Time Management

Who is Randy Pausch?

Randy Pausch was a professor of computer science, human computer interaction, and design at CMU Pittsburgh. He also co-founded the CMU Entertainment Technology Center, and created the Alice software project. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer on September 2006, and he was told in August 2007 that he only had at most 6 months to live. He went on to survive almost a year after that, passing away on July 25, 2008.

What was he known for?

After getting diagnosed in August, he gave his "Last Lecture" on the topic "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams" and one on time management, both of which became really well-known. His book "The Last Lecture" was a New York Times best-seller.

Notable points from his speech

• The need to create a to-do list which considers both importance and deadline. This kind of list allows us to spend our time doing the important tasks before non-important ones with a close deadline, freeing up a lot of time to do other things.


• In order to avoid procrastination, we can set up fake deadlines before the actual deadline, pressuring ourselves to get the work done earlier.


• Phone calls are a huge distraction, and when we call someone to get something accomplished, we have to announce the goal first. To avoid longer calls, we should also put our feet up, to be in a state of discomfort.


• Put all of the unnecessary papers in some box. So when it gets filled in a month or so, I can trash it. But in case I need one of those papers for some unforseen reason (like receipts), I can always get it from there.


• A small distraction usually means 6 to 9 minutes lost, with 4 to 5 minutes of recovery time. So only 5 of these will mean an hour is lost. We can reduce the amount of distractions, by turning phone calls into email, as they're usually the biggest distractor.