In this episode, I’m joined by my longtime friend and NeuFit client Thanh Pham. Thanh has turned his passion for productivity into a thriving business called Asian Efficiency. He has an excellent perspective on how to be efficient and productive, which of course is why he enjoyed using the Neubie to recover from his shoulder surgery way ahead of schedule, and he shares his frameworks for how we can all be more productive in our own lives. You can learn more about Thanh on his website www.asianefficiency.com or on his podcast The Productivity Show.
elcome to this episode of the undercurrent Podcast. I’m joined today by my friend, tan Pham, who is the founder of Asian efficiency, host of the productivity show, podcast, and someone who had the privilege of working with several years ago when he was overcoming shoulder surgery. So I’m sure we’ll get to talk about that today. And he’s also an expert on productivity and lifestyle design, and many very interesting topics that I’m excited to dive into. And I think you’ll enjoy hearing this conversation today. So Dan, welcome to the show.
[Thanh Pham] 1:42
Thanks for having me.
[Garrett] 1:43
Heck, yeah. Well, we got, we got a lot of different directions, we can go here, can we start with you, just sharing your story of how we met, I want to hear your side of the story here, you know, how we met and started working together and your experience with the using the newbie for shoulder rehabilitation.
[Thanh Pham] 2:00
So it started back in late 2017, I was taking a hip hop class in downtown Austin. And it was dancing to Rihanna, and I was getting really into it and
[Garrett] 2:12
How most good stories began here. And I was doing
[Thanh Pham] 2:15
an interesting move and I dislocated my shoulder. And so I had to lay down on the floor suffering and pain. And I had a few friends in class who had to take me to the ER that night to get my shoulder put back in. And after coming back home, I thought, you know, this is the second time this has happened now in a short timeframe in less than a year. Maybe I should do something about this because this is just not good. This can’t happen. Again, I don’t want to go to Oregon both for the medical bills, but also for just you know, longevity and health. So I talked to a few people about this. And they recommended that I got a second opinion on what I needed to do. So I went through different orthopedic surgeons around town and got an MRI scan done. And I asked people Hey, what is your opinion on what I should do next?
[Thanh Pham] 3:04
And they all agreed and they all said the same thing, you’re probably best to get surgery because if you don’t do anything about it, you might risk getting arthritis. And who knows what might happen after that? So I said, Okay, well, if you guys all agreed to that independently, then that’s what I’m gonna do. So I mentioned this to this practitioner who I was rehabbing with. And he mentioned, hey, you don’t want to before you go to surgery, you should check out new fit because I’ve worked with the machine. I have had some great success with myself. And I think he might like it. And maybe this will help you with your rehab as well. And so I said, Okay, let’s go check this out. And I came to the head office, and I met you and we had a consultation. And you showed me the machine. And we did a few exercises together. And mind you I was still rehabbing from my dislocated shoulder. So it wasn’t like completely, you know, back to where it used to be.
[Thanh Pham] 4:01
But after using the machine for maybe 1015 minutes, I was able to do certain movements that I could have done on my own. And I was like blown away by that. So I said, wow, like this is amazing. So I ended up having surgery nuts, not too long after that. And after my surgery, I had a post-op schedule with the surgeon just to kind of go over everything. And this was maybe 10 days out and he said, hey 10 surgery was successful, you know, we fixed everything with the labrum tear, you’re probably not able to work out for six weeks and you’re probably not able to fully recover until six months from now or so. And as someone obsessed with time management, efficiency, and just being productive, I said, how can I recover faster?
[Thanh Pham] 4:50
And I remember seeing the surgeon that morning on a Wednesday morning and then seeing you right afterward. So I left the surgeon’s office and took an Uber went to see you at your clinic. And I said, Hey, let’s, let’s try this newbie now and see how we can fix this and progressive and faster. And I remember getting hooked up on the machine. And we did a strength test before we hooked up and said, okay, very low strength, then I got hooked on the machine. And we did some movement, I was able to move my elbow and my arm, almost to a 90-degree angle. And I was blown away, because, you know, I was told I couldn’t move or do something for at least six weeks. And after seeing that, I said, you know what, this is going to be the way I’m going to rehab.
[Garrett] 5:36
So that’s good, I think I think you nailed it. And I think the thing that’s different about that is so many times, we are in fitness and physical therapy and rehabilitation in how people think about and talk about these sorts of things, we’re very output focused, we’re very much about, okay, we got to push harder, try harder, or use a machine to create that contraction. And this is a different paradigm, this is about providing the neurological inputs to allow you or me or whoever the patient or the client is to allow you to change your patterning. So that ultimately you’re not having to rely on that machine as much you’re learning to activate to tap into more of what you already have.
[Garrett] 6:23
So that you can tap into that in a sustainable, safe, and effective way. And don’t become as dependent on that, that output. And sometimes you can see these huge changes and range of motion post-surgery in one session, or sometimes you can see a 30% jump and strength in one session. And then once you tap into that reservoir of you know, whatever is kind of there at your current level, you can work on the more output-based approach of trying to focus on pressing harder or building new muscle or things like that. But it’s almost like if you have an engine, I guess we’ll talk about an internal combustion engine, not electric here. But you know, if you have like mpg, you have like the efficiency of what you’re able to get out of it.
[Garrett] 7:05
And then you have, then you could just build a bigger engine over time. So there’s, there’s like two components of it. And I think that people are trying to, or maybe not even mpg, it’s like you have this idea of a six-cylinder engine, but you’re only firing three cylinders. And then you think you want to upgrade to a V-eight engine. But, if you just get more from using the three that are already there that you’re just not firing, but that just isn’t working. So it’s more of that type of analogy, I think that people are trying to build a bigger engine before they learn to use all the cylinders and the ones that they already have.
[Thanh Pham] 7:39
I think one thing I’ve learned from working with a newbie over the years is that I don’t care as much about how much weight I can push or what my max strength is, even though it might be helpful to know. But it’s just having the right muscle connection with everything that’s going on. Whenever I do it movements. And just learning how so many connections between my gluts and upper body and legs, especially my calves to different parts of the body, you start to learn that especially from rehab, I learned everything is kind of connected in a way whether you realize it or not. And I think the newbie cannot allow me to see like, hey, everything is connected as one part is off, then everything else is kind of awesome. So let’s make sure we fix all of that before we put an extra load on something.
[Garrett] 8:26
Yeah. And that if one thing is off, you know, just too kind of carry that further. If that thing for you may very well have been in your feet, right? Because you, you work on your feet, and all of a sudden your bench press strength goes up. So yeah. Let’s, let’s pivot a little bit. I want to hear from you on the productivity show. I want to dive into your area of expertise a little bit. So can you tell us about Asian efficiency and your business and your work?
[Thanh Pham] 8:53
Yeah. So back in 2011, I started a blog called Asian efficiency.com. And it was all about me summarizing what I’ve was learning from reading books on productivity efficiency. And I’ve had a lot of family and friends just always asked me like, Hey, Dan, how do you do stuff? Like you always seem to be very productive. So I started to blog to kind of write articles and tell people like, hey, go read this instead of asking me the same question, multiple times
[Thanh Pham] 9:20
And FAQ for your life. Yeah, it’s kind of like when people come to Austin, they go, Hey, what’s your favorite taco place? And you go, just here’s a Google doc of all the best places in Austin, here you go. It’s kind of the same thing. And after about a year of blogging it every single week, it kind of took off and I had a life on its own. And people started asking me, Can I hire you for coaching? Are you available for consulting? Do you have any courses I said, No, this is all a passion project? This is all free. But because I kept getting the same emails, I said, you know what, maybe I should turn this into a business so it accidentally turned into a business and now over 10 years later, it’s still here. Helping people become more productive at work and in life. And what we’re mostly known for is what we call the T framework.
[Thanh Pham] 10:07
So it stands for time, energy, and attention. So I like to think of those as three currencies that everyone should maximize, to have a productive life. So we’re going to make sure we maximize our time and have the time available for what we want to do. Having the energy to do the things we want to do and the attention to do to things, being able to focus on the right things and not get distracted. And when we have all three, then it’s easy to say that we live a productive life, but most of us missed two or three things. Oftentimes, people come to us because they lack time. But once they do have the time, sometimes they don’t have the energy to do things, right? So if you have the desire to publish a book, you might not have the time to do so.
[Thanh Pham] 10:47
But once you do have the time, you might not have the energy to get it done after maybe you’re done with your nine to five job and come home from work and you go like I’m too tired to work on this stuff, you don’t have any energy, and then maybe you have the energy to do on stuff to do stuff. But maybe you’re not focused on the right things. Now you get distracted, now you have a million other responsibilities. So we want to make sure you’re always focused on doing the right things. There. So we’re always looking at productivity from a three-point point of view, it’s like, do we have the time and energy and attention, if we have all three, then you’re in a great spot.
[Garrett] 11:20
I love that, I think that that’s very true, I can relate to that. In my own life, those three, it needs to be all three and recognize times where if one is missing, you know, it’s been challenging to get done, when any of the sudden and thinking about, like you mentioned publishing a book, I know, for my book, finding the time to write was challenging. So I, you know, I became like, very zealous about going to bed earliest, I could get up and write at, you know, starting between five and 515. And I’d write until, till I kid, so bringing the kids got up at seven or so. And that was my time. And so I did that, you know, eight or nine months in a row, almost every day, and eventually, you know, got a book. But that was what it took.
[Garrett] 12:11
And then the attention, that’s such an interesting thing too, and growing a business. And so for a lot of our listeners, not skip over the E and the T framework there. But thinking about it your attention for a lot of our listeners, it can be tough, because a lot of them are, you know, treating patients and trying to run a business. And it’s like, was it Michael Gerber, whoever talks about, like, you know, working in your business versus working on your business, about how it’s tough to do both and like the mental load of thinking about, you know, like, a lot of entrepreneurs walk around with the business really in their heads, right, there’s no like plan, other people don’t know, it’s like, in their heads and, and that meant that’s a lot of mental loads. So being able to unload that, you know, on other people who can help lead the business forward, I think is a huge deal.
[Garrett] 13:04
And being able to have people to whom you can delegate, and who you trust, I think that’s one of the biggest things. So that rings true to me. And that’s been one of the biggest things that are, that’s made an impact on me as being able to finally have, you know, over time, you know, build that team and have those people that can take on that mental load that attention piece. So that just really stands out to me.
[Thanh Pham] 13:29
Yeah, a couple of things that come to my mind are, that I always considered travel as the way to gauge if you can use all three because oftentimes, you need to have the time, energy, and attention to be able to travel somewhere. And it’s like the ultimate way to kind of like test or assess if you can have all three currencies in life. And the energy piece is interesting because I think the newbie plays a role in that as well. After all, one of the things that I talked about is how important sleep is. And I remember seeing this on your Instagram a while back where you have like three hours of deep sleep.
[Thanh Pham] 14:06
And I go, how does [Garrett] do this? You know, what is the secret sauce here? Because if you can sleep for three hours in deep sleep that’s pretty amazing. And a lot of people can’t even get close to an hour. Like I think I averaged maybe an hour and 40 and if I peek it’s maybe like two hours or two hours and 15 So I was wondering like, what is [Garrett]? Do you know? And I remember messaging USA Hey, how do you do this? And I think he mentioned that you do that master reset on the newbie to do that. And then ask Bert, can I get a master reset? Can we try this out?
[Thanh Pham] 14:39
He was like Yeah, sure. Let’s go ahead and do this. And so I tried it out on like a Friday afternoon or something like that nothing going on. And he said hey, you might feel tired. If you want to take a nap, go take a nap. But if you don’t, you know you’ll see how it goes tonight. So like I didn’t feel tired or anything. So we went to bed that night and had my aura ring to kind of track it. So wake up the next morning Feeling like a million bucks, you know, or wring scores like over 90? And I look at my sleep, it’s like, oh, wow, like two and a half, two hours. 45 I’m like, wow, this is like a new record. So immediately I started thinking, you know, should I buy a newbie for myself like just to sleep better? Like, this is an I didn’t know this was possible, because I always thought that thing was, you know, for rehabbing and athletic performance, but little did I know, it could be used for enhancing your sleep as well.
[Garrett] 15:26
Yeah. And that there are so many things that go into that energy. I know. All three, all three are so important, and a lot of wonderful things on that. It’s great, I love that framework. So I’m glad you brought it up, I think we should use that more. So energy. You know, one of the things that that I write about in the book, and that I kind of use as a framework here is, you know, asking the question, do you have all the energy that you need to, to wake up feeling refreshed, to stay focused on the things you need to do to get done everything that you reasonably expect to be able to get done? Effectively during the day? Can you do it without needing sugary or caffeinated drinks in the afternoon, if you do have a little bit of an afternoon lull, which, which is okay, can you go for a walk, or, you know, sit down and rest for 10 or 20 minutes and then feel refreshed and be able to kind of get through the rest of the day? And?
[Garrett] 16:23
And can you do that, you know, sustainably without needing stimulants, overtime, and things like that? And, you know, for a lot of people, the answer is no. And for a lot of people, sometimes it’s issued with, you know, sometimes it comes back to a time, people are just trying to cram too much in and they’re stressed out over time, and there’s so much of that in our modern lifestyle, but some of it is not sleeping well. You know, there are so many avenues that sometimes it’s people, you know, eating foods that they’re, they’re sensitive to, and have like, reactive reaction, you know, inflammatory, almost allergy-like reactions to, and then you know, when your body’s inflamed, you just feel like crap, you feel fatigued, you feel brain foggy.
[Garrett] 17:09
And there are so many things that can rob us of energy that it takes a concerted effort to, you know, be diligent about how you’re eating, how you’re living, what you’re doing, how you’re sleeping, you know, avoiding blue light, you know, doing things to challenge yourself a challenge to build up your mitochondria, your act and make energy. I mean, there are so many, so many things there. That’s, you know, I mean, we’ve talked about various topics on this podcast, I know you’ve gotten into, into some things, what are some of your other kinds of new bio hacks or new health strategies outside of using the newbie that we’ve been talking about? What are some other things that have helped you in the energy piece?
[Thanh Pham] 17:47
I would say, after using the newbie for reality kind of kick-started the health and wellness journey for me, because before then, I was kind of like, okay, the fit guy and wasn’t really into health other than just working out, you know, two or three times a week. And that was, that’s all I knew. But after working with a newbie, and just focusing on the rehab, and start to dive into other avenues to say, what else can I do to recover faster? Because I follow a lot of athletes, especially in the NBA, and I’m always very interested in what people do there. And there’s been this big trend over the years of recovery. It’s not just about doing stuff more and better, but also how can you recover faster? Because fitness essentially means how fast can you recover?
[Thanh Pham] 18:33
That’s really what it comes down to. And so I started to learn more about, you know, like ice baths and I started learning about Wim Hof. And I remember, for my 30th birthday, I was in Miami, we hired a Wim Hof instructor, and we had a beautiful house with me and six other guys. And we hired this instructor to do Wim Hof training with us. And so the first time I was introduced to that, so we did ice bath training all of us and it was a great time. But when I came back to Austin, what else can I do to maintain this because I felt great? And that’s also at the same time this place in Austin called generator athlete lab started opening up to have like an infrared sauna, hot and cold tub, and Norma tech boots. And so they have this own protocol that they have where you go through all three. So that’s something I do probably two or three times a week to kind of help with recovery. And I always talk about how sleep is the biggest force multiplier for productivity.
[Thanh Pham] 19:32
If you just have a great night of sleep, you’ll just have so much more energy to focus to do two things you have to do because a lot of times procrastination comes down to either we don’t know what we want to do. So we procrastinate or we don’t have the energy to do stuff. So we tend to focus on other things that are maybe less important or less urgent or aren’t as scary because we oftentimes the important things we have to do Oftentimes also the scary things we have to do. And so if we don’t have the energy to do that, then it’s easy to procrastinate. So I always tell people, one of the first things we do when we work together is, let’s look at your sleep hygiene, are you getting enough sleep and oftentimes just changing that people see a huge increase in output because they just have more energy. Now, nothing is changed in terms of their skill level, their product knowledge, or what kind of tools they use, it’s just simply having more energy and output to do stuff.
[Thanh Pham] 20:30
And Another thing I like to do is see your chiropractor at least once a month. We talked about the ice bath or the cold tubs, getting a float in once a month. There’s a place here in Austin, I was going to call to ocean lab where I do that. So doing that regularly just helps me to relax because I think as entrepreneurs, especially it’s easy to work, work work all the time. And we forget about the recovery piece. And I wish more entrepreneurs to learn about recovery, so that they can continue to be happy, continuing to be healthy, so that they continue to get to show up for their employees, their team members, and their leaders. And I wish more entrepreneurs knew about that.
[Garrett] 21:14
Yeah, I love that you call sleep the force multiplier. I think that. I mean, that certainly is true. In my experience. And from the research, I’ve seen that sleep can be a little bit of a sleep deficit and can make a huge difference in cognitive function, and decision-making quality. I mean, overall health and brain function. I mean, it’s huge. And so, for me, one of the things that have made a difference I mentioned, I was writing the book, like I’d be very diligent about my bedtime, so I can get up early and have that time for some people. You know, some people are that night owl, Chronotype that does function better, staying up late. But for many people, I think, being more diligent about going to bed early, which does make a huge difference in meals, giving up that one extra Netflix show at night, or something like that. I mean, going to bed early can have a huge compounding positive effect.
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[Garrett] 22:36
Yeah, and I also would like to hear your thoughts. In terms of productivity, there’s different advice that people have probably heard about, you know, alternating rest, like you might want to work 45 or 60 minutes, and then take a five-minute walk or stuff like that, you know, talk to me about what you’ve seen work in terms of sustainability of energy, you know, throughout the day, and then, of course, you know, throughout the week and months and things like that, but you’re the kind of energy sustainability.
[Thanh Pham] 23:02
Yeah, so this is a very predictable pattern. Because it follows a circadian rhythm. So our body, we have like an internal clock that kind of predicts when we’re most alerts, and when we have a little bit more like fatigue, or like an energy break. And so typically, as we go through a 24-hour cycle, for most people, you have kind of like a morning peak, as we like to call it, where you’re very energized and focused. And then we have kind of like an afternoon law. And then later in the early evening, for a lot of people, there’s like another peak of energy. So it’s a very predictable pattern.
[Thanh Pham] 23:36
And it’s based on what time you go to bed and what time you wake up. And it’s a very repetitive cycle. So for those who are interested in that there’s a very simple app you can use called RISE science, r I s e science, that connects with your ring data as well. And it can see, based on your sleep pattern, what your circadian rhythm pattern is. So it can tell you, Oh, during 930, and 1130, is when you’ll be most alert. And it will calculate how much sleep you have, have had as well because it’s a sleep that is based on the last 14 days of your sleeping pattern.
[Thanh Pham] 24:13
And so when you have a lot of sleep that you just don’t feel as productive, versus if you have no sleep that you feel like you’re on top of the world. So following circadian rhythm is very helpful. And I think you know, your body best. So you probably have a better sense of when you feel most alert and when you kind of have like a lull in your day. So for a lot of people, it could be in the afternoon. And there’s like easy things you can do to avoid an afternoon wall. So for example, eating a large meal, you can get very detailed to the point where I know, for example, if I eat more than 1000 calories in one sitting, I tend to like feel kind of a low coming. Whereas if I eat under 700 calories I don’t like to you can go here people underestimate
[Garrett] 24:53
How much energy does digestion take? It’s a very energy-intensive process. So so please continue that.
[Thanh Pham] 25:00
Yeah, and we’re in Gore ring has shown me a lot of interesting data, for example, the timing of when you eat something. So it can tell for example, if you eat later in the day, close to bedtime, your body is still digesting food, and it’s not spending enough time recovering as you’re sleeping. That’s one of the things I learned from just wearing the aura ring as an example. But going back to just the energy piece to all of this, for a lot of people, if you can’t focus for, let’s say, 510 minutes at a time uninterrupted, it’s a muscle that you can build over time by just extended it five minutes, maybe every day or every week, depending on the person.
[Thanh Pham] 25:43
But for most people, if you think about the circadian rhythm, it goes through a 90-minute cycle. So there’s a 90-minute cycle where you know, for about an hour or so you’ll have like a peak where you can focus and be energized. And then there’s like an on-ramp and an off-ramp, which is about 15 minutes each. So think of it as like a 90-minute cycle that you go through, where anyone during that cycle can focus for 60 minutes. And I would say that’s kind of the sweet spot for most people to be able to focus for 60 minutes uninterrupted. And then take like a 1530-minute break before you go at it again. And you can do this for, you know, multiple times a day,
[Garrett] 26:20
what one of the keys that you said there, I don’t want to let that slip by as is uninterrupted, which for some people in some situation, if you’re working in a clinic like that you’re working with somebody or something like that, but even if someone is working at their desk, or working on like a more intellectually demanding project, you know, being uninterrupted, does take some intention, it means like putting your phone on silent or letting your spouse or kids know like, Hey, I’m, you know, I’m going to be working on this for an hour like, you know, please let me have some focused time unless you know, something comes up. That’s important, of course, let me know, but I’ll come back out after like, it can take some intention around that, and intention to not, you know, pick up your phone and look at your text messages or keep checking your email in the browser and stuff like that, too. So I feel like that’s an important piece in terms of productivity that is probably a hidden culprit, or maybe, you know, maybe not hidden but is a culprit for many people in terms of being able to focus.
[Thanh Pham] 27:15
Oh, absolutely. And do your example, use early in your life, like writing the book, you know, that, okay, if I go to bed at a certain time, and I wake up at a certain time, I have like the first part of my day to write that book, and use that because maybe the kids are still asleep, and you’re doing one who’s awake. So you have the oldest time to yourself to write, right? And that’s like a really common strategy, I always recommend people use as well. And if you are in a position where maybe you are in a job or role where it’s very interrupt-driven, maybe you can find the time to spend 1520 minutes uninterrupted to do things.
[Thanh Pham] 27:52
That’s more than what other people can do or maybe what you’re able to do right now. And that’s a huge improvement as well. And so we do have to be very clear about okay, what kind of environment can I create that allows that to happen, right? So maybe it’s a simple door sign that you put up and say, Hey, don’t interrupt me to turn off your phone, or one of the easy things you can do is just put your phone in a different room. So that way, if you want to have this urgency to feel like, oh, I want to check my phone, there’s no way to do it. Because now you have to walk up to stairs or something to get it. Right. So the more friction we can add to something we don’t want to do, the less likely this is to happen. So if
[Garrett] 28:32
You don’t have the chips in your house, like you’re not going to eat it right, exactly. Yeah. If you don’t
[Thanh Pham] 28:36
Have the candy at home that you’re just not getting it. And just like if you want to watch less TV, if you put the remote in a drawer somewhere, there’s so much energy start-up energy that is required to do that, that you might it’s not worth the effort. Right? So how can we be intentional about adding friction to what we don’t want to do? Likewise, how can we remove friction for all the things we do want to do? So if I want to write in the morning, before the kids wake up, what can I do to remove friction to allow that to happen? So maybe it’s like my desk is already clear. And everything is good to go. When I sit down am I making sure that I go to bed on time to do whatever else we need to do to remove friction? So that’s a really simple framework we can think about using as well,
[Garrett] 29:21
Like that. And, I interrupted you to talk about the noninterrupted time when you were talking about putting together these 90-minute cycles. Was there anything else there? I just want to circle the cycle back, if you will before we move on to is there are about 60 minutes out of every 90 So if you go 60 minutes of focused work and then rest 15 to 30 Do it again. Was there anything else that you were wondering about?
[Thanh Pham] 29:47
A question I get very often is how many hours a day should I be able to focus
[Thanh Pham] 29:53
Before diminishing returns essentially before you Yeah, and the answer varies vary wildly But it [Thanh Pham] 30:00
If you’re in a position where you can do a lot of intellectual work, or some people like to call it deep work, so when the Cal Newport going to coin, I would say if you can focus for two hours a day uninterrupted, you’re probably in the top 5% of people that can do that. It doesn’t sound like a lot, but in a day where you might have appointments and things, team members’ meetings, having two hours to yourself to do stuff is challenging for a lot of people. So I would say use that as a benchmark, having two hours for yourself. But start with 30 minutes to an hour. Like I think if you can get one hour of uninterrupted, uninterrupted time, every single day, that essentially means you have five hours of uninterrupted time to do the things that you want to do. And five hours, you can push a lot of things forward. That’s a lot of time essentially, a lot of people don’t even have
[Garrett] 30:51
A whole book. I mean, that’s, that’s, you know, an hour and a half to two hours every day for a few months. And I got a book out
[Thanh Pham] 30:58
Of it. Exactly. So don’t underestimate what you can do in an hour a day.
[Garrett] 31:02
That’s, that’s great. You know that the first time I heard that, I had that same type of reaction of like, you know, think about what an hour or two have been around the time of day, I’m thinking like, I need to be working like eight or 10 hours a day, like what do you what are you talking about, like not including breaks and stuff like that. But when I one exercise that, that I did that I don’t even know if you’ve ever talked about it, but you may have experienced this, too, is a time study.
[Garrett] 31:26
So we just did when we had our whole team do a time study. So for every 15-minute increment, during the day, we write down what we’re doing. So for me, like in the morning, I write it down, it’s a little bit of personal time, I stand in front of my red light, and I do my mobility exercises I put the newbie on in the morning, and then it’s you know, some work time or reading time or, and then family time with the kids, you know, preparing breakfast, take them to school, stuff like that, and then either work or meetings or different things during the day.
[Garrett] 31:57
And so to be able to get them so we kind of break down between strategic time and tactical time where strategic things are kind of moving the bigger projects forward things that that you know, we really shouldn’t be doing because it’s in our zone of genius, or it’s part of our higher priority activities for our role versus tactical are things that we probably should you know, offload to somebody else should delegate to somebody else or things like that. So it’s a fascinating exercise.
[Garrett] 32:28
And I’d invite anyone who’s listening who’s interested, who’s intrigued by this topic of like, how much dedicated, focused uninterrupted time do I get during the day, you know, start to track it. And I would invite you to do a time study, you know, if anyone writes in or comments on this, I’d be happy to share a little template that we use with you that we got from the business coach that we use for tracking this, but it’s fascinating. And yes, I would just, ultimately, it’s a long way of saying, Yes, I want to underscore and highlight and bold and italicized that of, you know, a couple of hours of uninterrupted work, compounded over time, can make a huge difference in strategic projects.
[Garrett] 33:08
I mean, that can be the difference between, you know, getting a new project, starting a new marketing initiative, creating the copy for something or it can be, you know, for some people, it’s, it’s putting together a plan and starting to implement like a new business if you’re in something that you don’t enjoy as much, and you want to start your own business start something like that can be that can be the time that you do that. And it does compound over time. So that’s great. Thank you, thank you for sharing that. I think that’s super valuable.
[Thanh Pham] 33:35
Yeah, just to add a bow on top of that, Asian efficiency, you guys started by seven hours a week, just an hour a day, writing blog posts and turn it into the business that it is today by just writing for one hour a day. So
[Garrett] 33:49
And now you have a great business, I know you’re able to and that was something that I want to acknowledge you for his how intentional you are about how you spend your time and how you’re able to be productive, be effective as a leader of your business. And also be very intentional about curating social gatherings, I’ve been to a few with, you know, with you here in Austin, just you know, setting up these fun, wonderful experiences that, you know, if someone doesn’t take the initiative to do it like it just doesn’t happen.
[Garrett] 34:16
Really fun, memorable experiences. And then you know, the travel you get to do and you know, all these different things. So it’s wonderful. And you’re a wonderful example of what people can do when they figure out these elements of I don’t know if you call it lifestyle design or productivity and when you master the T framework, you’ll always have time for tea.
[Thanh Pham] 34:39
Yeah, thank you. And yeah, I just wanted to lead by example. So being able to do this firsthand, and then passing on whatever I’ve learned that’s kind of how things start in something I still tried to do today. So thank you for the acknowledgment.
[Garrett] 34:53
So if our listeners want to hear more about you want to check out Asian efficiency or see the podcast what are the best ways you to see your content to learn more?
[Thanh Pham] 35:02
Yeah, we have a blog at Asian efficiency.com. It’s one word, Asian efficiency.com. And we also have a podcast where we have a new episode every Monday. And the podcast is called D productivity show. And we just surpassed 11 million downloads. So check it out.
[Garrett] 35:17
Thank you. I was on it back when you were like 2 million, right? We didn’t episode back shortly after we did your shoulder, but that’s why it took off. All right. That one episode changed the trajectory. Yeah. So Asian efficiency productivity shows. And then the other thing you mentioned, was that that app to rise signs Si Gn s, right? Yeah, yep. That’s a good one. That’s as much a mental note for me.
[Garrett] 35:43
I want to try that. I haven’t seen that. Yeah, I’ll show it to you. It’s cool. I love that the circadian, circadian rhythm if you can get that it’s like, you can either be, you know, going through your day with a tailwind or you going to be going into a headwind. If your circadian rhythm is working for you. It’s like a tailwind. If not, it feels like a headwind. So I think that’s a good note on which, to end and say goodbye. Thanks so much, Dan. Thanks for being here. Yep. Thanks. So thanks, everybody for tuning in to the undercurrent podcast. Thank you so much for listening to the undercurrent podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving a review and be sure to subscribe to stay up to date as we release future episodes.
