Greatest Hits Blog

The one-sentence summary

• The best ideas aren’t always complicated and the incredibly straightforward stuff is often overlooked in the search for a complex answer
• Many smart people lack the set of essential skills which could roughly be described as “common sense”
• There are 7 principles here that can be adapted for attacking most everyday problems

1. Many things are simple – despite our tendency to complicate them
2. You need to know what you’re trying to do – many don’t
3. There is always a sequence of events – make the journey in your head
4. Things don’t get done if people don’t do them – strategic wafflers beware!
5. Things rarely turn out as expected – so plan for the unexpected
6. Things either are or they aren’t – don’t fudge things
7. Look at things from other’s point of view – it will help your expectations

• In a world of over complication, asking some simple questions can really make your life easier. For example:

~ What would be the simplest thing to do here?

~ Describing an issue or a solution in less than 25 words

~ Telling it as though you were telling a six year old

~ Asking whether there is a simpler way

• Try writing the minutes of a meeting before the meeting – then you’ll know what you want to get out of it
• It highlights the difference between duration and effort. “How long will it take you to have a look at that?” “About an hour.” But when?
• It explains the reasons why things don’t get done: confusion, over-commitment, inability – usually busy people never say there’s a problem!
• Plan your time assuming you will have interruptions – the “hot date” scenario

• The orientation is very much based on a project management perspective, which is fine if you are one, but others may prefer to cherry-pick the most applicable ideas
• Anyone who flies by the seat of their pants would have to be very disciplined to apply these ideas. It’s a bit like dieting

WHAT THE BOOK SAYS

• This quirky book explains the benefits of making bad decisions, why unreason is better than reason, and shows how risk is the security in your life. It’s about having the confidence to roll the dice.
• The problem with making sensible decisions is that so is everyone else. They are dull, predictable, and lead you nowhere. Unsafe decisions cause you to think and respond in a way you hadn’t thought of.
• I want is better than I wish
• It’s better to regret what you have done than what you haven’t.
• Too many people spend too much time trying to perfect something before they actually do it. Instead of waiting for perfection, run with what you’ve got, and fix it as you go.
• There is no right point of view. There are personal, conventional, large and small ones. You are always both right and wrong. Advances in any field are built upon people with the small or personal point of view.
• What is a good idea? One that happens. One that doesn’t isn’t. If an idea is not taken up as a solution to a problem it has no value.
• Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Authenticity is invaluable. Originality isn’t. “It’s not where you take things from – it’s where you take them to.” Jean-Luc Godard

WHAT’S GOOD ABOUT IT

• The booked is packed full of inspirational and contrary thoughts – just the place to start if you are bogged down or suffering from inertia.
• Until the Mexico Olympics of 1968, high jumpers faced the bar, and the record stood at 5′ 8″. Dick Fosbury turned his back on it and leapt 7′ 4″, by thinking the opposite of everyone else.
• In 1889 George Eastman invented the Kodak brand. It means nothing but was chosen because it was short, was not open to mispronunciation, and could not be associated with anything else.
• “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable man adapts the world to himself. All progress depends on the unreasonable man.” George Bernard Shaw
• Meetings are for those with not enough to do. They are performances, acts to convince people of their own importance.
• The world is what you think of it. So think of it differently and your life will change.

WHAT YOU HAVE TO WATCH

• Not much. This book is all about jumping off points, so don’t expect to be guided by hand through the creative process.