Rework by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson
Rework
By Jason Fried, David Heinemeier Hansson
My Favorite takeaways:
- Good enough is fine. It's better than wasting resources or doing nothing.
- Say no by default.
- Long lists are dust-collecting guilt trips. Start making smaller to-do lists. For example, break a list of a hundred items into ten lists of ten items.
- Get into the rhythm of making choices. Decisions are progress. As you get in the flow of making decisions, you build momentum and boost morale.
- Interruption is the enemy of productivity.
- Go to sleep. Problems with not getting enough sleep:, Stubbornness, Lack of creativity, Diminished morale, Irritability.
- Instead of trying to outspend, outsell, or outsponsor competitors, try to out-teach them.
- Own your bad news. It's better you tell the story when something goes wront than someone else.
- Getting back to people quickly is probably the most important thing you can do when it comes to customer service.
- There are four-letter words you should never use in business: need, must, can’t, easy, just, only, and fast. They get in the way of healthy communication, introduce animosity, torpedo good discussions, and cause projects to be late.
Highlights
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Writing a plan makes you feel in control of things you can’t actually control. We should really call them guesses.
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Have you ever noticed that while small businesses wish they were bigger, big businesses dream about being more agile and flexible?
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To do great work, you need to feel that you’re putting a meaningful dent in the universe or that you’re part of something important.
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The easiest way to create something great is to make something you want to use. You’ll figure out immediately whether or not what you’re making is any good.
Highlight (Yellow): Location 466
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Right now, you’re the smallest and fastest you’ll ever be. From here forward, you’ll accumulate mass and the more massive a thing is, the more energy it takes to change its direction.
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Get into the rhythm of making choices. Decisions are progress. As you get in the flow of making decisions, you build momentum and boost morale.
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Big decisions are hard to make and hard to change.
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Long projects zap morale. The longer it takes, the less likely it is to launch.
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Invest and build your business around the core things that won't change.
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Put off anything you don’t need, build the necessities now and worry about the luxuries later. There's a whole lot that you don't need on day 1.
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Abstractions like reports and documents create illusions of agreement where aundred people can read the same words and each imagines a different thing.
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Interruption is the enemy of productivity. Successful alone-time period means letting go of communication addiction to instant messages, phone calls, emails, and meetings.
Meetings are toxic: The worst interruptions of all are meetings. - Here’s why: They’re usually about words and abstract concepts, not real things. - They usually convey an abysmally small amount of information per minute. - They drift off-subject easier than a Chicago cab in a snowstorm. - They require thorough preparation that most people don’t have time for. - They frequently have agendas so vague that nobody is really sure of the goal. - They often include at least one moron who inevitably gets his turn to waste everyone’s time with nonsense. - Meetings procreate. - One meeting leads to another meeting leads to another …
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Say you invite 10 people to a one-hour meeting. That's really a ten-hour meeting, not a one-hour meeting.
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Good enough is fine. It's better than wasting resources or doing nothing.
- Find solutions that get the most while doing the least.
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Recognize that problems are negotiable.
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Quick wins: Momentum fuels motivation to keep you going. You build momentum by getting something done and then moving on to the next thing.
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The longer something takes, the less likely it is that you’re going to finish
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Go to sleep. Problems with not getting enough sleep:, Stubbornness, Lack of creativity, Diminished morale, Irritability.
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Your estimates suck, we’re all terrible estimators. The longer the timeframe, the more of a fantasy it is.
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The solution: Break the big thing into smaller things. The smaller it is, the easier it is to estimate.
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Long lists are dust-collecting guilt trips. Start making smaller to-do lists. For example, break a list of a hundred items into ten lists of ten items.
- Divide problems into smaller and smaller pieces until you’re able to deal with them completely and quickly.
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Prioritize visually and put the most important thing at the top. The next thing on the list becomes the next most important thing. You’ll only have a single next most important thing to do at a time. And that’s enough.
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If you’re successful, people will copy you.
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But there’s a great way to protect yourself from copycats: Make you part of your product or service. Make it something no one else can offer.
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Pick a fight. Ex: If you think a competitor sucks, say so.You’ll find that others who agree with you will rally to your side. Being the anti-______ is a great way to differentiate and attract followers.
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Underdo your competition. One-upping, Cold War mentality is a dead end that costs you massive amounts of money, time, and drive. Instead, do less than your competitors to beat them.
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Don't just bulid something better, redefine the rules
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Say no by default.
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Don’t make up problems you don’t have yet. Many of the things you worry about never happen and it's not a problem (yet).
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Instead of trying to outspend, outsell, or outsponsor competitors, try to out-teach them. Teaching probably isn’t something your competitors are even thinking about.
- Chefs put their recipes in cookbooks and show their techniques on cooking shows.
- As a business owner, you should share everything you know too.
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Imperfections are real and people respond to real.
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Never hire anyone to do a job until you’ve tried to do it yourself. You'll understand the nature of the work.
- Hire slowly to avoid winding up at a cocktail party of strangers that don't talk about anything real or deep
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A cover letter is a much ebtter test than a resume because appliants cant churn out hundreds of personalized letters.
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Managers of one are people who come up with their own goals and execute them.
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Own your bad news. It's better you tell the story when something goes wront than someone else.
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Getting back to people quickly is probably the most important thing you can do when it comes to customer service.
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The number-one principle to keep in mind when you apologize: How would you feel about the apology if you were on the other end? Would you believe them?
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Culture is the byproduct of consistent behavior.
- We’re all capable of bad, average, and great work. The environment has a lot more to do with great work than most people realize.
- There's untapped potential trapped under lame policies, poor direction, and stifling bureaucracies.
- If casual Fridays or bring-your-dog-to-work day were such good things, then why aren't you doing them every day of the week?
- When you treat people like children, you get children’s work. (i.e. Employees needing to ask permission before they can do anything. This creates a culture of nonthinkers and screams "I don't trust you")
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No one sets out to create a bureaucracy. They sneak up slowly, one policy (scar) at a time. Don't create policies because someone did one thing wrong once.
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There are four-letter words you should never use in business: need, must, can’t, easy, just, only, and fast. They get in the way of healthy communication, introduce animosity, torpedo good discussions, and cause projects to be late.
- Stop saying ASAP. Everyone wants things done as soon as posisble. When everything is high priority, nothing is. It's inflationary and devalues any request without ASAP.