Rethink the Season of Giving

Next Thursday, soup kitchens, homeless shelters, and other charities across the US will be fully staffed with smiling-faced, happy volunteers eagerly doling out food and other assistance to those whose need is greatest. Families across the country will come together in the spirit of giving, and will return home beaming with pride and contentment, knowing deep in their hearts that they have made a difference. It’s the finest side of… Continue reading

November 20 | By Dustin | Tagged: | 4 comments»

10 Best Productivity Books of 2009

November 18 By Dustin | 15 comments»

Granted, the year’s not done yet, but publishers start to slow down new releases right about now, so it’s not likely we’ll see another contender for “best of 2009” until January. Plus, Christmas is coming up, and I wanted to give you plenty of time to read some of these books before you give copies to your friends and relatives.But really? It’s never the wrong time to recommend a list… Continue reading

Rethink the Season of Giving

November 20 | By Dustin | Tagged: charity, christmas, giving, holiday, season, thanksgiving, volunteering | 4 comments»

10 Best Productivity Books of 2009

November 18 | By Dustin | Tagged: book, book review, chance, gift, gtd, luck, motivation | 15 comments»

Take a Vacation from Your Email!

Considering how useful – revolutionary, even – email is as a communication tool, it can also be an incredible drain on productivity. If you’re anything like me, you have discussion listservs, newsletters, Google alerts, Facebook updates, blog comments, advertisements, automated backups, reminders, and all manner of other stuff pouring into your inbox all the time – all in addition to emails from actual people actually trying to communicate with you.Of… Continue reading

November 16 | By Dustin | Tagged: email, inbox, procrastination, time-management | 7 comments»

Stationery Pr0n: Japanese Pens and More from JetPens.com

Geeks tend to love pens, notebooks, and office gadgets. Some of the most popular posts here at Lifehack have been about pens and other stationery. Let us loose in a Staples or Office Max and we're like kids in a candy shop. We can't pass a stationery shop without feeling at least a twinge of desire – and usually without dropping some of our hard-earned money inside. And of course… Continue reading

November 13 | By Dustin | Tagged: office-supply, pen, pen-and-paper, pencil, stationery | 15 comments»

Searching for a Shared Virtual Workspace?

In my coaching practice, I am increasingly looking for ways to work with my clients on shared documents and projects online. Pretty simple right? You’d think so. I went to the first two places that I knew offered some or all of these services: Google & Microsoft. Big disappointment. Continue reading

November 12 | By Clemens | Tagged: collaboration, google, microsoft, online, online-app, software, virtual workspace, web-2.0 | 26 comments»

Ask Reader: What’s your dream iPhone app?

Stepcase Lifehack readers and other lifehackers, we are reaching out to hear what types of applications you guys would like to see on your iPhone. Think of it as your dream iPhone app. In the past, Stepcase Apps were developed based solely on our team needs. However, as we continue our development of mobile apps for the iPhone, we’d like to get our readers involved and see what kind… Continue reading

November 11 | By Angus | Tagged: iphone, Productivity, stepcase | 15 comments»

Review: Xobni Extends Outlook’s View, But at a Cost

Outlook is a well-established presence on the business desktop, providing millions with their email, calendar, contacts, and tasks. It’s such an institution, in fact, that when Microsoft radically revamped the Office suite’s interface in 2007, it left Outlook largely unchanged.Although it’s big and sluggish, there’s no denying that Outlook does what it’s supposed to do. Not quickly or with style, but consistently and effectively nonetheless. The thing is, though, that… Continue reading

November 11 | By Dustin | Tagged: email, outlook, review, software, tool, xobni | 11 comments»

Information Pollution Alert! Living with Data Smog

We are a nation awash in data smog. This is more than just information overload -- it's not just that there's too much information out there for one person to adequately encompass, it's that there's too much data out there to even make out the information clearly, let alone to evaluate and act on that information.What's worse is that unlike normal smog, which is the unintentional byproduct of our need… Continue reading

November 10 | By Dustin | Tagged: bias, data-smog, filter, information, information-overload, news, science, truth | 12 comments»

Put Up Your Hand If You Ever Lie

Put up Your Hand if You Ever Lie.If your hand went up, then we now know you’re a liar. If it didn’t go up then we know you’re an even bigger liar.When asked the question “are you a liar?” nearly 97% of people answer “no”. When the remaining 3% (self-confessed liars) are subjected to questions calibrating their real, rather than perceived, honesty, they turn out to be, on average, 28… Continue reading

November 9 | By Craig | Tagged: honesty, lying, truthfulness | 14 comments»

11 Ways to Think Outside the Box

Thinking outside the box is more than just a business cliché. It means approaching problems in new, innovative ways; conceptualizing problems differently; and understanding your position in relation to any particular situation in a way you’d never thought of before. Ironically, its a cliché that means to think of clichéd situations in ways that aren’t clichéd.We’re told to “think outside the box” all the time, but how exactly do we… Continue reading

November 6 | By Dustin | Tagged: creativity, innovation, problem-solving, solution | 19 comments»

12 Lists That Help You Get Things Done

At the center of just about every personal productivity system are lists – GTD has it’s context lists, Pomodoro has it’s action inventory and daily to-do lists, todoodlist has, well, the todoodlist, and so on.But there are a lot of different kinds of lists besides your task or to-do list that can help you be more productive. Lists in general are powerful tools – open-ended, constantly growing… Continue reading

November 5 | By Dustin | Tagged: checklist, list, online-tool, pen-and-paper, reference, software, task list, todo | 26 comments»

Make Email Your Servant (Not Your Master)

Let's be clear. Your email is not your work; it is simply a tool to help you do your work. But like any tool it can be ineffective or even dangerous when used wrongly. Here is how to make email your servant not your master.1. Check your email inbox at set intervals. Do not have your email on and active in front of you all the time. For most people… Continue reading

November 4 | By Paul | Tagged: contact, email, folder, message, outlook, twitter | 16 comments»

Your Happiness Plan

A Quick Survey Before we get under way with today’s briefer-than-normal chat, I want to conduct a little research on the run. Put up your hand if happiness is one of your aims in life. And no, participation is not optional at Stepcase Lifehack today. Yep, even you scaredy cats. Okay, keep ‘em up so I can count… 1001, 1002, 1003… yep; that’s all of you. Guessed as much. So it seems that… Continue reading

November 2 | By Craig | Tagged: happiness, life, materialism, personal-development, planning | 17 comments»

Four Kinds of Vampires that Haunt Your Life (and What to Do About Them)

You are surrounded by vampires.They circle you, slowly, eyeing your throat, their teeth glistening in the moonlight. Your heart pounds in your chest as they move in, intent on draining your life's blood for their own unholy nourishment. A scream rises up in your chest as they close in on you, their fangs bared, and then you feel the first pair of teeth sinking into your throat."Hey, Dustin, got a… Continue reading

October 31 | By Dustin | Tagged: attention, halloween, no, time-wasters, vampire | 11 comments»

Being a Man in the 21st Century (Part 2)

Earlier this week, I began a discussion of the way that manhood in American society is changing. Today, I want to revisit the topic with some of my own ideas about how these changes could lead to a more enriching and satisfying take on masculinity.Before I do that, though, I want to say how thrilled I was at the response the first post got – I had never expected… Continue reading

October 30 | By Dustin | Tagged: culture, identity, manhood, masculinity, men, work | 42 comments»

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