Rework isn't really a book, it's a manifesto. Sure it's packaged like a paperback, has compelling blurbs to go along and seems like your average management-self-help effort. There's barely any structure, for one, which clearly differentiates it from most of the other management books out there. "Chapters" are more like op-eds, covering a few pages at most and only a few paragraphs at least. Where others try to convince businesses based on scientific (or pseudo-scientific) evidence, Rework relies on sound argumentation, passion and chutzpah.
Many of its core ideas are as valid as ever. Working late nights and weekends is useless and often ruinous. Budgets are guesses. Meetings are (mostly) a waste of time. Companies should sell their by-products. All are excellent guidelines for would-be entrepreneurs and business managers. Even when its arguments are backed up by barely more than an anecdote and a few wise words, Rework is convincing. There is a transparency to making bold statements with limited evidence. Most business books leave you with a sense of being duped; their evidence, often in the form of graphs or cherry picked data, is often too neat and too convincing. Rework shows you its weaknesses and is better for it.
I'm always surprised to find out how much the actual world of work differs from that of Rework. Its ideas are sometimes obvious to the point of banality, yet most companies are unable to implement them. For example, there is no evidence that meetings are suddenly becoming less prominent or their content more engaging. Why are we stuck in this imperfect world? I would like to understand what is actually standing between us and the world of Rework. Is it our inability to question tradition, handed down from previous generations of managers? Is it our overconfidence and hesitance to learn and read? Or is it the surplus of poorly formulated and contradicting management advice? Whatever it is, Rework makes a compelling case for a new era of work.
Many of its core ideas are as valid as ever. Working late nights and weekends is useless and often ruinous. Budgets are guesses. Meetings are (mostly) a waste of time. Companies should sell their by-products. All are excellent guidelines for would-be entrepreneurs and business managers. Even when its arguments are backed up by barely more than an anecdote and a few wise words, Rework is convincing. There is a transparency to making bold statements with limited evidence. Most business books leave you with a sense of being duped; their evidence, often in the form of graphs or cherry picked data, is often too neat and too convincing. Rework shows you its weaknesses and is better for it.
I'm always surprised to find out how much the actual world of work differs from that of Rework. Its ideas are sometimes obvious to the point of banality, yet most companies are unable to implement them. For example, there is no evidence that meetings are suddenly becoming less prominent or their content more engaging. Why are we stuck in this imperfect world? I would like to understand what is actually standing between us and the world of Rework. Is it our inability to question tradition, handed down from previous generations of managers? Is it our overconfidence and hesitance to learn and read? Or is it the surplus of poorly formulated and contradicting management advice? Whatever it is, Rework makes a compelling case for a new era of work.