Slow Productivity

Sometimes a book comes along with exactly what you need when you need it. This one helped me reflect to on my own mindset about productivity and make adjustments to be happier and healthier.

The main premise of the book is stated early (on page 8):

A philosophy for organizing knowledge work efforts in a sustainable and meaningful manner based on the following three principles.

1. Do fewer things.
2. Work at a natural pace.
3. Obsess over quality.

some of this I vibed with and some of this was absolutely nuts e.g. just sneaking away from work for an afternoon every month to go to the cinema?? (even if you work in an office)

This book primarily consists of anecdotes from the lives of historical figures, along with the ways in which you can implement similar strategies in order to achieve success yourself.

The problem is, even the author acknowledges that their lifestyles were unrealistic by today's standards, and the suggestions he gives end up being so watered down they lose any meaning. You can't take a whole summer off to escape to the countryside and write? Take a day off once a month and go see a movie.

Overall, the core ideas of the book were good, but I fail to see how any of this benefits the average reader.

There is two possibilities; either I am bored of the productivity genre or this book is not great. Ultimately it could be both; perhaps I have gotten all the productivity advice I needed and now the step forward is actually working instead of trying to hack my work process that usually does not exist. I'm a big fan of Deep Work by Newport and that was a big step in my career in thinking deeply about my work process, unfortunately this book has failed to reach the same bar.

He posits a theory that knowledge workers have been treated poorly; too much work and an emphasis on busyness & quantity of work. As a result, workers have been overloaded, on the edge of burnout and the noticeable lack of quality content. As a result, he argues workers ought to take more breaks, do less work and focus on the quality of work. He proceeds to spend about six to seven hours to argue this when it could have been done in about three or less. That is my issue with the productivity genre, too long is spent on unnecessary details and examples when more time ought to be spent dealing with the philosophical logic; explain to me why I ought to be listening to you instead of a strawman evil manager who wants me to work twelve hour shifts or my academic rival who works constantly and produces more work. He tries to argue his point by using the examples of others, from writers to musicians but it feels so irrelevant I'm bored throughout most of this book. The work feels too easy and not challenging enough - I would hope that Cal Newport would evolve as a writer; away from the middle ground of Stephen Covey and Malcolm Gladwell and into a writer befitting a philosopher of productivity. It seems that Newport is basically just rehashing the same couple ideas he has and writing more books unnecessarily. I read Deep Work, why read anything else from Newport if it's just more of the same?

no

Este libro no aporta nada que no hayamos leído antes. Es una mezcla de textos de la que se puede extraer muy poco. No lo recomendaría.

I'm a fan of Cal's work. His books Digital Minimalism and Deep Work pushed me toward making changes that have positively changed my life, at work and at home. I listen to his Deep Questions podcast and it is also great. But I can't help but think that this book is a repackaging of his podcast. It also doesn't feel as deep and well-worth the time as his other books. It was really short, it didn't go super deep into the topic like he has done in previous books, and it could have been a blog post. One of the pivotal stories in this book about the singer/songwriter Jewel was completely spoiled for me on his podcast MONTHS before I read the book.

Unless you find it on sale, skip it.

Listen to his podcast.

This is overall a good meditation on how we work best. A lot more Jewel than I expected, and sometimes the book feels more like a collection of survivorship bias anecdotes than practical studies or applications, but throughout it remains a good reminder to slow down, because that's how we work best.

Particularly depressing in our modern age was discovering that hunter gatherers worked fewer hours than we do now. I guess they hadn't yet discovered the blessings of capitalism.

I listen to the Deep Life podcast every week, so I had been waiting for this book for long (I even requested it for my local library here in Taipei). I feel grateful for all the advice Cal and his co-host constantly share, as it has helped me to be more successful in my PhD and job, without compromising my life (and sleep!) quality. Yet, this book is just a dumbed-down regurgitation of what the podcast has been covering for years. I am not stating that it is all bad, but that it's nothing new, which was also the problem with his previous book “A world without email”.
I think Cal's advice is immensely valuable, but I'd recommend his podcast or “Deep Work” instead of this book.

3 stars, DNF. Only because I felt like I kept reading the same passage over and over again. The passage was great, but there's only so many times you can es plain the same thing over and over.

So incredibly timely, and as always, engaging and well-written. He outlines how we went from living and working seasonally, to nonstop work, to knowledge work, which encourages giving an impression of busyness to make the managers happy and, combined with always-on tech, means we’re caught in the trap of pseudo-productivity. The majority of the book is spent outlining practical ways to escape this trap. If you work in front of a screen, this book is for you.

I quite like Cal Newport, and many of the core ideas of the book are worth noting, but the drawn out pacing, along with the somehow-novel-but-still-trite anecdotes that are just a tad too cute, make the book a slog with too few practical tips to make it worthwhile. A few good ideas - worth a read if you're approaching burnout or are deep in productivity-land, but for most people, read Deep Work instead.

1. Do fewer things.
   2. Work at a natural pace.
   3. Obsess over quality.

Quick read, not groundbreaking, a bit repetitive. That said, as usual, Cal Newport has a very refreshing and empowering perspective / timely reminder: take the time to actually focus on important tasks of high quality and avoid the frenzy of trying look busy. You will get more done and feel better along the way.