Reviews
Smarter Faster Better: The Secrets of Being Productive in Life and Business by Charles Duhigg
tylercritchfield's review against another edition
3.0
This book read like the Malcolm Gladwell books I've read, where the author makes his point with related anecdotes and research studies. Each chapter had interesting ideas that I enjoyed learning about and that I'm interested to apply to my day-to-day life. Overall, these were great tips to do things better, but I did feel it was missing cohesion of ideas. Each chapter existed well on its own but didn't fit together that well.
For those interested, here is a brief summary of the topics he discusses:
- Gain motivation from taking charge of your decisions
- Combine stretch goals with SMART goals to achieve bigger and better things
- Improve focus from building mental models of what you expect to happen in a given situation
- Use probabilistic thinking to make better decisions
- Foster better teamwork productivity by creating an environment where everyone feels heard and free to speak up
- In management, give more authority to those closest to the problem to maximize their expertise
- Encourage innovation and creativity from your own experiences and by combining older ideas in new ways
- Absorb data and information better by making it harder to process in your mind (i.e. handwriting notes instead of recording lectures) - This ironic approach makes it easier to remember and test new theories with
For those interested, here is a brief summary of the topics he discusses:
- Gain motivation from taking charge of your decisions
- Combine stretch goals with SMART goals to achieve bigger and better things
- Improve focus from building mental models of what you expect to happen in a given situation
- Use probabilistic thinking to make better decisions
- Foster better teamwork productivity by creating an environment where everyone feels heard and free to speak up
- In management, give more authority to those closest to the problem to maximize their expertise
- Encourage innovation and creativity from your own experiences and by combining older ideas in new ways
- Absorb data and information better by making it harder to process in your mind (i.e. handwriting notes instead of recording lectures) - This ironic approach makes it easier to remember and test new theories with
dmturner's review
4.0
Duhigg is a thorough and very readable writer who tells useful stories and organizes ideas well. I enjoyed his book on developing habits, so I picked up Smarter Faster Better when it came out. At first, I was less interested in it, because unlike The Power of Habit it seemed less content-driven and more narrative, a conventional self-help book. I even gave up on it for a while. But then, when I finished it finally and went back to skim it for main ideas, I realized it had a nicely coherent and well-researched set of ideas for making effective decisions.
Anyone who has read many of this kind of books will be familiar with the assertions in it, of course. Successful people have a strong locus of control, remind themselves of why they are doing things rather than being too task-focused, encourage psychological safety in their teams, avoid cognitive tunneling and reactive thinking by visualizing what things should look like, and create mental models. They set both stretch and SMART goals, create commitment cultures, think probabilistically and see the future as a collection of potential possibilities. They take ideas from other settings, pay attention to how things make them feel and think, and reframe situations to create tension and dissonance. They make data disfluent and process it actively rather than absorbing it passively, and they break problems into smaller pieces to make it easier to process. What makes the book worth reading is the combination of well-analyzed narrative and good research, which allow the reader to envision putting the ideas into action.
That is: A readable and worthwhile book, more conventional and focusing closer to the ground than The Power of Habit.
Anyone who has read many of this kind of books will be familiar with the assertions in it, of course. Successful people have a strong locus of control, remind themselves of why they are doing things rather than being too task-focused, encourage psychological safety in their teams, avoid cognitive tunneling and reactive thinking by visualizing what things should look like, and create mental models. They set both stretch and SMART goals, create commitment cultures, think probabilistically and see the future as a collection of potential possibilities. They take ideas from other settings, pay attention to how things make them feel and think, and reframe situations to create tension and dissonance. They make data disfluent and process it actively rather than absorbing it passively, and they break problems into smaller pieces to make it easier to process. What makes the book worth reading is the combination of well-analyzed narrative and good research, which allow the reader to envision putting the ideas into action.
That is: A readable and worthwhile book, more conventional and focusing closer to the ground than The Power of Habit.
readyxaimsxfire's review
4.0
A lot of great insights and super helpful real-life examples of each of the conflicts. I have fallen down several black holes already reading about the real-life examples as some of them were truly fascinating! I’ve already started putting some things to practical use in my own life and I’m seeing results.
tabithar's review
4.0
In my opinion, this book was worth the time. I went back and listened to the appendix (in which he broke down steps more succinctly but still used a new example to tie it together) a second time and made notes. I feel like there are a couple of other common links between some of the observations made beyond what he mentioned and that "teams" is not an actual method. However, he also made it clear (by the end) that the focus was on the top 8 factors that he felt impacted focus, motivation, and productivity. Unfortunately, when he said that, I was surprised. It wasn't clear to me from listening what each of those were. Of them, I could identify most when I looked for the table of contents online. A summary chart, table, or graphic for them would be a helpful visual.
One thing that would have improved it would be to break things down into more action steps. It seemed like some of the stories over generalized without making the points more clear.
This is a book I can see going back to again. It would be good for book club and work team discussions.
One thing that would have improved it would be to break things down into more action steps. It seemed like some of the stories over generalized without making the points more clear.
This is a book I can see going back to again. It would be good for book club and work team discussions.
canadianoranges's review
4.0
Lots of actionable examples are given to increase your productivity, focus and creativity. Though the chapter about Pixar seems to be right out of Creativity, Inc.
emmanuelbg's review
1.0
Terrible book. Filled with mildly related and boring "stories" to help illustrate points which, in all honestly, aren't quite relevant. Very tedious read, especially compared to "the power of habit" which was by far better; maybe having a specific topic on which to focus is better than trying to cover lots of them poorly.
mzdeb's review
3.0
I received a digital ARC from NetGalley.
Had the same thought as every review I've read so far: interesting concepts and riveting stories--that I rushed through thinking, "OK, but how do I apply this to ME?" So there's this chapter at the very end, as if Duhigg realized, "Oh, right, I should finally tell people how to use this, huh?" And it's too little too late. I feel he sort of squandered the reputation he earned for "The Power of Habit" and people might not readily run out and buy any third book he might write after
Had the same thought as every review I've read so far: interesting concepts and riveting stories--that I rushed through thinking, "OK, but how do I apply this to ME?" So there's this chapter at the very end, as if Duhigg realized, "Oh, right, I should finally tell people how to use this, huh?" And it's too little too late. I feel he sort of squandered the reputation he earned for "The Power of Habit" and people might not readily run out and buy any third book he might write after
priyankav's review
5.0
Outstanding book. Highly recommend to anyone who is trying to connect to their younger and more intuitive selves and the little things we did as children to study better and be happier.