Last month, I watched this talk by Jason Fried. It was the first I’d seen from him in a while, but I love it. The talk mirrors a lot of what he says in his book, Rework, so I thought I’d share some of them with you:
- Failure is not cool. Online especially, there’s this fad floating around that failure is a good thing, that we can learn from failure. Jason takes the opposite stance, saying that failure is just that, failure, and it’s not good. (I’ll have my own post on this soon.)
- Focus on doing well now, not on planning. “Plans are all based on the wrong information.” Namely, information that’s going to change.
- Don’t confuse interruption with collaboration. “The best way to be productive is to stay away from each other.” Jason says to use passive collaboration tools, like email, so you can turn them off to get your work done.
- Everyone’s making a byproduct. “Whenever you make something, you always make something else. You can’t just make one thing.” So find and take advantage of the byproducts.
- Focus on things that don’t change. If you focus on trends, you’ll lose everything when they pass. Instead, focus on things that will always matter.
- Inspiration is perishable. “If you’re into something, if you want to do something, you’ve got to do it now. Because you’re simply not going to be pumped up about it later.”
What are your thoughts on this?
