The Weekly Pulse is my content curation and my highlights from readings, books, podcasts, insights, and everything I discovered during the week.
So, let’s go with some discoveries from the week!
#1 – How to Retrain Your Frazzled Brain and Find Your Focus Again
#2 – Revisiting Agile Teams After an Abrupt Shift to Remote
#3 – What Children Lose When Their Brains Develop Too Fast
#4 – If You Encounter Any of These “Monster” Managers … Run
#5 – The Project Economy Has Arrived
How to Retrain Your Frazzled Brain and Find Your Focus Again
Source: The Guardian
Author: Eleanor Morgan
Summary: This article is for you that find it harder than ever to concentrate during the pandemic, where the focus just makes it impossible to concentrate on just one thing, like a book, your work, cleaning, or even cooking something. Eleanor Morgan suggests some exercises to help your brain come back to reality.
3 Highlights:
“… We can learn to focus better, but we need to think about attention differently. It is not something we can just choose to do. We have to train the brain as a muscle. Specifically, with short bursts of daily exercises…“
“… Stress is one of the biggest obstacles to focusing, says Dr Amishi Jha. In a high-alert state, we often start ruminating and catastrophizing. We get stuck in “loops of doom” or imagined scenarios. This mode impacts our working memory…”
“… After a fortnight of doing the exercises, I notice that being able to carve a little sliver of space between myself and the contents of my mind means I am able to divert my attention back to what I need to do more easily…”
Access the full Weekly Pulse here >>
Revisiting Agile Teams After an Abrupt Shift to Remote
Source: McKinsey
Author: Santiago Comella-Dorda, Lavkesh Garg, Suman Thareja, and Belkis Vasquez-McCall
Summary: As organizations adapt to the pandemic, their agile teams can be a real source of competitive advantage. Agile teams are typically well suited to periods of disruption, given their ability to adapt to fast-changing priorities and digitization. But the abrupt shift to remote working in response to the coronavirus has challenged the typical approach to manage agile teams, right?
3 Highlights:
“… If the necessary technology is in place, a talented remote team can deliver just as much value as co-located teams…“
“… Teams already operating remotely before the crisis are less likely to struggle, given their ability to handle ambiguity without losing focus and to concentrate on outcomes over processes…”
“… Working in isolation is hard for any person, but particularly for agile teams accustomed to face-to-face communication and frequent interpersonal engagement. Multitasking and home-based distractions also take a toll, depending on how things are set up…”
Access the full Weekly Pulse here >>
What Children Lose When Their Brains Develop Too Fast
Source: The Wall Street Journal
Author: Alison Gopnik
Summary: Adverse early experiences can make young minds inflexible, while a carefree childhood has clear cognitive benefits. Brains start out being more plastic, more open to experience, and better at learning. But how would witnessing a traumatic event when you’re 5 years old put you at risk for cancer when you’re 50? Just how do early experiences shape development?
3 Highlights:
“… Children with more adverse childhood experiences are more likely to suffer from anxiety, depression or addiction as adults, and they have a higher risk of cancer and heart disease…“
“… The brain gets thicker in infancy, for instance, and then thins out in adolescence…”
“… The most important part of caring for young children is in some ways the easiest. Loving your children and giving them space to learn and explore is more important than crafting a particular curriculum…”
Access the full Weekly Pulse here >>
If You Encounter Any of These “Monster” Managers … Run
Source: Harvard Business Review
Author: Sulagna Misra
Summary: In this (funny) article we are going to meet these managers: the ghost, the zombie, the werewolf, the vampire and Sauron, the eye that sees all. If you find yourself dealing with one of these monster managers on a daily, here are some tips on how to fight them off.
3 Highlights:
“… No, your manager is not actually haunting your office. The truth is, this type of manager might just not be that interested in being a leader…“
“… The mummy is typically brand new to being the boss. They were promoted last week, and suddenly they’re wearing new clothes, they smell different, and they have a fancy new tomboffice…”
“… When you are on the other side of one of their outbursts, try to stay calm and remind yourself that their temper has nothing to do with you…”
Access the full Weekly Pulse here >>
The Project Economy Has Arrived
Source: Harvard Business Review
Author: Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez
Summary: Projects have displaced operations as the economic engine of our times, but despite this shift, many leaders still undervalue projects and project management. By 2027, 88 million people are likely to be working in project management, and the value of project-oriented economic activity will have reached $20 trillion.
3 Highlights:
“… Agile and traditional project management isn’t at war with each other. In a change-driven world, companies can’t apply just one methodology to all their projects…“
“… This transformation to a project economy will have profound organizational and cultural consequences. The problem is, many leaders still don’t appreciate the value of projects and write them off as a waste of time…”
“… By executing our projects better, we’ll be able to provide trillions of dollars worth of additional benefits to the world.…”
Access the full Weekly Pulse here >>
Do you want to get new content in your Email?
I am incredibly grateful that you have taken the time to read this Weekly Pulse.
The Weekly Pulse is an important section of this website, aiming to share good stuff with you every week!
Do you want to explore more? Check more Weekly Pulse content here.
Check my main categories of content below:
- Agile
- Blog
- Book Notes
- Career
- Leadership
- Management
- Managing Yourself
- Productivity
- Project Management
- Technology
- Weekly Pulse
Navigate between the many topics covered in this website:
Agile Art Artificial Intelligence Blockchain Books Business Business Tales Career Coaching Communication Creativity Culture Cybersecurity Design DevOps Economy Emotional Intelligence Feedback Flow Focus Gaming Goals GPT Habits Health History Innovation Kanban Leadership Lean Life Managament Management Mentorship Metaverse Metrics Mindset Minimalism Motivation Negotiation Networking Neuroscience NFT Ownership Parenting Planning PMBOK PMI Politics Productivity Products Project Management Projects Pulse Readings Routines Scrum Self-Improvement Self-Management Sleep Startups Strategy Team Building Technology Time Management Volunteering Work
Do you want to check previous Weekly Pulse posts? Check the last couple of weeks:
- Weekly Pulse by William Meller | Special Edition, 2023
- Weekly Pulse by William Meller | Week 51, 2023
- Weekly Pulse by William Meller | Week 50, 2023
- Weekly Pulse by William Meller | Week 49, 2023
- Weekly Pulse by William Meller | Week 48, 2023
Support my work by sharing my content with your network using the sharing buttons below.
Want to show your support tangibly? A virtual coffee is a small but nice way to show your appreciation and give me the extra energy to keep crafting valuable content! Pay me a coffee:
