Turning busyness into results

2 min read

You're busy every day, and yet you're no closer to the results you aimed for. What's worth thinking about then isn't only "how to try harder," but "what do I call a result?"

Why I recommend this book

This book by Dan S. Kennedy deals with management problems like hiring, employee accountability, productivity, and profit. The publisher's description, too, names the time it takes to turn ideas into action, and turning work into profit, as its themes.

The reason I recommend it is that it prompts you to re-examine work from a perspective beyond "how much I did." You spent time, held meetings, prepared. I chose it as a book for thinking about what actually changed after all that.

Questions makers can take away too

It's a book for business owners, but the habit of putting results into words carries over when you make things on your own. If you're building a website, for example, adding pages and making it easier for visitors to do what they came for need to be checked separately.

"What will I finish this week?" "Who will I give what value to?" "What would count as progress?" These aren't quotes from the book; they're questions for applying it to making things. As you read, create one question translated into your own work, and what you're thinking about becomes concrete.

How to handle strong opinions

This is a management book that pushes the owner's perspective hard. You don't need to make agreeing with every claim the goal of reading it. It seems best read while asking, "Does this idea fit my work?" and "What else do I want to value alongside results?"

For people who want to re-examine how they work with people, and how action connects to results. Before reading, write down one piece of work you're spending time on now, and you'll know what you want to think through with the book.

Source for the book's content: the publisher's description. I've summarized why I recommend it and how to read it based on that description.