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Archive for the ‘Productivity’ Category

How I use OneNote for my Dissertation

Posted in Being a scholar, Dissertation, Organization, Productivity, Writing on June 20, 2010 | 1 Comment »

The question came up recently about how I am using OneNote for my dissertation note taking.  Sometimes show is easier than tell. I have one OneNote notebook called Dissertation.  Within it, I have 8 sections: A few things about this: The first 5 sections reflect the 5 chapters required in my dissertation: Introduction, Literature Review, [...]

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Time to get back to work.

Posted in Blogging, Productivity, Stress on June 16, 2010 | Comments Off

Apologies for the long absence; the spring semester involved a change of my day job and teaching 3 classes.  I didn’t touch my dissertation or really anything but what needed to be done for my job or my courses.  Now that I’ve more or less recovered (yes, it really did take a month) I will [...]

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Integrating a new cell phone into my life

Posted in Organization, Productivity, Technology, Tools on March 16, 2010 | Comments Off

At my prior job I had a blackberry, and over the years I became very adept at using it.  My new organization only gives blackberries to those who travel a lot so I had to, for the first time in half a decade, buy myself a new phone.   We had a contract with T-Mobile, but [...]

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I will not become a statistic….

Posted in Academic life, Being a scholar, Dissertation, Graduate school, Organization, Productivity, tagged , , , on December 20, 2009 | 1 Comment »

They used to say that only 50% of those who start a doctorate finish.  Updated statistics in the social sciences says that number (10-year completion) is more like 56%, but that still leaves 44% unfinished and (in most programs like mine that have a time limit) unfinishable.  It isn’t the course work;  16% opt out [...]

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Review: GTDAgenda.com

Posted in GTD specific, Organization, Productivity, Technology, Tools on October 18, 2009 | Comments Off

A few months ago I was contacted by the developer of gtdagenda.com and offered an premium account that I could evaluate and, if I wanted, review.  I have now been using the site for several months and wanted to post a review of my experience. What is gtdagenda? gtdagenda.com is a web-based implementation of David [...]

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Perspective: Useful thing that…

Posted in Academic life, Dissertation, Graduate school, Productivity, Psychology, Stress, Teaching on October 4, 2009 | Comments Off

Often we are told to take a step back from things to gain some perspective.  It’s very hard when you are in the thick of things, particularly all-consuming things like a dissertation. This week, however, I got some perspective.  In order to enhance my qualifications for the classes I’m already teaching, I signed up for [...]

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Laser-sharp focus reduces stress

Posted in Academic life, Productivity, Stress, Teaching on September 27, 2009 | Comments Off

We live in a world with a wealth of things to distract us: The internet and all the amazing information it brings to our door RSS feeds Facebook and social networking sites YouTube Wikipedia A new TV season starting up Books and/or magazines on every possible topic Free education via things like Open Courseware or [...]

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Kicken’ it old school: paper for some things

Posted in GTD specific, Organization, Productivity, Technology on September 20, 2009 | Comments Off

On the one hand, I really WANT to be able to use an electronic planner, note taking system and organizational process.  I’ve tried a number of them, and some (OneNote for my dissertation and my Inbox as a to do queue) are still in use.  But not all. I have reverted to paper note taking [...]

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Summer break?

Posted in Academic life, Graduate school, Productivity, Psychology, Teaching on August 1, 2009 | Comments Off

Ah, the good old days as an undergrad when you got your summers off.  I wish.  Summer for a graduate student is often as hectic as the rest of the year, and if some things (teaching) are reduced that merely means that other things (research) are expected to step in and make up the difference. [...]

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Backups are one of your most important tasks…

Posted in Organization, Productivity, Technology, Tools on July 12, 2009 | 1 Comment »

Modern academic work is centered on our computers; data storage and analysis, writing, research, reference libraries, and often collaboration with our peers all require working computers. It is for this reason that keeping good backups is paramount to success as an academic. There are a number of techniques for keeping good backups as an academic.  [...]

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