Reading Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less
A mind web labeled “Areas of Focus” points to different areas of focus. The areas include Design, Copy, and Brand Strategy.
I finished reading Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown at a critical time in my career.
As you may know, I work at a super cool startup, and like many startups it is full of eager life-long learners and multiple hat-wearers like myself. Every day I see how much people I report to and work with take on and accomplish; it makes me want to say: “YES! I can do everything you need and more!”
I found myself tasked with different kinds of design work, especially graphic design. My area of expertise is product design, but I was toying with the idea of developing some skills in graphic design. Many intriguing projects were being lobbed my way; I wanted to help.
I said: “Yes, I can design a flowchart for our customers!”
I justified it by thinking: Wow! This will improve our new customer’s understanding of the product.
“I would love to work up some banner images for advertisements!”
Maybe I can help set expectations for new users and increase their CTR.
“I bet I could make a really cool looking weekly banner for that email list!”
Maybe I should request access to Photoshop to become faster at these graphic asks?
After completing these tasks, I realized I had to start saying no. And I did! No. No. And no! I needed to decide where my attention, growth, and focus would be most impactful for myself and for the company.
As the expert of myself, my strengths, and my projects, I needed to decide where best to allocate my time. I asked myself, what is taking me away from product and experience design?
No more graphic design, no more copy outlines, no more icons, no more compliance QA!
And what happened when I started saying no? I found that people respected my answer, which allowed me to laser focus on my actual product work which started moving faster and with better quality and strategy. Also, saying no forced us to hire a graphic design contractor, and guess what? His work is amazing! Way beyond what I was achieving with my baby graphic design skills.
Whew, am I glad I found essentialism and essentialist philosophy when I did.
“You can do anything, but you can’t do everything.”
Reading this book forced me to take a step back and think about how I really wanted to be effective for myself, my team, and my company. I can be a mediocre jack of all trades, or a master of a few.
I choose mastery and focus.
Here’s how I’m currently integrating essentialism into my life:
Make time for thinking and strategizing to ensure my essential activities support my goals
Journal a little everyday to stay on track and review journal entries
Complete small wins to build momentum for big projects
Use routine to enable deep work, focus, and creativity
Improve upon the constraints that inhibit my progress towards completing big projects
This is just a small part of the essentialist philosophy, and I know I’ll reread this book to ensure I’m staying on the essentialist path and maximizing my skills and strengths.
You can find Essentialism here.
