Rework Summary - Part 1 — Nov 28, 2023

Comprehensive summary on Rework Book by David Heinemeier Hansson and Jason Fried.

Table of Contents

1. Chapter 1 - First
2. Chapter 2 - Takedowns
3. Chapter 3 - Go
4. Chapter 4 - Progress
5. Chapter 5 - Productivity

Chapter 1 - First

• The new reality:
  • It’s even for people stuck in day jobs who have always dreamed about doing their own thing.

Chapter 2 - Takedowns

• Ignore the real world:
  • The real world isn’t a place, it’s an excuse. It’s a justification for not trying. It has nothing to do with you.
• Learning from mistakes is overrated:
  • Other people’s failures are just that: other people’s failures.
• Planning is guessing:
  • Unless you’re a fortune-teller, long-term business planning is a fantasy.
  • You have the most information when you’re doing something, not before you’ve done it.
  • Give up on the guesswork. Decide what you’re going to do this week, not this year.
  • Make decisions right before you do something, not far in advance.
• Why we grow?:
  • Grow slow and see what feels right—premature hiring is the death of many companies.
  • Have you ever noticed that while small businesses wish they were bigger, big businesses dream about being more agile and flexible?
  • And remember, once you get big, it’s really hard to shrink without ring people, damaging morale, and changing the entire way you do business.
  • Don’t be insecure about aiming to be a small business. Anyone who runs a business that’s sustainable and profitable, whether it’s big or small, should be proud.
• Workaholism:
  • First off, working like that just isn’t sustainable over time. When the burnout crash comes—and it will—it’ll hit that much harder.
  • They try to fix problems by throwing sheer hours at them. They try to make up for intellectual laziness with brute force. This results in inelegant solutions.
  • Workaholics aren’t heroes. They don’t save the day, they just use it up. The real hero is already home because she figured out a faster way to get things done.
• Enough with “entrepreneurs”:
  • Instead of entrepreneurs, let’s just call them starters. Anyone who creates a new business is a starter. You don’t need an MBA, a certificate, a fancy suit, a briefcase, or an above-average tolerance for risk. You just need an idea, a touch of confidence, and a push to get started.

Chapter 3 - Go

• Make a dent in the universe:
  • You want your customers to say, “This makes my life better.” You want to feel that if you stopped doing what you do, people would notice.
  • You should feel an urgency about this too. You don’t have forever.
  • This is your life’s work. Do you want to build just another me-too product or do you want to shake things up?
  • What you do is your legacy. Don’t sit around and wait for someone else to make the change you want to see. And don’t think it takes a huge team to make that difference either.
  • Look at Craigslist, which demolished the traditional classified-ad business.
  • The Drudge Report, run by Matt Drudge, is just one simple page on the Web run by one guy.
  • If you’re going to do something, do something that matters. These little guys came out of nowhere and destroyed old models that had been around for decades. You can do the same in your industry.
• Scratch your own itch:
  • The easiest, most straightforward way to create a great product or service is to make something you want to use.
  • That lets you design what you know—and you’ll figure out immediately whether or not what you’re making is any good.
  • When you build what you need, you can also assess the quality of what you make quickly and directly, instead of by proxy.
• Start making something:
  • What you do is what matters, not what you think or say or plan.
  • Stanley Kubrick gave this advice to aspiring filmmakers: “Get hold of a camera and some film and make a movie of any kind at all.”
• No time is no excuse:
  • Come on. There’s always enough time if you spend it right. And don’t think you have to quit your day job, either. Hang onto it and start work on your project at night.
  • When you want something bad enough, you make the time— regardless of your other obligations.
  • Besides, the perfect time never arrives. You’re always too young or old or busy or broke or something else.
  • If you constantly fret about timing things perfectly, they’ll never happen.
• Draw a line in the sand:
  • Great businesses have a point of view, not just a product or service.
  • Strong opinions aren’t free. You’ll turn some people off. They’ll accuse you of being arrogant and aloof. That’s life.
  • When you don’t know what you believe, everything becomes an argument. Everything is debatable. But when you stand for something, decisions are obvious.
  • There’s no point in selling a few more sandwiches if the bread isn’t good. A few bucks isn’t going to make up for selling food we can’t be proud of.
• Mission statement impossible:
  • Standing for something isn’t just about writing it down. It’s about believing it and living it.
• Outside money is Plan Z:
  • We’re in a service economy now. Service businesses (e.g., consultants, software companies, wedding planners, graphic designers, and hundreds of others) don’t require much to get going. If you’re running a business like that, avoid outside funding.
  • You give up control. When you turn to outsiders for funding, you have to answer to them too. That’s fine at first, when everyone agrees. But what happens down the road? Are you starting your own business to take orders from someone else? Raise money and that’s what you’ll wind up doing.
  • It’s just not worth it. We hear over and over from business owners who have gone down this road and regret it. They usually give a variation on the investment-hangover story: First, you get that quick investment buzz. But then you start having meetings with your investors and/or board of directors, and you’re like, “Oh man, what have I gotten myself into?” Now someone else is calling the shots.
• You need less than you think:
  • Great companies start in garages all the time. Yours can too.
• Start a business, not a startup:
  • The startup is a magical place. It’s a place where expenses are someone else’s problem. It’s a place where that pesky thing called revenue is never an issue.
  • It’s a place where the laws of business physics don’t apply.
  • Anyone who takes a “we’ll figure out how to profit in the future” attitude to business is being ridiculous.
  • A business without a path to profit isn’t a business, it’s a hobby.
  • Actual businesses have to deal with actual things like bills and payroll. Actual businesses worry about profit from day one.
  • Act like an actual business and you’ll have a much better shot at succeeding.
• Building to flip is building to flop:
  • Another thing you hear a lot: “What’s your exit strategy?” You hear it even when you’re just beginning.
  • You need a commitment strategy, not an exit strategy.
  • When you build a company with the intention of being acquired, you emphasize the wrong things.
  • Instead of focusing on getting customers to love you, you worry about who’s going to buy you. That’s the wrong thing to obsess over.
  • If you do manage to get a good thing going, keep it going. Good things don’t come around that often. Don’t let your business be the one that got away.
• Less mass:
  • Embrace the idea of having less mass. Right now, you’re the smallest, the leanest, and the fastest you’ll ever be.
  • From here on out, you’ll start accumulating mass. And the more massive an object, the more energy required to change its direction.
  • The more expensive it is to make a change, the less likely you are to make it.

Chapter 4 - Progress

• Embrace constraints:
  • “I don’t have enough time/money/people/experience.” Stop whining. Less is a good thing.
  • Limited resources force you to make do with what you’ve got. There’s no room for waste.
  • And that forces you to be creative.
  • Ever seen the weapons prisoners make out of soap or a spoon? They make do with what they’ve got.
  • Creativity is born from embracing constraints.
  • So before you sing the “not enough” blues, see how far you can get with what you have.
• Build half a product, not a half-assed product:
  • You can turn a bunch of great ideas into a crappy product real fast by trying to do them all at once. You just can’t do everything you want to do and do it well.
  • Lots of things get better as they get shorter.
  • Directors cut good scenes to make a great movie. Musicians drop good tracks to make a great album. Writers eliminate good pages to make a great book. We cut this book in half between the next-to-last and final drafts. From 57,000 words to about 27,000 words. Trust us, it’s better for it.
  • So start chopping. Getting to great starts by cutting out stuff that’s merely good.
• Start at the epicenter:
  • If I took this away, would what I’m selling still exist.
  • Which part of your equation can’t be removed? If you can continue to get by without this thing or that thing, then those things aren’t the epicenter.
  • When you find it, you’ll know.
• Ignore the details early on:
  • Architects don’t worry about which tiles go in the shower or which brand of dishwasher to install in the kitchen until after the floor plan is finalized.
  • They know it’s better to decide these details later.
  • Details make the difference. But getting infatuated with details too early leads to disagreement, meetings, and delays.
  • So ignore the details—for a while. Nail the basics first and worry about the specifics later.
  • When we start designing something, we sketch out ideas with a big, thick Sharpie marker, instead of a ballpoint pen. Why? Pen points are too fine. They’re too high-resolution.
  • Walt Stanchfield, famed drawing instructor for Walt Disney Studios, used to encourage animators to “forget the detail” at first. The reason: Detail just doesn’t buy you anything in the early stages.
• Making the call is making progress:
  • When you put off decisions, they pile up. And piles end up ignored, dealt with in haste, or thrown out. As a result, the individual problems in those piles stay unresolved.
  • Don’t wait for the perfect solution. Decide and move forward.
  • Decisions are progress.
  • You can’t build on top of “We’ll decide later,” but you can build on top of “Done.”
  • The problem comes when you postpone decisions in the hope that a perfect answer will come to you later. It won’t.
  • You’re as likely to make a great call today as you are tomorrow.
  • It doesn’t matter how much you plan, you’ll still get some stuff wrong anyway. Don’t make things worse by overanalyzing and delaying before you even get going.
  • Long projects zap morale.
• Be a curator:
  • What makes a museum great is the stuff that’s not on the walls. Someone says no.
  • It’s the stuff you leave out that matters.
  • So constantly look for things to remove, simplify, and streamline.
  • Be a curator. Stick to what’s truly essential. Pare things down until you’re left with only the most important stuff. Then do it again. You can always add stuff back in later if you need to.
  • The owner actually tried the oil and chooses to carry it based on its taste. It’s not about packaging, marketing, or price. It’s about quality. He tried it and knew his store had to carry it. That’s the approach you should take too.
• Throw less at the problem:
  • Watch chef Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares and you’ll see a pattern. The menus at failing restaurants offer too many dishes.
  • The owners think making every dish under the sun will broaden the appeal of the restaurant. Instead, it makes for crappy food (and creates inventory headaches).
  • That’s why Ramsay’s first step is nearly always to trim the menu, usually from thirty-plus dishes to around ten. Think about that.
  • Improving the current menu doesn’t come first. Trimming it down comes first.
  • More people, time, and money. All that ends up doing is making the problem bigger. The right way to go is the opposite direction: Cut back.
• Focus on what won’t change:
  • The core of your business should be built around things that won’t change.
  • You start focusing on fashion instead of substance. You start paying attention to things that are constantly changing instead of things that last.
  • Things that people are going to want today and ten years from now.
  • Amazon focuses on fast (or free) shipping, great selection, friendly return policies, and affordable prices.
  • Japanese automakers also focus on core principles that don’t change: reliability, affordability, and practicality.
• Tone is in your fingers:
  • Guitar gurus say, “Tone is in your fingers.” You can buy the same guitar, effects pedals, and amplifier that Eddie Van Halen uses. But when you play that rig, it’s still going to sound like you.
  • Fancy gear can help, but the truth is your tone comes from you.
  • It’s tempting for people to obsess over tools instead of what they’re going to do with those tools.
  • Many amateur golfers think they need expensive clubs. But it’s the swing that matters, not the club. Give Tiger Woods a set of cheap clubs and he’ll still destroy you.
  • People use equipment as a crutch. They don’t want to put in the hours on the driving range so they spend a ton in the pro shop. They’re looking for a shortcut. But you just don’t need the best gear in the world to be good. And you definitely don’t need it to get started.
  • In business, too many people obsess over tools, software tricks, scaling issues, fancy office space, lavish furniture, and other frivolities instead of what really matters. And what really matters is how to actually get customers and make money.
  • You also see it in people who want to blog, podcast, or shoot videos for their business but get hung up on which tools to use. The content is what matters.
• Sell your by-products:
  • The rock band Wilco found a valuable by-product in its recording process. The band filmed the creation of an album and released it as a documentary called I Am Trying to Break Your Heart. It offered an uncensored and fascinating look at the group’s creative process and infighting. The band made money off the movie and also used it as a stepping-stone toward reaching a wider audience.
  • Software companies don’t usually think about writing books. Bands don’t usually think about filming the recording process. Car manufacturers don’t usually think about selling charcoal.
  • There's probably something you haven’t thought about that you could sell too.
• Launch now:
  • When is your product or service finished? When should you put it out on the market? When is it safe to let people have it? Probably a lot sooner than you’re comfortable with.
  • Once your product does what it needs to do, get it out there.
  • Just because you’ve still got a list of things to do doesn’t mean it’s not done. Don’t hold everything else up because of a few leftovers.
  • Think about it this way: If you had to launch your business in two weeks, what would you cut out?
  • You suddenly realize there’s a lot of stuff you don’t need. And what you do need seems obvious.
  • When you impose a deadline, you gain clarity.
  • It’s the best way to get to that gut instinct that tells you, “We don’t need this.”
  • Put off anything you don’t need for launch. Build the necessities now, worry about the luxuries later.
  • This approach just recognizes that the best way to get there is through iterations. Stop imagining what’s going to work. Find out for real.

Chapter 5 - Productivity

• Illusions of agreement:
  • If you need to explain something, try getting real with it.
  • Instead of describing what something looks like, draw it. Instead of explaining what something sounds like, hum it. Do everything you can to remove layers of abstraction.
  • The problem with abstractions (like reports and documents) is that they create illusions of agreement.
  • Get the chisel out and start making something real. Anything else is just a distraction.
• Reasons to quit:
  • It’s easy to put your head down and just work on what you think needs to be done. It’s a lot harder to pull your head up and ask why.
  • Why are you doing this? What problem are you solving? Is this actually useful? Are you adding value? Adding something is easy; adding value is hard. Will this change behavior? Is there an easier way? Is it really worth it?
  • Sometimes abandoning what you’re working on is the right move, even if you’ve already put in a lot of effort.
  • Don’t throw good time after bad work.
• Interruption is the enemy of productivity:
  • When do you get most of your work done? It’s no coincidence that these are the times when nobody else is around.
  • Long stretches of alone time are when you’re most productive.
  • When you don’t have to mind-shift between various tasks, you get a boatload done.
  • The alone zone is where the real productivity magic happens.
• Meetings are toxic
• Good enough is fine:
  • A lot of people get off on solving problems with complicated solutions. Flexing your intellectual muscles can be intoxicating. Then you start looking for another big challenge that gives you that same rush, regardless of whether it’s a good idea or not.
  • Find a judo solution, one that delivers maximum efficiency with minimum effort.
  • One way to do it is to climb Mount Everest. That’s the ambitious solution. But then again, you could take an elevator to the top of a tall building. That’s a judo solution.
  • Problems can usually be solved with simple, mundane solutions.
  • When good enough gets the job done, go for it. It’s way better than wasting resources or, even worse, doing nothing because you can’t afford the complex solution.
  • And remember, you can usually turn good enough into great later.
• Quick wins:
  • Momentum fuels motivation. It keeps you going. It drives you.
  • The way you build momentum is by getting something done and then moving on to the next thing.
  • No one likes to be stuck on an endless project with no finish line in sight.
  • Being in the trenches for nine months and not having anything to show for it is a real buzzkill. Eventually, it just burns you out.
  • The longer something takes, the less likely it is that you’re going to finish it.
  • Excitement comes from doing something and then letting customers have at it.
  • Small victories let you celebrate and release good news.
• Don’t be a hero:
  • A lot of times it’s better to be a quitter than a hero.
  • The task was worth it when you thought it would cost two hours, not sixteen. In those sixteen hours, you could have gotten a bunch of other things done.
  • Even heroes need a fresh pair of eyes sometimes—someone else to give them a reality check.
  • People automatically associate quitting with failure, but sometimes that’s exactly what you should do.
• Go to sleep:
  • Forgoing sleep is a bad idea.
  • You destroy your creativity, morale, and attitude.
  • Once in a while, you can pull an all-nighter if you fully understand the consequences. Just don’t make it a habit. If it becomes a constant, the costs start to mount:
  • Stubbornness: When you’re really tired, it always seems easier to plow down whatever bad path you happen to be on instead of reconsidering the route. The finish line is a constant mirage and you wind up walking in the desert way too long.
  • Lack of creativity: What distinguishes people who are ten times more effective than the norm is not that they work ten times as hard; it’s that they use their creativity to come up with solutions that require one-tenth of the effort. Without sleep, you stop coming up with those one-tenth solutions.
  • Diminished morale: When your brain isn’t firing on all cylinders, it loves to feed on less demanding tasks. Like reading yet another article about stuff that doesn’t matter. When you’re tired, you lose motivation to attack the big problems.
  • Irritability: Your ability to remain patient and tolerant is severely reduced when you’re tired.
  • It’ll come back to bite them in the ass.
• Your estimates suck:
  • We’re all terrible estimators. We think we can guess how long something will take, when we really have no idea.
  • Even with these simple tasks, our estimates are often off by a factor of two or more.
  • If we can’t be accurate when estimating a few hours, how can we expect to accurately predict the length of a “six-month project”?
  • Break the big thing into smaller things.
  • The smaller it is, the easier it is to estimate.
  • You’re probably still going to get it wrong, but you’ll be a lot less wrong than if you estimated a big project.
• Long lists don’t get done:
  • Start making smaller to-do lists too.
  • Long lists collect dust.
  • Whenever you can, divide problems into smaller and smaller pieces until you’re able to deal with them completely and quickly.
  • Simply rearranging your tasks this way can have an amazing impact on your productivity and motivation.
• Make tiny decisions:
  • Big decisions are hard to make and hard to change.
  • And once you make one, the tendency is to continue believing you made the right decision, even if you didn’t. You stop being objective.
  • The desire to save face trumps the desire to make the right call.
  • The more steam you put into going in one direction, the harder it is to change course.
  • When you make tiny decisions, you can’t make big mistakes. These small decisions mean you can afford to change. There’s no big penalty if you mess up. You just fix it.
  • Polar explorer Ben Saunders said that during his solo North Pole expedition (thirty-one marathons back-to-back, seventy-two days alone) the “huge decision” was often so horrifically overwhelming to contemplate that his day-to-day decision-making rarely extended beyond “getting to that bit of ice a few yards in front of me.”
  • Attainable goals like that are the best ones to have.

Also read: Rework Summary - Part 2, appendly, Seed.