Weekly Inspiration #5: summer tunes, corporate cultures and time management
August 10th, 2009 by Fabian PfortmüllerSummer vibes have found the Sandbox HQ in sunny Switzerland. A special edition of weekly inspirations with video, music and thoughts that inspired us this week. Tell us how your summer has been!
1) Summer – time to build the best work environment ever
Summer has given us time to think about what company we want to create with Sandbox. We have been greatly inspired by Zappos, which Nico already covered. And this week we came across this internal presentation of Netflix, which blew our minds. At Sandbox we firmly believe that a great company is all about trust, passion and positive impact. And living this values becomes the best advertisment a company can get. Everyone I talked to about this presentation wants to work for Netflix now 
. And we want learn from Netflix and make Sandbox the place to work at. For example what a good vacation policy is. Wow.
“There is also no clothing policy at Netflix, but no one has come to work naked lately.” – Patty McCord 2004
2) Summer – trying to optizime time so you can spend more time outside
At Sandbox we spend day and night on connecting our members and helping Sandboxers worldwide. And so we often wished that the day had 48 hours. I read a few inputs on time management which inspired me to make more out of my summer days:
- Serial entrepreneur Paul Graham (founder of Y-Combinator) writes great essays, his newest talks about the difference between the schedule of a “maker” and a manager. My learning: meetings divide the day and make it much less productive. Try to schedule meetings early in the morning, at lunch or in the evening, so you can get real stuff done during the day.
- A little anectode about time management which encourages to focus on the big chunks first and then fill in small items.
- Is it possible to learn to focus? In the Value of Hard Focus MIT student Cal Newport argues that it is. I agree. And I want to learn. Do you guys have tips?
3) Summer – time to learn about the story of stuff
Have you ever wondered where all our stuff comes from? This video about the Story of Stuff, done by former Greenpeace staff Annie Leonard, explains it. Read more about the effects of human consumption in the NYTimes coverage.
4) Summer – time to listen to the world’s best summer radio
We have included below the great summer tunes of Rundfunk.fm, arguably the best summer radio ever.
5) Stories which made us appreciate our summer even more
- Miss Landmine Cambodia 2009, (thanks to our friend Nettra Pan from the Cambodia Project)
- TapIt Water, refill your water bottles on the go in NYC with clean drinking water. Great initiative.
- Send a Message, a dutch NGO which helps you send a message that will be written by a Palestinian on the wall that Israel erected. More.
Fabian started Sandbox 1.5 years ago, is a student at Columbia (the university, not the country) and currently enjoys the summer in Europe by singing to Rundfunk tunes at Sandbox office together with Johanna. He twitters regularly and just spent a great weekend in the Swiss alps.
