DIGITAL MINIMALISM FOR ENTREPRENEURS – enhanced personal productivity anywhere
It's crucial for entrepreneurs to build their own systems. If well-designed they streamline tasks for you, reducing friction and time needed to achieve your goals. Efficiency is critical, especially in the beginning when your resources are limited. Set up a robust system today and be ready for long-term success and peace of mind.
As a beginning entrepreneur, you may find yourself starting off your journey as a solopreneur. Nevertheless, whether you are an 'Army of One' or three, everyone has come across the daunting situation where there is no (longer an) IT department to call up when you can't locate an urgently needed file or you suddenly lose data and fall into a digital abyss.
OwnFoundations likes to help you find a new technological solution to enhance your personal productivity and gain digital autonomy. We will apply the philosophy of digital minimalism from Cal Newport, with a twist towards enhancing your productivity and autonomy even further into our digital reality.
His book, Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World, primarily centers around how social media and large tech companies have taken control of your attention and robbed us of our "autonomy." All of the concerns Newport raises regarding our psychological drive for social approval and positive reinforcement through those toxic dopamine "like" buttons and view counts are legitimate issues.
However, the more important philosophical questions are about finding your own digital sovereignty. The main principles of digital minimalism are an excellent starting point to get there. Let's extract the three main principles and unfold the concepts to help you employ technological leverage and build your own system.
First of all digital minimalists are tech-affine. In fact, they are highly inclined towards technological advancements– fervent advocates for innovation.
Take the time to define what you need to accomplish and do the research to find the app/software tool that delivers the result you want. Below is a set of questions sorted under three focal points to get you started.
1. Declutter– This refers to cleaning up your desktop, apps, software, and also your filing system. How many different chat apps do you really need? What software is the best for keeping your taxes in check? What is your method for archiving files? How many files are floating around on your desktop named Finalversion_01, Final_02, Final_03, FinalFinalFinal...? Is your system built to scale? If the business expands, can a new hire immediately adapt to your system without a complete gut reset?
2. Optimize– Apply the famous phrase, "Does it spark joy?" from Marie Kondo to your current digital system. Does the app interface, and workflow experience spark joy? Are they getting the job done exactly as you wish? Are you satisfied or are you left with multiple unsatisfactory apps and software that you never replaced for better and faster solutions? Does this technology achieve all tasks at hand? If not, change it for a better alternative. Do not underestimate the amount of lost time and the amount of negative psychological impact caused by poorly designed apps!
3. Take Control– Which apps protect your privacy? Where do you store your private and financial information? Do you have access from anywhere and make frequent backups and syncs? Are they all sorted in a simple and action-oriented manner?
If not, this will help you:
P A X
Priorities, Ambitions, and X.
PAX is our personal productivity framework to support you with templates and tools (coming soon). PAX instructs you on how to structure your data and workflows more efficiently. Let's have a sneak peek:
Priorities
are actionable and goal-oriented task series with a clear deadline. See them as one-time efforts – sometimes in Sprints, Kanban style, etc. – which are reviewed weekly. We use Todoist as our preferred tool to effectively execute our priorities every day of the week.
Ambitions
are long-term hats we wear, roles we play, and dreams we have. In contrast to Priorities, ambitions have no clear finish line. You can see them as standards you want to adhere to or as eternal marathons that are often kept private. We have for example sports and health ambitions. Ambitions are reviewed monthly and quarterly.
X
are vast, unlimited topics of ongoing interest or hobbies. X can be thought of as some sort of Zettelkasten and we use Maps of Content to navigate them when needed.
Want to see the PAX framework in action? Stay tuned.
PAX – Your peace of mind in the digital world.