Roomba Productivity

David Seah in his ever-interesting blog produces a masterpiece. David is a compulsively organized person. Come on, what do you expect from a person who had designed the 'Emergent Producitivity tracker" and stuff like that.

He talks about some times, when there are just way too many things to do, too many goals, and we are just short of time. Within these 'too many things' also lie some things which do not have a specified goal. In other words, progress towards these goals cannot measured. They will be done, when they are done. Now enter the roomba.

Getting back to the idea of “unspecific goals, unspecified time” being something that could be worthwhile, consider the Roomba vacuum cleaner. It goes about its cleaning chores every day, sweeping the room in an algorithmically defined, but not time-bound operation. It doesn’t even have a specific goal, as in “clean the living room”. It just goes and does its thing, which is to vacuum whatever surface it happens to come across. The net result of this action is a clean living room. Amazing.

In other words, sometimes, just getting in, and 'getting things done' - not towards a specific goal, but just getting parts of it done, helps.

A beautifully written piece. Check it out here .