5 Productivity Lessons I Learned by Starting a Podcast
Earlier this year I started the Productivity in Tech Podcast. This I my first podcast and the first time that I have ever done anything this collaborative. I’ve learned the biggest productivity lessons from actually starting the podcast.
1. Stay Ahead of the Game
Since this was my first podcast, I had no audience. That meant finding guests would be a constant struggle. To prepare myself, I spent two months talking to people and recording episodes before the show ever went public.
Now I have a healthy backlog of episodes. This means I don’t have to stress about doing interviews. This also allows me to be critical in selecting the best guests for the show.
2. Invest Most of the Time Doing Things You Love to Prevent Burnout
Two years ago, I started a blog. I spent so much time editing and researching, I barely wrote anything. Eventually, I dreaded making the whole process and the blog slowly died.
My favorite part of the podcast is recording the interview. Originally, I spent 90 minutes doing that and EIGHT hours doing everything else!! The podcast was on its way to join my blog in the trash bin. Before that happened, I decided to change my processes and focus more on the things I liked.
- I changed recording and editing tools to speed up the editing process.
- I pre-rolled my intro and outro.
- I use Text Expander Snippets to help with show notes and social content.
- I Outsourced some of the social media management.
- (MOST IMPORTANTLY) I changed how I took notes to be more in depth and fun.
Now I spend most of my time doing the things I enjoy most about the show.
3. Understand your priorities
I’ve never ran a podcast (I can’t say that enough). I often have no idea what I’m doing. I quickly realized I needed to figure out that the biggest priority was. There have been several times that I have had to list out all of my tasks and then make an Eisenhower Matrix to figure out the most important.
When there are so many different things going on. It can be hard to identify the priority. Tools like Priority Matrix help you discover priorities for your team so you are always working on the right thing. During my conversation with Kari Beaulieu she even mentioned that focusing on your priorities eventually begins to creep into your personal life as well.
Nowadays, I try to only work on the most important thing. Once that is done I move to the next one.
4. Learn from Those Around You
The whole premise of Productivity in Tech Podcast is that I interview people in tech related fields and figure out how they handle productivity so I can learn from it. Everybody’s productivity is different. This means that I learn something from every person that I interview.
Take Dan Berger (Episode 14) for instance. Dan, likes to keep a single notebook for each month that way he is always looking at a small set of information all the time. As a fan of notebooks I quickly adopted this mentality and I began to notice that finding information became easier. Now, my Midori Travellers Notebook has a new insert every month.
I also have reached out to many other podcasters, especially in the Productivity space. Many of my peers have a ton of valuable knowledge. While some may think that they are my rivals, I consider them to be some of my greatest allies.
5. Have a Team
Having said all this, the biggest help to my productivity has definitely been the Productivity in Tech Community. We have a plenty of people interested in learning more and more about productive. Everyone helps each other and gives some of the best feedback into the show and many other topics. As we continue to grow, it gives us the ability to do even more with it. They have been extremely helpful in extending the reach of the podcast farther than I could have ever done by myself.
written by Jay Miller — Host of Productivity in Tech Podcast
