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How to Do More in 12 Weeks than Others Do in 12 Months

2024-04-16 · Book summary (Book Club) · Ali · recording, 19:32 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Goals, purpose and life design (also: Productivity and time) · mode: List of tips or lessons · tags: Lesson from a book, His own numbers, Sponsor segment present

In a Book Club episode on The 12 Week Year by Brian Moran and Michael Lennington, Ali shares three takeaways: close the execution gap, replace annual thinking with 12-week periods that use the deadline effect, and build an emotionally resonant vision that outweighs the love of comfort.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Introduction: The 12 Week Year and three key ideas

00:00:56 — Key idea one: the execution gap

  • ★★★ Ali broadly agrees with The 12 Week Year that what separates successful people from unsuccessful ones, however success is defined, is not knowledge, strategy or information but execution. — 00:00:56
  • ★★ Brian Moran (quoted): The 12 Week Year notes that 65% of Americans are overweight or obese although diet and fitness was a $60 billion industry in 2013 and a search for diet books gave 45,915 results. — 00:01:24
  • ★ Thomas Edison (quoted): The first chapter of The 12 Week Year quotes Thomas Edison: if we did the things we are capable of, we would astound ourselves. — 00:01:24
  • ★★★ Brian Moran (quoted): The 12 Week Year argues that most people know how to get in shape but don't do it, an execution problem rather than a knowledge one, and that most people could double or triple their income by consistently applying what they already know. — 00:01:53
  • ★★ Ali, who says his publisher calls him the world's most followed productivity expert, realised while reading The 12 Week Year that he too holds himself back through a lack of consistent execution. — 00:02:22
  • ★★ Reading The 12 Week Year gave Ali a journaling prompt he encourages viewers to pause and think about: where am I allowing a lack of consistent execution to hold me back? — 00:02:48
  • ★★ Ali says his health is not where he would like it to be because of a lack of consistent execution, not a lack of knowledge about the gym, protein and eating well. — 00:02:48
  • ★★ Ali's business made about 5 million in annual revenue last year (2023). — 00:03:22
  • ★★ Had he consistently executed what he knew he should, Ali says, his business's revenue last year (2023) would probably have been closer to 8 or 9 million: a $4 million execution gap. (hedged) — 00:03:22
  • ★★ Brian Moran (quoted): The concept of the 12 week year, set out in the book's first chapter, is designed to close the execution gap. — 00:03:22 · Feel-Good Productivity (book)

00:03:58 — Sponsor read

00:05:13 — Key idea two: annualisation over periodisation

  • ★★ Ed Mylett (quoted): In a clip Ali plays, Ed Mylett says he splits each day into three days, 6 a.m. to noon, noon to 6 p.m. and 6 p.m. to midnight, which gives him 21 days a week. — 00:05:17
  • ★★ Ali says there is real wisdom in Ed Mylett splitting his day into three: what Ed Mylett is doing is periodisation. — 00:06:15
  • ★★ Ali describes level zero of goal setting as setting no goals at all and level one as setting annual goals, which is also how most businesses operate. — 00:06:44
  • ★★★ Brian Moran (quoted): The 12 Week Year argues that thinking in an annual timeframe wastes a lot of time. — 00:07:11
  • ★★ Ali cites Parkinson's law, that work expands to fill the time allotted: a goal set in January or February feels far away, since the end of the year is so distant. — 00:07:11
  • ★ Many businesses make about 40% of their annual revenue in the final two months of the year, Ali says. — 00:07:41
  • ★★ While writing his book Ali had weekly deadlines from his editor and a meeting every Tuesday at about 5 p.m., so on Tuesdays he would write lots of words. — 00:08:13 · Feel-Good Productivity (book)
  • ★★ Ali describes the deadline effect: as a deadline gets closer, performance rises through a greater sense of urgency, not harder work. — 00:08:13
  • ★★ Brian Moran (quoted): According to The 12 Week Year, periodisation began in the Olympics in the 1970s with Eastern European athletes, who trained one skill at a time for four to six weeks each. — 00:08:42
  • ★★ Making a little progress on lots of things at once is generally much less effective than focusing on one thing, finishing it, then moving to the next, Ali says. — 00:09:18
  • ★★ Ali says The 12 Week Year is basically about quarterly planning: it periodises the year into four 12-week periods, a name he says just sounds cooler than quarters. — 00:09:18

  • ★★★ Thinking of the year as 12 weeks, Ali says, makes you set goals you can actually get done in 12 weeks: every week counts, and the deadline effect pushes you as the period ends. — 00:09:54

    “when you only have 12 weeks every week counts”

  • ★★ Arbitrarily splitting time works, Ali says: a year into four 12-week segments with a break week, or a day into three, uses our tendency to push harder as things end; this is not hustle culture. — 00:10:23

00:10:56 — Key idea three: emotional connection to the outcome

  • ★★★ Brian Moran (quoted): The 12 Week Year says the number one thing you have to sacrifice to be great and execute your plans is your comfort. — 00:11:01
  • ★★ New actions towards a goal are uncomfortable, Ali says: to get fitter he must swap the PS5 for the gym, to grow his business have uncomfortable conversations, and with time the discomfort enters his comfort zone. — 00:11:25
  • ★★ Ali says we are so addicted to comfort, the subject of the book The Comfort Crisis, that the love of comfort holds us back from living our best life. — 00:11:47 · Feel-Good Productivity (book)
  • ★★ Ali, who loves collecting journaling prompts, offers a second one: where am I allowing my fear of discomfort to hold me back from building a life that I love? — 00:11:47
  • ★★★ Asking yourself a prompt is far more powerful than being told the answer, Ali says: as studies on active recall show, real change in your life happens when it is driven from within. — 00:12:15 · active recall
  • ★★★ Brian Moran (quoted): Chapter three of The 12 Week Year says the one key skill for overcoming the love of comfort and taking action is a compelling vision of the future. — 00:13:04
  • ★★ Alok Kanojia (quoted): Psychiatrist Dr K says the number one correlate of male suicide is not depression, and one study suggests 50% of men who kill themselves have no history or evidence of mental illness. — 00:13:32
  • ★★ Alok Kanojia (quoted): Dr K says at least half the suicidal men he has worked with are not mentally ill: their minds are not malfunctioning, they genuinely have a life no longer worth living. — 00:13:32 · Mental health
  • ★★★ Ali takes from Dr K and The 12 Week Year that without a vision of the future significantly better than your current state, there is no reason to act in a way that pulls you towards it. — 00:14:20

  • ★★★ Feel-good productivity is about the journey rather than the destination, Ali says, but there is no journey without a compelling destination: wandering aimlessly does not feel fun. — 00:14:20 · feel-good productivity (concept), Feel-Good Productivity (book)

    “there is no journey without a compelling destination”

  • ★★ Brian Moran (quoted): The 12 Week Year's prompts for a vision ask what you truly want to achieve, what legacy you want, what you want for your family and spiritually, what security, income and fulfilment you seek, and what interests you would pursue. — 00:15:33

  • ★★ Brian Moran (quoted): The 12 Week Year calls vision the starting point of all high performance: you create things twice, first mentally, then physically. — 00:15:56

    “You create things twice, first mentally, then physically.”

  • ★★ Almost everyone who has written productivity books, including Ali in chapter nine, Alignment, of Feel-Good Productivity, talks about creating a compelling vision because it is so powerful in helping you act. — 00:15:56 · Feel-Good Productivity (book)

  • ★★★ When people ask Ali for help, his first question is what the goal is and why; he then uses prompts to find a personal vision, starting with a life vision and then a work vision that facilitates it. — 00:16:37
  • ★★ A personal vision is only a rough first draft you can change, Ali says, but even that usually gives people enormous clarity and the willingness to face discomfort. — 00:17:06
  • ★★★ Goals in your vision need to be emotionally resonant, Ali says, not shoulds: a should rests on fear, avoidance of negativity and duty, and motivates less than something you would love to do. — 00:17:06
  • ★★ With emotionally resonant goals, such as playing anything on the guitar by ear, Ali says he is far more likely to practise guitar, go to the gym or work on his business instead of scrolling TikTok or playing on the PlayStation. — 00:17:50 · TikTok
  • ★★ Ali hosts regular free Zoom workshops on creating a personal vision and 12-week planning, about every three months; the next is on 20 April 2024. — 00:18:19 · Zoom

00:18:30 — Free 12-week planning workshops and a playlist on feeling lost; sign-off

  • ★★ Ali says the free workshops are part of the free version of Productivity Lab ("productivity" as heard), a new community he is building of ambitious entrepreneurs, creators and professionals to double their productivity while enjoying the journey and making friends. — 00:18:53

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Mentioned

Central: Brian Moran · execution gap · periodisation · The 12 Week Year

Also: People: Alok Kanojia · Ed Mylett · Thomas Edison · Tom Bilyeu

Projects: Productivity Lab

Works: Feel-Good Productivity (book) · The Comfort Crisis · The Diary of a CEO

Organizations: TikTok

Concepts: active recall · deadline effect · feel-good productivity (concept) · hustle culture · Mental health · Parkinson's law

Products: PlayStation 5 · Zoom

Only in the description or credits: Book Club · Michael Lennington

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