in their life who's going to listen to them, be on their side, but not get emotionally involved and keep you accountable.
Do Yourself A Favour Podcast - ...And Find A Coach (with Vicki Lovegrove) | Free Listening on Podbean App
Vicki Lovegrove of Seventy Three Design joined Tim to talk coaching, vinyl, stationery and how our emotions can hold us back. Show notes for the episode can be found at https://doyourselfafavour.notion.site
This newsletter's soundtrack
chosen at random by Vicki Lovegrove
Dub Come Save Me - Roots Manuva (Big Dada, 2002)
You could be forgiven for thinking Roots Manuva's 3rd album is a straight up versioning of the previous year's 'Run Come Save Me' - certainly the title and sleeve art doesn't do anything to disabuse you of this notion - but there's a bit more to it than that. Only half the tracks are remixes (and what speaker-rattling remixes they are!), the remainder being new tracks that feel like they may have been slept on as a result of being tucked away on here.
More in a few weeks, and don't forget to check the podcast in the meantime!
Cheerio
Tim