I finished reading Deep Work by Cal Newport yesterday (by the time you're reading this, it has been a week). I found that I couldn't read this in one sitting, so I read it at the same time with other books, and it also took me longer to get through it because I went back and forth all the time.
Deep Work is extremely helpful and insightful when it comes to planning and working with focus. It has a no BS approach to becoming a better professional with real paradigms. Not only does Newport state that you should reduce the time spent on shallow work, for instance, but he also explains how to identify shallow work, how to communicate it with your boss and other people, and he also gives you real-life examples of people who work deeply and why that has worked for them.
I might not be a fan of all the examples of successful deep workers he mentions (Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates), but that is not the point. He even states so, too. Newport claims that Facebook was both a good and a bad contribution for the world we live in. He deems social media in general a great distraction in our world, actually. But he mentions Zuckerberg's deep work as an honorable mention, I suppose? And Gates and his "obsession" with his craft, falling asleep on his keyboard, and waking up a couple of hours later just to continue working doesn't sound healthy to me. I understand Newport's point was different, but please find better role models to praise for their work, who have a work-life balance and are also good people and don't exploit their employees and our privacy.
So before I get too heated about straight white men with billion-dollar companies, let me finish this review by saying I was glad to find out I implement almost all strategies described in this book. I just didn't have fancy words to describe the way I work and plan. And now I do, thanks to Cal Newport. I adored his approach on the fear of missing out, and the time consuming regular planning meetings. Being a PhD candidate, myself, I was also pleased to see advice and strategies from an academic that involve not working after 5:30pm and on weekends, and not responding to irrelevant and vague emails.
Have you read this book? If not, you can buy it here and help support my blog. Thank you. (:
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