Quotes About Productivity

Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work at hand. The sun's rays do not burn until brought to a focus.

Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work in hand. The sun's rays do not burn until brought to a focus.

A gude paymaster ne'er wants hands to work.

What I want to know is, when did busy become better? When did a jam-packed diary become a measure of success?

The most efficient way to live reasonably is every morning to make a plan of one's day and every night to examine the results obtained.

We complain loudly about such things as the sagging productivity of our workplaces, the crisis of our schools, and the warped values of our children. But the very strategy we use to solve those problems—dangling rewards like incentive plans and grades and candy bars in front of people—is partly responsible for the fix we're in. We are a society of loyal Skinnerians, unable to think our way out of the box we have reinforced ourselves into.

Rewards usually improve performance only at extremely simple—indeed, mindless—tasks, and even then they improve only quantitative performance.

But my point is not just that the psychological theory is inadequate; it is that the practice is unproductive. If we do not address the ultimate cause of a problem, the problem will not get solved. This is not to say

Two are better than one because they have a good return for their labor. Ecclesiastes 4:9

Growth hackers don't tolerate waste.

When you waste a moment, you have killed it in a sense, squandering an irreplaceable opportunity. But when you use the moment properly, filling it with purpose and productivity, it lives on forever.

The best way to fill time is to waste it.

Capitalists make money by exploiting labor and by externalizing the costs of the wastes produced by the productive process by imposing the wastes on the environment.

Roy Hill had to achieve more than 4,000 approvals, permits, and licences and more again for construction. The delays and costs of this were not only humungous and waste of human resources but did nothing to assist productivity.

Every day you waste is one you can never make up.

I think of all my time as existing in 15-minute blocks. Most people think in terms of 30-minute chunks, but I've found that when I free up more time, I waste it.

Mostly, I just waste my time.

To be a good manager, a manager tries to constantly fight to reduce waste.

I can't have my employees sitting in traffic when they should be in the office. Spending two-and-half hours in the car is a huge waste of productive time.

Three-quarters of directors waste four hours on a shot that requires five minutes of actual directing. I prefer to have five minutes' work for the crew - and keep the three hours to myself for thought.

Don't waste even a minute magnifying your perceived inadequacies. You can't do it all. Why berate yourself for not achieving the impossible?

What is the point of one guy developing a 1.3 engine, and another guy a 1.4? What are you getting for this? And the answer is nothing: a total waste of capital.

I will be ruthless in cutting out waste, streamlining structures and improving efficiency.

Making products for $17 an hour that we could have purchased for 75 cents an hour wastes resources that we could have used elsewhere.