How I Work

• Meetings are the last resort, not the first option.
• I only work on 'fun' and personal projects in the evening, on the weekends and during holidays.
• I live in my calendar and then my task lists. If it's not on their I'm not doing it.
• I prefer to sit when I work, but I try to get up every hour and do not eat my desk etc.
• If I often work more hours, I notice that the quality of my work is rapidly deteriorating. I work best in 1 or 2 hour time blocks.
• My definition of a meeting includes an agenda and/or intended purpose, the appropriate amount of productive attendees, and a responsible party running the meeting to a schedule. If I am attending a meeting, I’d prefer starting on time
• If you send me a presentation deck a reasonable amount of time before a meeting, I will read it before the meeting and will have my questions at the ready.
• Hierarchy of communication (most→ least urgent): Call→ Text→ Slack→ Email.
• I switch in time blocks between creative and non-creative work. Deep work and shallow work.
• If a meeting doesn't have an agenda upfront I'm not coming.
• If it's 'formal' or first contact I prefer e-mail. After that it's instant messaging for me. I stopped salutation and closing e-mails.
• I don't like phone calls. I need time to think before I respond.
• I prefer to discuss things in real life, but only if it's clear that it can't be discussed over messaging.
• Always give a time and date when you want to discuss something. No 'let's talk about it sometime'.
• I like communicating via email, you have more time to think about your response.
• Don't say “let's discuss” without a follow-up of when we’ll discuss.
• When you request something from me, that is mostly your time and your agenda. I don't really prepare in advance since I expect you to take the lead.
• I wont always make myself available if you need me. I try to create time blocks where you can ask me things.
• I always prepare important meetings and take notes wile meeting.
• I record end times for my appointments so that I know when the appointment ends. I do most meetings within 30 minutes.
• I try to take one day off on the weekends to recharge
• I know when to quit and when to say no.
• I don't like small interuptions troughout the day.

Working ¶

• I'm a hard worker but only things I feel like doing. But I'm also very lazy. I like to do things in the minimal amount of time necessary. I have a low tolerance for chores and repetitive tasks
• I don't like to over-communicate. I usually spare up questions and topics and get trough them at one single long meeting.
• I don’t begin work or leave a critique without a highly organized list of next steps and expectations laid out for me
• I try the question "what should I do now?" as much as possible. I often plan this in advance.
• I organize my time myself and let other people do it as little as possible.
• If I think in advance what I'm going to work on, I get more done in a day.
• I work poorly when I have days that are fragmented, which is good for days with many meetings, etc.
• I don't work well under pressure, I need time to finish things. (flow)
• I love saving up work and then quickly completing multiple tasks

Communication ¶

• I want to start on time, I'm always early to appointments.

• I don't like it when we are in a conversation and you are doing other things (looking at your phone etc.). Be engaged and nu multi-tasking.

• I don't like it when people asks questions about 'easy' things, things you can look up or solve on your own.

• I don't expect people to respond immediately but I do get frustrated when I have to ask about something twice.

• I work best if I don't have people around me.

• I don't like working under pressure.

• I work poorly when I know later that I have an appointment, fragmented days.

• I work better with music, preferably stimulating house music. Podcast listening things with a lot of voices I am very bad at.

• Respond incredibly well to ask assertiveness (“Rands, can you help with X?”). I respond poorly to being told what to do (“Rands, do X.”)

• I get frustrated when I have to ask about something twice.

• When we are meeting I'm fully commited to the meeting. I'm engaged and fully active, I don’t multitask and only have devices if I need to make notes. I hate it when you are distracted.

• I have quite a lot of travel time, and in general I think that's fine. I can do enough dinners on the train and it will give me time to think.

— Danny de Vries