Book SummaryRework, by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson

1-Page Summary1-Page Book Summary of Rework

Co-founders Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson of 37signals, a company that creates project-management software and other online management tools, believe that anyone can start and operate a business with fewer resources than they think. Based on the authors’ own startup success, their book Rework champions a simpler, cheaper, less labor-intensive way to manage any company.

Rework’s less-is-more philosophy deconstructs conventional business wisdom and rewrites it according to today's Internet-based paradigm. It shows that you don't need an MBA, outside investors, strategic plans, or a board of directors to launch a business. You also don't need to work 100 hours per week or hire 100 employees. You don't even need an office. Instead, reject old-school thinking, embrace simplicity, and run your company like a smart, frugal, well-oiled machine.

In this summary, we’ll cover various elements of Fried and Hansson's business philosophy, including advice on:

• Ignoring old-school business advice
• Starting and maintaining your business
• Ignoring the competition
• Upgrading and promoting your product
• Hiring employees and helping them thrive
• Managing your business’s reputation

Ignore Old-School Business Myths

Much of what we've learned about business is no longer true, but plenty of people still buy into the myths. They’re impressed when you run a big company in a high-rise building with a lot of employees, but they're not nearly as impressed when you work out of your garage by yourself.

But company growth is highly overrated. What really matters is "appropriate size." Your one-person company may be far more profitable than someone else's 100-person company.

Additionally, many people admire workers who burn the midnight oil to make a deadline or give up their weekends to finish a big project. They’re seen as truly dedicated to their company’s success. But workaholism doesn't turn profits. Productivity occurs when you figure out the fastest, smartest, and most efficient way to get things done—not when you pull all-nighters.

Start Your Business

The best companies are ones that produce a meaningful product—one that has a positive impact on the world. Your product doesn't have to influence millions of people, but it should make at least a few lives better or easier.

Ideally, your product should also make your own life easier. If you set out to invent something that you personally want or need, you'll make the best product possible. Many businesses have started this way: James Dyson was vacuuming his house one day and got frustrated by how often the vacuum lost suction, so he invented the Dyson cyclonic vacuum.

Don’t Seek Outside Funding

Don't fall into the trap of seeking outside funding or borrowing a pile of cash to start your business. Sure, it sounds great to have a big influx of cash to spend. But it comes with strings attached—like a board of directors who will tell you how to run your company. You'll find yourself working to please your investors rather than your customers.

Do More With Less

You may think you need tons of money to go into business, but you don't. In fact, you’re better off if you start up your business with as little as possible because it will force you to economize. Don't hire employees. Don't rent office space. Don't pay for advertising. Do everything you can to operate your business on a shoestring.

Don't view budget constraints or time constraints as negative limits—working with what you have leads to creativity and innovation as you look for inventive ways to cheaply produce an excellent product, and it will help you keep your product simple.

Keep Moving Forward

Once you've made a product, it's time to move forward with releasing it. Most business owners put so much time and energy into creating their product, they're afraid to release it into the world. They keep tinkering endlessly because they fear it's not good enough yet.

Don't put off your launch because you're trying to attain perfection. Go ahead and unleash the earliest, not-yet-perfect version of your product. You'll gain valuable knowledge from user feedback—you'll learn what works and what doesn't, which you can use to launch product version 2.0.

Make Decisions—Don’t Sit on Them

Don't let the fear of making a bad decision slow you down or stop you from deciding at all. It's far more productive to make the wrong decision now than to put off deciding until later. You can build on a less-than-perfect decision by making corrections and alterations, but you can't build on an empty void in which no decision was made.

Keep Focused on the Core of Your Business

Consider what makes up the foundation of your business and make that your top priority. For example, if you've opened a burger joint, focus on the burgers, not the condiments. If you've opened a flower shop, focus on the flowers, not the vases. Sure, there's always other stuff you could work on, but focus on the core.

Maintain Your Momentum

Running a business requires expending energy in many different directions. You need to know when your time and energy would be better spent doing something else. Evaluate whether that energy is well spent by analyzing the value of your projects at frequent intervals:

• Do you understand why you're doing this project? What are the benefits of completing it? Who will benefit from it?
• Is the problem you're trying to solve real or imaginary? On a scale of 1 to 10, how important is this problem?
• Is the project you're working on truly beneficial, or is it just fun to work on?
• If you're adding a feature or component to a product that already exists, are you adding quantifiable value to the product? Will the new feature...

Rework Summary Chapters 1-2: Ignore Old-School Business Myths

Co-founders Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson of 37signals, a company that creates project-management software and other online management tools, believe that anyone can start and operate a business, and they can do it with fewer resources than they think. Based on their own startup success, Fried and Hansson champion a simpler, cheaper, less labor-intensive way to manage any company. Rework details the insights the pair gained while keeping 37signals intentionally small, lean, and low-maintenance.

Chapters 1 and 2 contain a list of principles that deconstruct conventional business thinking. In brief, you don't need an MBA, outside investors, strategic plans, or a board of directors to launch a business. You don't need to work 100 hours per week or hire 100 employees. You don't even need an office. Instead, you need to reject old-school myths, embrace simplicity, and run your company like a smart, frugal, well-oiled machine.

Principle 1: Don't Listen to Naysayers

The world is filled with pessimists who will tell you that your innovative business ideas and product concepts won't work because people aren’t ready for something new. They'll also say that...

Shortform Exercise: Examine Your Beliefs About Entrepreneurship

Take a few minutes to examine your beliefs about what it's like to start a business.

Briefly describe your mental image of what an entrepreneur looks like. (For example, do you picture an entrepreneur (or a “starter”) as an MBA in a button-down shirt who works 100 hours per week? Or do you picture someone who tinkers in their garage, rides their mountain bike every day, and frequently borrows money?)

Rework Summary Chapter 3: Start Your Business

Now that we’ve deconstructed the old entrepreneurial paradigm, let’s explore how to create a product or launch a new business using the innovative principles that worked for the authors’ company, 37signals. These principles include:

• Creating a product that improves people’s lives
• Building your product with scant resources
• Avoiding the trap of seeking outside funding
• Paying close attention to your bottom line

Principle 1: Create Something Meaningful

The business you're starting should make a positive impact on the world. Any business that doesn't will quickly feel meaningless. If your product or invention makes even a few people's lives better or easier, you'll gain deep satisfaction from your work. Plus, your business will have a much greater chance of success.

Model for success: Craigslist was started by one man, Craig Newmark, and it's one of the Internet's most influential websites. It makes people’s lives better by helping them connect with each other within their local communities, whether to find a job, rent an apartment, sell an old refrigerator, or find a new tennis partner. Craigslist has survived on the Internet for a quarter of a...

Rework Summary Chapter 4: Move Ahead With Less

Now that we’ve discussed how to start your new company, we’ll cover how to run it with minimal resources for maximum efficiency. We’ll also discuss the importance of making decisions and moving forward—not waiting for the perfect time or the perfect scenario. That includes releasing your product even if it doesn’t seem 100 percent ready and ignoring small details as you focus on your product’s functionality.

Principle 1: Recognize Constraints Are Good for You

Don't view budget constraints or time constraints as negative limits—they actually help your business run more efficiently and economically. Also, having to work with what you have leads to creativity and innovation as you look for inventive ways to cheaply produce an excellent product.

Do This, Not That

Create constraints even if they don't exist. When developing a new product, don't throw tons of staff hours and money at it. Instead, allocate only bare minimum resources. That will force you to keep your product simple, which will help your company run efficiently.

Model for success: Southwest Airlines flies only Boeing 737s, so all of its excess parts fit all of its planes. Its flight crews can work...

Shortform Exercise: Find the Core of Your Business

To make the best use of your time and energy at work, focus on the essential core of your business and don’t get sidetracked by less essential parts.

What's the most essential part of your business? (To find this out, ask yourself: If I took away XX from my business, would I still have a business? Fill in XX with whatever is appropriate. For example, if you run a hamburger stand, you can take away the ketchup and the diet soda and still run a hamburger stand, but you can't take away the hamburgers.)

Shortform Exercise: Make Your Product Timeless

Successful businesses are built around features that customers want today and will still want in the future. Your product should include elements that have a timeless, permanent appeal.

Consider a product you're developing (or think about your existing product). Will it still be relevant—and in demand—in 10 or 20 years? Why or why not?

Rework Summary Chapter 5: Maintain Your Momentum

In this chapter, we’ll discuss how to keep your business moving forward after your product is launched. Specifically, we’ll discuss:

• How to ensure that people quickly understand your product plans and new concepts
• How to evaluate whether you’re putting your efforts into worthwhile projects
• How to make every day more productive by building in silent, uninterrupted work sessions,
• Why meetings are time-wasters
• Why you shouldn’t trust your estimations.

Principle 1: Don’t Write a Report, Make a Model

If you want people to understand a new concept or product plan, make a model of it. Draw it. Sculpt it. Make your vision "real" in any way that doesn't require the unhelpful abstraction of language or the dullness of a document.

Model for success: When Alaska Airlines wanted to imagine what future airports would look like and how their employees could function most efficiently in them, they built a miniature airport inside a warehouse. Then they tested their prototype by putting real people to work in their mocked-up airport.

Principle 2: Constantly Analyze the Value of Your Efforts

Instead of just hammering away at a project, analyze the...

Shortform Exercise: Find a “Good Enough” Solution

Sometimes business owners get stuck on a problem because they’re searching for an ideal solution. To get unstuck, they need to give up on finding a perfect answer and embrace the concept of “good enough,” or achieving maximum efficiency with minimal effort.

Consider the current state of your business. Describe a problem that you haven’t yet solved because you haven’t come up with a perfect solution.

Rework Summary Chapter 6: Ignore the Competition

In this chapter, we’ll explore the importance of ignoring the competition. What your competition does is out of your control, but what your company does is within your control, so that’s where you should focus your energy. You won’t achieve success by copying what somebody else is doing—in fact, you might succeed by doing exactly the opposite.

Principle 1: Don't Copy Existing Products

Copying may seem like a great shortcut to building a business, but it's bad policy. When you create a knockoff product or write a book that reads much like the latest bestseller, you don't get to experience the many-layered process of invention. You won't understand why a product looks the way it does or functions the way it does. Worst of all, you'll put your company in the backseat instead of in the driver's seat: You've made your company a follower, not a leader.

Principle 2: Make Your Product Unique to You

To stand out from the crowd, inject some of your individual...

Rework Summary Chapter 7: Be Prudent About Upgrades

Another important element of running a business is deciding when and if you should make improvements or upgrades to your product. Customers may request modifications, but that doesn’t mean you should make them—even if it means your customers outgrow your product.

Principle 1: Don't Say Yes to Modifications

Your customers may ask you to add features to your product. Don't say yes just because they're customers. Make "no" your default answer. Liberal use of the word "no" keeps you focused on your priorities rather than distracted by continual product tweaks. (Of course, your "no" must be polite. Explain your reasons and most people will understand.)

As a corollary to this principle, don’t bother keeping track of all the upgrade requests your customers ask for. If they're asking for something worthwhile, you'll hear that request so often...

Rework Summary Chapter 8: Promote Your Product on the Cheap

In this chapter, we’ll discuss how and when to publicize your product, and how to do it with little or no advertising budget. Specifically, we’ll cover:

• The benefits of giving away free information about your industry and your company
• How to build brand loyalty via social media
• Why factory tours create loyal customers
• How to get attention from industry-specific media

Principle 1: Savor Obscurity While You Have It

When you’re just starting out, don’t rush to promote your product. You might think you want everybody to know your company's name, but obscurity has its advantages: You can try out new ideas, take risks, make mistakes, and fix problems without the whole world watching.

Principle 2: Get Free Advertising by Posting (and Teaching) Online

Previously, you had to buy expensive ads to reach potential customers. Now, you can reach them via the Internet for free (or nearly free). Tweet about your product. Write a blog about it. Shoot promotional videos and post them on Instagram or YouTube. You'll get a lot of attention, and if people are interested in what you're tweeting, blogging, and posting, they will probably be interested in your...

Shortform Exercise: Teach People About Your Industry

If you run a business, you’re an expert in a lot of things—probably more than you realize—and other people would like to learn what you know. Even if you don’t see yourself as social-media-savvy, you can make your brand stand out by teaching people about your particular business or the industry you work in.

What interesting or useful information do you know about the industry your business operates in? (For example, if your company makes tennis balls, you definitely know a lot about tennis balls, but you probably also know how to hit a perfect serve, what the best tennis clubs in the country are, how to teach tennis to kids, and so on.)

Rework Summary Chapter 9: Add to Your Team (or Don't)

The principles in this chapter spell out when and how to hire (and when not to). We’ll explore:

• How to know when to increase your staff
• How to properly evaluate resumes and credentials
• How to choose among your top candidates for any position

Principle 1: Don't Hire Until You’ve Done the Job Yourself

As a business owner, you need to know how to do every job in your company before you hire someone else to do it. That's the only way you'll know if the position should be full-time or part-time, what questions to ask potential employees, and whether the person you hire is actually doing a good job.

It may feel uncomfortable to do a job you don't know how to do, but do it anyway. The knowledge you gain will pay off: You'll develop a deep understanding of every aspect of your business.

Model for success: The authors wore the hats of system administrator and customer support representative at 37signals before they hired someone for those roles. Their experience doing those jobs helped them to hire people who had the most appropriate skills: They knew what those skills were because they’d had to develop them themselves.

Principle 2: Don't Hire...

Rework Summary Chapter 10: Manage Your Company's Reputation

In this next chapter of the summary, we’ll tackle how to manage your company's reputation in good times and bad. We’ll look at tips on:

• How to apologize when your company makes an error
• How to deal with complaints about product changes
• How to provide great customer service every day

Principle 1: Own Up to Your Mistakes

Thanks to the Internet, anything and everything your business does (or doesn't do) can go viral. If you've made a mistake, don't deceive yourself that you'll be able to cover it up. Take a lesson from the 1989 Exxon environmental disaster, when the tanker Valdez spilled 11 million gallons of oil into Alaska's Prince William Sound. Exxon turned their mistake into a public relations disaster by not responding to the crisis immediately. The media crucified them.

Model for success: In contrast, when Ashland Oil spilled oil into a river near Pittsburgh, the company chairman traveled to the scene immediately, held a press conference, and got crews working on cleaning up the mess. By managing the crisis openly and immediately, the company saved face.

Do This, Not That

If your business screws up, tell your...

Rework Summary Chapter 11: Help Your Employees Thrive

In this final chapter of the summary, we’ll examine the notion of “company culture.” Specifically, we’ll learn how to create a workplace in which staff members do their best and enjoy their jobs.

Principle 1: Don't Force a "Company Culture" on Your Employees

A great company culture develops over time through consistent positive actions, not by installing foosball tables or espresso machines. If managers treat their employees kindly, kindness will become part of the company culture. If employees leave work daily at 5 p.m., then a healthy work/life balance becomes the cultural norm.

Principle 2: Create a Workplace Where Everyone Flourishes

It's impossible to hire only geniuses and rock stars, so stop trying to. Instead, focus your energies on creating an environment in which every employee can do his or her best work. Even a mediocre employee can do outstanding work in a nurturing workplace. Give your employees the tools, space, privacy, respect, and trust they need to achieve greatness.

Principle 3: Treat Employees Like Adults

It's a waste of time and energy to regulate your employees' work hours or police their actions during the workday. Banning...