Kevin KruseBesprekingen

Maybe I was expecting too much from this book, but I had a really difficult time getting through it. I found it dull and overly long. The writing style felt very basic, so my eyes kept glazing over information I'd heard a thousand times before (often offered in a much more engaging way).

Having said that, I did pick up a few ideas I'll be implementing in my daily routine (checking email 3 times a day, touching everything only once, "themed" focus days), but that was about it. The book read like a collection of blog posts, loosely tied together by the overall theme of time management. It lacked depth, and even given the multitude of quotes from successful athletes, students, and business people, the content felt dry and lifeless.

Overall, this was a superficial look at a topic we all struggle with.

Recommended book. I plan to share with my team. Two takeaway quotes:

"Leadership is the art of persuasion, the act of motivating people to do more than they ever thought possible in pursuit of a greater good."

"Managers need to plan, measure, monitor, coordinate, solve, hire, fire, and so many other things. Managers spend most of their time managing things. Leaders lead people."

Good basic advice for leaders, including the need for transparency so that your people are better prepared to make decisions. I also appreciate the whole concept that rules are basically a substitute for decisions, and that providing too many rules and too much access through open door policies that you are disengaging and disempowering your employees from acting on their own in the moment. Replacing that often-fake "open door" with regularly scheduled one-on-ones and team meetings allows for conversation, coaching, and learning. If you aren't having one-on-ones yet, they are game changers. Start.

Being likable, not liked, and showing weakness - good overviews of why these are important and how they can play out. Early managers and supervisors definitely can use this advice! I know I could have.

I had a very hard time with a chapter about "crowding your calendar". While I do time block (schedule my most important priorities), there's a downside to having an overcrowded calendar. There is real value in spending time with people that is NOT scheduled. Some of the best ideas I've gotten have come from someone stopping me in the hall with "I was thinking about that thing you said...". There is no need for "do you have a minute" when you make sure you have a minute, or can take one because your calendar isn't crowded.

That same chapter stresses the importance of agendas for meetings and good facilitation. Again, I agree but with a caveat. Especially when you are working in a virtual environment, having some chat time available is critical. In a "normal" environment, people catch up with one another as they come into the room, and they've likely already had other moments that day. For a virtual team, they need that same connection time but it doesn't start until everyone signs in. If you don't allow that time to connect on family and personal events, you don't get the same team behaviors. Agendas should always be there, but they should also be targeted enough for the time allotted to flex for personal conversation. Good facilitators finish their agenda. Great facilitators finish the goals of the meeting and the team, even if it means going off agenda. (less)

While some info was contradictory, there were some truly useful ideas here, and many suggestions on how to implement them personally as well as professionally.

I wish I had read this book decades ago. Oh, the time I would have saved by not spinning my wheels on ineffective scheduling. Time is our most valuable resource and yet we often fail to manage it so that we can directly reach our goals. Logical, practical, insightful, and brilliant are the time management methods used by billionaires and top-performers in every industry. They are revealed here for all to apply. Thank you, Kevin Kruse, for this revelation. I am changing my habits and reducing stress through these tips and techniques.

Quick to read and to the point, this book is full of easy-to-follow advice for time management. It is a combination of the author's own advice, with brief advice and quotes from billionaires, entrepreneurs, Olympic athletes, and straight-A students. Some are the result of the author's own research and enquiries; some he just seems to have borrowed. Still, he does a good job organizing it and making it readable. He also offers a set of mostly memorable time management quotes, although some of them are repeats that he has quoted earlier in the book. He also provides chapters at the end of the book that sum up (i.e., repeat) the advice from the billionaires, athletes, etc. All in all, there is quit a lot of padding to get the book to a minimum book length. Also, widely spaced typography!

Still, I recommend this book highly. A time management book shouldn't take a long time to read. It should get to the point--and this one does.

My biggest takeaway is a simple one: don't add your tasks to a to-do list; schedule them on your calendar. That simple act causes you to make a commitment and keep things real, rather than having a lot of tasks on your list that get pushed back day after day, month after month.

Some of the advice, such as taking lots of handwritten notes, I was already doing, and I can confirm its value.

The author offers additional content online, which is helpful, but mainly designed to get you on his mailing list. How ironic that one piece of his advice is to unsubscribe from as many mailing lists as possible!½