REWORK: Possibly your next business development pocket reference?I first became aware of Jason Fried, one of the principals of 37 Signals and co-author of
REWORK, back in the first 10 minutes or so of the Internet. He was pimping a cool app - I think it was called Audiophile - that allowed you to catalog all your CDs and make copious notes and cross references with regards to composers, recording locations, liner notes and all kinds of music geek stuff like that. I even shared a few emails back and forth with him at the time about some issues I was having with the app. Seemed like a genuine guy.
This was pre-iTunes and iTunes pretty much killed his app. I lost track of him for awhile but then at one point someone turned me on to the Basecamp project management software and I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was Jason and his crew behind that as well. To observe 37 Signals’ company and product growth through the years has certainly been informative and inspiring.
Several years ago when I’d heard that Jason had co-authored a book on business development best practices gleaned from his experiences, I added it to my ‘To Read’ list. Ironically in the age of information overload, I’ve only just now found time to finally read it.
The book is presented in chapters based around a ‘subject’ - “Growth”, “Culture”, etc. Each chapter is filled with singular topics/ideas presented pretty much in a one page ‘nugget.’ The writing is clear, down to earth, easy to understand and at times humorous.
There wasn’t much in the book that I didn’t agree with or find that I could use in some way. My problem was more remembering it all. Reading from one entry to the next, each was often times an ‘a-ha’ moment, with the realization of it’s potential or application often blocking out the previous one(s). Perhaps I’ve just killed to many brain cells in my youth, but I found myself excited about the prospects of all the book discussed, but once done feeling overwhelmed with how/where to get started.
It was definitely a book that, once done, I said, “I need to read this again.” I checked it out from my library and will read it again before returning it, but I can see the book being useful as a go-to reference all the time. One could easily open to a random page, read the entry, and then take a minute to deliberate on it, and consider how that might apply or be implemented in their own life. Very Zen in that aspect, although the writing is not at all cryptic or vague as one might think. I have developed a habit of doing a few readings each morning from various sources and this book could definitely slot in somewhere in the queue each day, especially given that the entries are all brief and succinct in nature. There’s no riddles or mysteries to solve, just straight forward ideas and concepts to chew on with regards to business, professional development and in some cases, life.
I highly recommend checking it out if you haven’t, I doubt there’s anyone that couldn’t find several valuable takeaways within, and who knows, you may go back to it over again.
#bookreview #productivity #businessdevelopment #professionaldevelopment
