PDF Summary:Essentialism, by Greg McKeown
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1-Page PDF Summary of Essentialism
We feel constantly pressed for time. We try to do too much, yet when someone makes a request, we say yes without thinking. We feel we have to do it all. But because we’re going in so many directions, we make little progress in any of them. Yet most of these activities are trivial. As Greg McKeown, author of Essentialism puts it, we’re majoring in minor activities.
The way out of this trap is to practice essentialism: “do less but better.” McKeown explains how you can distinguish the vital few from the trivial, then eliminate the nonessentials and make your optimum contribution in your life and work.
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2) Eliminate nonessentials: You have trouble getting rid of things because of sunk-cost bias. This means you place a greater value than they’re worth on things you own because you’ve invested in them, so you’re reluctant to get rid of them. To circumvent this bias, ask yourself what you’d be willing to pay for the item if you didn’t already own it. This may be the reality check you need to realize the item’s true worth. Regarding an activity, the question could be, “if it hadn’t just popped up, would I go out of my way to seek out this activity?” If the answer is no, it’s probably not an “essential” activity. Not only must you sort out the nonessentials, whether possessions or activities, you also must actively eliminate them.
3) Execute routinely: For your closet to stay organized, you need a maintenance system that’s automatic. In your life, once you’ve decided what things to pursue (those that enable you to make your highest level contribution), you need a system to make doing the important things simple and routine.
Learn to Say No
One of the most crucial skills for practicing essentialism is saying no. If you can’t say no to the nonessential, you won’t have the time and energy to pursue the truly important things.
Saying no makes us uncomfortable because it’s socially awkward. There seem to be only two options: say no and endure the immediate awkwardness, or say yes and regret it much longer. However, you can learn to say no gracefully and even get people to respect you for it in the process.
Some key principles are:
- It’s the decision, not the person. Rejecting someone’s request isn’t the same as rejecting them. Separate the two in your mind. Then communicate your decision clearly but also kindly. You may want to reject the request without using the word no. For instance, you might say, “I would love to do it, but I’m overcommitted right now.”
- Remember the trade-off. Remembering what you’d give up to say yes makes it easier to say no.
- Accept that you might be temporarily unpopular. When you say no, the other person may be disappointed or angry. However, the anger is usually short term. In the long term, the other person may respect you more for demonstrating that your time is valuable, which is more important than popularity.
- Don’t leave them hanging. Most people would rather have a definitive no than a noncommittal response, such as, “I’ll try to be there,” when you know you won’t. Being frank is more respectful. Besides, delaying a no makes it more difficult for both of you.
Since essentialists say no a lot, it helps to have a repertoire of ways to do it. Here are a few to start with:
1) Employ the pregnant pause: When someone makes a request, pause and wait for them to fill the silence, or just wait a few beats before saying no.
2) Make the rejection gentle: Say “No, but…” For instance, “I’d love to but I have other plans; let’s try it next month.”
3) Buy some time: Saying something like, “I’ll check my calendar and get back to you,” gives you time to think and ultimately reply that you’re unavailable. Just remember not to use this as as a noncommittal response — use it only if you genuinely have to think about it.
4) Use email auto-responses: Many people are accustomed to receiving email auto-responses when others are on vacation or holidays. You can use them more broadly. Indicate that you’re tied up with a project and temporarily unavailable.
5) Suggest someone else: If you know of someone else who might want to help, convey your regrets while suggesting another name.
At the end of life, many people express the wish that they’d had the courage to live on their own terms rather than trying so hard to meet the expectations of others. However, you can be true to yourself,focusing on what’s important to you, by saying no to nonessentials, not randomly, but intentionally as part of an overall strategy. It takes determination and practice, but you can resist business and social pressures to be all things to all people by learning to focus on what’s essential by eliminating everything else.
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PDF Summary Introduction
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Essentialism: Less but Better
- You focus on just a few important things, so you’re headed in one clear direction.
- You make significant progress on those things.
- You function by design rather than by default.
- You make tough trade-offs between what you do and don’t do, but these one-time decisions set you on a path that keeps you from having to make the same types of decisions repeatedly.
- Once you determine what’s essential, you remove obstacles so that achieving the essentials becomes routine.
- You say things like: “I choose to. Is it essential? What are the trade-offs?”
- You stop and ask yourself what matters most.
- You say no to everything nonessential.
- You remove hurdles so projects develop their own momentum.
Results: You do outstanding work, get the right things done, and feel in control and energized.
Nonessentialism: All Things to All People
- You try to do many things at the same time, so you’re going in multiple directions. Because you’re not making choices, others make choices for you and you function by default.
- You flail and make only minuscule progress in multiple activities.
- You say things like: “I have...
PDF Summary Part 1: The Essentialist Mindset
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- You learn to make your optimum contribution in your life, work, and the world.
Imagine a society where schools replaced busywork with important projects that made a difference to the community or where students thought about their highest contribution. What if companies eliminated pointless meetings and let employees work on their most important projects? What if society stopped telling us to buy more, and stopped celebrating busyness as a sign of importance?
In your own life when you commit yourself to discovering and focusing on the essential, you’re ready to clearly answer the question posed by poet Mary Oliver: “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
Changing Your Mindset
Essentialism isn’t a way to do one more thing — it’s a different way to think about and do everything.
We’re constantly pulled toward the flawed logic of nonessentialism: I have to do it. Everything is important. I can do it all. The essentialist replaces these false assumptions with: I will or I won’t do it (it’s my choice). Few things are important. I can do it if it’s important.
An essentialist does three things when faced with options or decisions:...
PDF Summary Part 2: Explore Options
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There are many examples of the benefits of creating space to think:
- Isaac Newton spent two years working in almost solitary confinement on Principia Mathematica, his ground-breaking work on universal gravitation and the laws of motion.
- The author of this book blocked off eight hours a day to write, 5 a.m. to 1 p.m., with no emails, calls or appointments. By creating space to explore, think, and write, he got the book done faster and gained control over how he spent the rest of his time. He also reads from classic inspirational literature for the first 20 minutes of each day in order to broaden his perspective and learn from ideas that have endured for hundreds of years.
- Jeff Weiner, CEO of Linkedin, began scheduling two hours of blank space on his calendar daily because he didn’t have time to think between back-to-back meetings. It’s helped him take charge of his day, instead of being at the mercy of others’ schedules and priorities. He focuses on big-picture questions, such as what the company will look like in a few years or how to better meet customers’ needs.
- While CEO of Microsoft, Bill Gates took a week off twice a year to read and think about...
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Learn more about our summaries →PDF Summary Part 3: Eliminate the Nonessential
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There are two common outcomes when teams aren’t clear on their purpose: members play politics and everyone pursues his or her own agenda.
Playing politics. Instead making their optimum contribution to the group’s goal, team members vy for the manager’s favor or attention by doing such things as undercutting peers, trying to look important, or echoing whatever the manager says or seems to want. These things are both nonessential and counterproductive.
When we lack clear personal goals and values, we behave similarly, making choices that are political or competitive. For instance, we focus on nonessentials like having a nicer car or living in a nicer area than someone else does. Essential activities, such as family relationships and health, get short shrift.
Everyone for himself. When teams lack purpose, members pursue their own interests. Their pursuits may conflict with other members’ activities. When many people pursue different activities, neither the members nor the team make their optimum contribution and the team’s results fall short. In contrast, when teams are clear about their purpose and members perform at their optimum levels, momentum builds and the whole —...
PDF Summary Part 4: Execute Effortlessly
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Nonessentialists assume a best-case scenario, even though things always take longer or are more complicated than expected. They’re forced to react to changes at the last minute and results suffer — for instance, they cut corners or turn in an incomplete report. Their execution is forced and they end up feeling stressed.
Here are some tips for smoothing implementation by creating buffers:
Overprepare: Think about what could go wrong and be ready. During the race to the South Pole in 1911, Roald Amundsen prepared for everything — he brought duplicates of critical items, created extra caches of food and supplies for the return trip, and posted extra flags or markers so they could be found in bad weather or from off course. The other team led by Robert Falcon Scott failed to prepare and ended up not having enough food and supplies, and he and his team didn’t survive.
Beware of the planning fallacy: The planning fallacy refers to people’s tendency to underestimate how long a task will take, even when they’ve done it before. To avoid succumbing to the planning fallacy, always add 50% to any time estimate. For instance, if you expect a conference call to take an hour,...
PDF Summary Appendix: Being an Essentialist Leader
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- Outcome: Unified team makes a significant breakthrough to its highest level of contribution.
Summary of the steps to being an essentialist leader:
- Be extremely selective in hiring people.
- Establish a radically clear essential intent, not a fairly clear one.
- Practice extreme empowerment by having clear roles and goals.
- Communicate clearly, succinctly, and consistently (the right things to the right people at the right time).
- Check in often to ensure meaningful progress. Remove obstacles and encourage small wins.
Leading by applying the principle of less but better will allow your team or organization to make their highest collective contribution and achieve phenomenal results.
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