I've recently asked how people have become more hard-working. I compiled the answers across the EA Forum and LessWrong (and some private messages) in a list for myself to make it easier for me to experiment with the suggestions. I thought I'd share the list here in case it's useful for anyone else. I also list the things that people said didn't work and a couple of other things.
This wasn't done to be "proper", so the list is sloppy in many ways: I liberally paraphrased what people said; often I could have easily counted something two people said as the same or two different things, which would change the way I counted how often something was mentioned; I very roughly grouped the things that were said into categories but easily could have categorised many things differently.
Notable points
Individual points that were mentioned the most:
- (Soft) accountability (deadlines, beeminder, accountability buddy, posting about your goals, boss as a service, promising friends) (9)
- Working on interesting problems/enjoyable work (and in an enjoyable work environment) (8)
- Focusmate/Coworking (often poms) (7)
Some things that weren't mentioned a lot but that I found interesting:
- Identifying (or being thought of) as hard-working (3)
- Categorising work as "not work" and instead as something enjoyable, adjusting work environment accordingly (1)
Other things
- Age at the time of the shift in hard-workingnesswas usually not mentioned, but when it was mentioned, it was between 20-30
- Some people managed to become permanently more hard-working after experiencing one period of working hard, even when they switched to less enjoyable or just very different work. That initial period would either be induced by external pressure or by working hard on something they didn't consider work. (3)
Full list of what made people more hard-working
Here is the full list, ordered by how often things in a category were named. (Note that often the same person would list multiple things in the category, so the sums aren't summing over people)
| Thing that worked | How many people mentioned |
Social | |
Focusmate/Coworking (often poms) | 8 |
(Regular) contact with other people to talk about work, debug, check-in etc. | 4 |
Identifying (or being thought of) as hard-working | 3 |
Surrounding yourself with ~hard-working people in life in general | 3 |
Supportive work environment | 2 |
Having a manager | 1 |
| 21 | |
What kind of work | |
Working on interesting problems/enjoyable work (and in an enjoyable work environment) | 8 |
Feeling like you're good at what you're doing, getting positive feedback | 4 |
Working on things you consider important | 3 |
More clear tasks, feedback, endpoints etc. | 2 |
Less pressuring work | 1 |
Autonomy | 1 |
Making work more fun | 1 |
At least one (work) thing you like per day | 1 |
| 21 | |
External pressure | |
(Soft) accountability (deadlines, beeminder, accountability buddy, posting about your goals, boss as a service, promising friends) | 9 |
Children/poverty: External motivation to do work | 2 |
Almost being fired | 1 |
| 12 | |
Learning more about yourself and your goals | |
Figure out which work hours are most useful, schedule different kinds of work for different times to work more efficiently | 3 |
Thinking about what you want to do with life and what (work) motivates you | 3 |
Experimenting with what actually makes you (less) productive e.g. via tracking and realising that productivity advice is very personal | 2 |
Repeated experience of joy from achieving big things | 1 |
Deciding how many hours you endorse working | 1 |
| 10 | |
Misc. specific techniques | |
Productivity books | 2 |
Productivity systems | 2 |
Having policies for ways of making time productive when there are trade-offs e.g. with money | 1 |
Physical Kanban boards | 1 |
Walking meetings with yourself | 1 |
Leverage momentum: Start the day with a small experience of success and let that spiral | 1 |
Work diary (to spur ambition) | 1 |
Notes in the evening to get back into it the next day | 1 |
| 10 | |
Stimulants and distractions | |
ADHD meds | 3 |
Good App-blockers or other removing distractions | 3 |
Meditation | 1 |
| 7 | |
Being emotionally in tune with work | |
Not forcing yourself to do (certain) work when not feeling like it and doubling down when feeling productive | 2 |
Noticing when you haven't actually decided and committed to work and then doing that | 2 |
Not feeling guilty about too little or too much work-life balance | 1 |
Categorising work as "not work" and instead as something enjoyable, adjusting work environment accordingly | 1 |
| 6 | |
Life-things | |
Dealing with mental health problems | 2 |
Sleep | 1 |
Being strict about at least one day off | 1 |
Do enjoyable things to recover instead of resting | 1 |
| 5 |
List of what failed to make people more hard-working
Some people mentioned what didn't work for them. Note that I didn't ask for it, so very few people did this.
| Thing that didn't work | Mentioned |
Productivity hacks | 4 |
Rewards | 2 |
Self-set "fake" accountability | 1 |
Pomodoros | 1 |
Internal work | 2 |
Exercise, diet, sleep | 1 |
Taking more breaks | 1 |
Switching roles | 1 |
Meds | 1 |
Thanks for everyone who offered their stories and advice. I really appreciate it :)