CUIBEEE

This week was filled with anxiety and struggle, mainly stemming from life.

In life:

1. I did something very important for my current stage of life: I changed cities. Escaping from Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou seems to be the slogan of young people nowadays. Middle-aged people don't have the qualifications to escape because they have a family to support. In their lives, the self has become a small part, and they have to consider more for their families. The reason for changing cities is simple: I want to settle down. This is something unimaginable for me. Although I haven't formed a family in the traditional sense, I have two cats. One is almost 7 years old, and the other is almost 6 years old. I don't want to continue this nomadic lifestyle because it stresses them out. But who would have thought that when I was younger, my wish was to wander around the world, work and live in cities I like for a few years, and then move on to the next city until I found the one I loved. Imagination is always full, reality is not a bucket of cold water, nor a sharp blade, it is sandpaper, slowly grinding down some of the ideals in my heart. In the end, I became the person I used to hate the most - ordinary. The new first-tier cities have the salary level of third-tier cities and the housing prices close to first-tier cities. This difference exists in all cities in China. These days, I have been weighing and calculating whether the salary difference between the two cities can be compensated by the cost of living. After some calculations, changing cities not only does not increase the weight of my pocket, but also increases my pressure. There was a moment of hesitation, because after I had the intention to leave, life became lovely. We often have this feeling, the most exciting time for one thing is when it is either not obtained or lost.
2. I made the decision to leave, and the most difficult part of changing cities is packing and moving the cats. Packing and moving test me, and moving the cats tests the cats. The two cities are more than 1000 kilometers apart. After comparing, I decided to use train transportation, but I still had worries in my heart. A 13-hour journey, plus 3 hours in advance to handle the transportation at the station, and the time spent on the road. This long-distance journey is undoubtedly a challenge for them, but flying them is more dangerous, and driving would take a 14-hour journey without counting rest time. Pet transportation costs are generally above 3500, and I am more worried about the safety in the car. However, compared to that, I can visit the cats during the train stops, and I can only rely on Gabapentin.
3. Recently, I have been looking for a house and feeling a bit overwhelmed. Renting a house in an unfamiliar city still has some information barriers. However, I am short on time and must find a house and move within 20 days.
4. Lost 7 pounds, not sure if it's because of coffee or stress.

In learning:

1. The asynchronous collaboration model of Zoplay has attracted me, but I have not yet practiced this model in my experience. So I searched for some articles about asynchronous collaboration, and one of them, # What the heck is asynchronous communication anyway?, benefited me a lot and gave me some understanding of the concept, but I am still not clear about the actual practice. I am more curious about whether this model can be applied to my industry. From a time perspective, it may not be suitable for us, as we mainly focus on timeliness. However, Zoplay's Asynchronous Collaboration Handbook made me reflect on it. Among them, the axiom of asynchronous collaboration is to establish the understanding of asynchronous work:

   1. All asynchronous collaboration uses communication tools as the medium for transmitting information. Information is injected by the sender's software and hardware and presented by the receiver's software and hardware.

   2. In asynchronous collaboration, you can send messages at any time, but you cannot control when collaborators will process and reply to the information.

   3. Asynchronous collaborators cannot reply to each other's messages while facing individual business output of production materials.

   And the part about thoughtful feedback resonated with me the most:

   High-quality individual output is the premise of collective business success.

   Even in remote asynchronous collaboration, we cannot discuss specific issues with individuals while facing business capabilities such as writing code, designing interfaces, and creating prototypes.

   We should cleverly use the powerful real-time collaboration capabilities of productivity tools to protect the creator's dedicated time and ensure high-quality individual output.

   In order to be exempt from the anxiety of being on standby and responding as soon as possible, we form a collective consciousness of collaborating in rhythm with project stages and cycle periods at the macro level, and at the micro level, we establish an async review mechanism that deliberately slows down the rate of communication.

   In an advertising company, collaboration is the most common, so synchronous communication time is greatly increased, and the disadvantages of synchronous communication are as follows:

• Constant interruptions. Research shows that after an interruption, it takes an average of 23 minutes and 15 seconds to refocus on the task, and even if we do, we experience a decrease in productivity. Therefore, a single zoom meeting or Slack message can break up the entire afternoon into two fragments, each too small to do anything substantial.

• Hasty discussions and half-baked decisions. When we expect an immediate response, there is no time to think about the problem, so we often rely on our intuition in the end. While synchronous discussions can make decisions faster, are they the right decisions?

• Information silos. Missed a meeting? If you're lucky, your team may have recorded their decisions in the form of meeting minutes, but you still don't have the full picture. Busy with an urgent task and unable to participate in a Slack discussion? If you miss the opportunity to contribute, then an important decision can be made without you.

This often leads to the need for in-depth thinking and content exploration. However, most companies now eliminate the position of Account Executive (AE) to save costs and combine it with client strategy, resulting in more time spent dealing with clients and less time for thinking about solutions. Just when I have an idea, it is interrupted by consecutive meetings. After the meeting, I need more time to get back into the thinking process. The most extreme work experience was when a company had 5 hours of meetings in one day, with 3 meetings held intermittently. For jobs that require deep thinking, this is undoubtedly fatal. In order to speed up, it was thought that efficiency could be improved, but in the end, it may result in 80% of an employee's original productivity not being demonstrated. However, I still need to learn more about whether asynchronous work can be practiced in the advertising industry.

Review of last week's plans

1. Added a reading page to the blog Tried it, the content can be loaded, but because the wheel's Douban book images cannot be displayed and downloaded successfully, I removed it and put it on hold for now.
2. Finished reading two books Did not achieve, can only continue reading after moving.
3. Adjusted my schedule This also failed, work and house hunting mostly went into the night.
4. Increased exercise This one did increase.

Plans for next week

1. Ideally, I would like to finalize my job and then find a house within 4 days. If the job cannot be finalized, I still need to find a house.
2. Obtain quarantine certificates for the cats.

Summary:
Life is about constantly letting go, and the answer is never in the present.