Customer Reviews

The Simplicity Survival Handbook: 32 Ways to Do Less and Accomplish More

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I have to tell you, I'm done with authors, managers, and companies who ask me to "embrace change," and share tips for "lifelong journeys". I need some help -- now. Can anybody help with all the little things, so they don't add up to big things, and so I'm in more control of my own life?

Yes! Jensen's tips are huge helps! I've started writing memos and emails and presentations and running meetings exactly the way this book describes, and _every single person_ I work with has said, "This is really helpful." "This is so much more useful than what I'm getting from so-and-so." "I really appreciate what you've done. We can be so much more effective now. Thank you!"

These tips have made a huge difference in how focused my team and I are, and how effectively we get things done, and the respect we're earning from everyone else. And most important to me: It took minutes to master the basics...not months or years.

If you are one of those people who continually looks for shortcuts to overcome the overwhelming feeling of overdoing your life, this book is for you. If you are not one of those people, you're probably confounding things for the rest of us-so this book is for you.

If you already seek ways to simplify your life, a lot of the material in this book will stimulate a "Duh" reaction: I already know this stuff. Very good! A gold star for you. Now here's the Big Question: are you actually employing Jensen's simplicity techniques to do less and accomplish more? Or are you one of those well-intentioned people who needs a swift kick every once in a while to get you back on track? This book is full of swift kicks.

A word of caution. If you do all these things as well as the author would expect, you will probably alienate some people who don't get it yet. Be prepared. You may want to temper some of the applications with a little wisdom and sensitivity to the folks you interact with. Chapter 1 is How to Ignore Most Corporate Communications. While there could be a lot of value in that practice, there's also an inherent risk. This juxtaposition runs throughout the book as Jensen somewhat irreverently pokes fun at what so many of us do just because we've always.... You know the drill. Ready to change?

In addition to the read-through text, which can also be used as a reference-thanks to a clear Table of Contents and a triple-comprehensive index, there are tear-out pages with compressed advice clearly presented on single pages. Triple-index? Yes, there are three indexes: by subject, by people, and by organization.

Prepare to feel lectured-to. You'll probably have that feeling in many sections of this book, because you deserve it. Accept what you'll get, trusting in this consultant who understands the topic well enough to write a book that's full of valuable content. The trick is to apply what you learn. That important step will give you great return on your investment in this volume.

Note: the author also wrote Simplicity. This book could be perceived as a companion to that work, but it stands alone nicely.

With a title like this, Jensen's book should be flying off the shelf. I know it caught my eye when I first saw it. We all want to "do" less and "accomplish" more and there are some excellent ideas in this book to help you do just that.

Nothing in this book is easy, though. Someone as inclined to follow the rules like myself will find it difficult, if not impossible, to implement the more demanding recommendations. This is a shame, as these people are those who would probably benefit the most.

Even if you don't think of yourself as a rabble-rouser, you should still read this book and take heart that there are some possible methods of extracting yourself from business situations that leave you feeling busy, but not very productive. There are ways of escaping the bureaucracy and yet keep your job.

The cutest, yet still effective, idea in the book is the "Less-O-Meter" associated with each chapter. These graphical gauges give you an "at a glance" reading on how much Courage you will need to put this tip in place, how difficult it can be and the possible yield to your productivity and happiness.

You may be ready to take on your whole company and engage in full-scale "pushback", but implementing even one idea from this book could do a world of good for you, your job and your career, while helping your company, as well.

I think this book is the best book ever written for dealing with the business world today. I feel like it was written for me. I wish I had access to this book 5 years ago, I could have used it.

Thank you for your contributions for helping to make a healthier more informed work environment and employee for those who take a long time to get there.

It's about time. Literally.

This book is highly readable, with a pleasing layout of text and graphics. Crack it open, and you'll immediately see how it is different in a good way. And it gets down to business quickly. Most business books waste chapter after chapter describing and defending a theory, and finally get to the how-to at the end. Fooey!

Bill Jensen is a proven guru about the world of work. His other books have stood the test of time, as will this one.

There are 32 useful chapters in bites you can easily devour in short sittings. Read a bit over lunch each day. There's also a "Do-Less Toolkit" filled with quick-read summaries of the tools you should be using in your world of work.

Works equally well for executives, managers and worker bees (that covers everyone who works for a living).

Best of all, it is not tied to some product or technology. You can apply all the tools in ways that work for you.

Start your new work life by wasting far less time and communicating more effectively.

I think Bill Jensen's most fatal flaw (or sly-like-a-fox brilliance -- you choose) is that he has chosen to disguise truly important strategic thinking in a simple how-to book.

At its heart, Simplicity Survival Handbook is about nothing less than rethinking how leaders build businesses so that people can actually get everything done that they are supposed to.

Rethinking Design and Leadership Development: His research into how ease-of-use and reduced-use-of-time are equal to -- and sometimes more important than - recognition, compassion, inclusion, rewards, penalties, loyalty, and hierarchy is potentially ground-breaking in what leaders
need to focus on as they build their companies.

Rethinking Culture/HR/People Development: His research into the number one behavior in business today (Moving to-do's onto someone else's plate) and how work follows the path of least resistance should be required reading for anyone in HR anyone who develops mid-managers.

If you want quickie how-to's, skim the first half of this book. (As other reviewers have already said...his advice really works!) If you want to develop tomorrow's leaders today, truly study Jensen's last six chapters. Extremely insightful, important, and strategic.

The day I started reading this book, I was faced with not one or two, but five examples of why the Simplicity Survival Handbook is so necessary. 1) I was sent way too many emails, all of which were "must reads." 2) I was invited to attend too many "must attend" meetings. 3) I was asked to put together a presentation to the big boss, and all the in-between bosses were adding their two cents without adding anything. 4) I needed to justify my budget in a more concise and compelling way than just connecting it to this year's strategic plan. 5) Two of my newest hires wanted to essentially rewrite their orientation and training programs to be a lot more useful to them.

I discovered Jensen has fully researched each of these problems, plus dozens more, and provided easy how-to's for each. The step-by-step how-to's really work (...he provides percentages of likely success...with each of these five, I actually did better than he promised!), and are easy to execute, if you're willing to challenge yourself. But be forewarned: If you want a For Dummies book that asks little of you...this handbook is not for you. Anytime I started to feel like "Of course I'd like to do this, buuuuuut," or "I can't do this becauuuuuuuse...," I immediately thought of the cartoon character Pogo, who famously said "We have met the enemy and he is us."

If you are seeking an author who believes in his readers enough to lay out the whole truth...asking us to ask ourselves tough questions at the same time he doles out extremely useful how-to's...then, this is one of the most important books you can buy this year!

Bill Jensen's newest book is both an easy-to-read guide to leadership in tough times, and an immensely practical tool for focusing on what matters at work and in your life. For anyone who's followed Bill's teachings since his best-seller, Simplicity, this is the how-to book you've been craving! If you're not familiar with Bill's work, you're in for a treat.

Years ago, I attended one of Bill's workshops as his ideas were just forming. It had a huge impact on my life! What Bill's really about is helping you see the choices you have in life, and then making different ones. Everything he writes about, and is wildly passionate about, comes down to three core ideas: 1) Respect. Doing less of what doesn't matter and more of what does is about increasing the respect you have for yourself and for others. 2) Control. Bill has researched the biggest things that waste our time, energy, and talent, and most of them are within our control. We can choose to react differently, be differently, communicate differently. Bill's how-to's are all about taking back more control in ways that not only keep you employed, they enhance your effectiveness and productivity. 3) Time. If you practice even one-tenth of what Bill teaches, you will gain back a most irreplaceable asset -- time. Time to spend with your kids, or yourself, or others. While Bill writes about workplace issues, really he's giving you the tools to change your life.

Bill Jensen has a place among some of today's top business thinkers -- Jim Collins, Clayton Christensen, Noel Tichy, John Kotter, Peter Drucker, Warren Bennis, and more -- not because he thinks big thoughts, but because he thinks about everyday issues, like Studs Terkel does. He studies organizational structures, practices, tools, and processes, all from the perspective of the people who use them. That bottom-up view grounds his big thinking in day-to-day challenges and realities.

Get Simplicity to change your thinking, and get Simplicity Survival Handbook as the follow-up, how-to manual. Give copies of both to your teammates and your boss. They'll thank you for saving them so much time, and getting back control over their lives too.

So many books tell us how the world _should_ be. Bill Jensen has written a guidebook for how workplaces _really_ are.

I picked up this book to learn how to delete more of my emails and how to get out of way-too-many meetings. I gave a copy to my friend because she's got a boss who just doesn't get it! And I showed it to my boss because he's trying to figure out how to get more money in our budget, and how to keep _his bosses_ happy. Now, I'll admit that some of the 32 ways to do less take more courage than my friend, or my boss, or I have. Frankly, only about a third of his ways work for me. But that's still great. Because I learned that I can reclaim some small portion of my life back. That made this book an invaluable investment.

Part of what made Jim Collins' Good to Great so powerful was how
thoroughly he researched his subject. Jensen does the same with his study of work.

Why should we ignore so much Corporate Communication? Because only 6% of senior executives believe strategic communication includes the design of information people can use to make decisions. Why follow the four steps he describes for going to fewer meetings? Because people who did immediately reported a 10% to 30% reduction in meetings attended. Why redesign your own New-Hire Orientation? Because 76% of people don't get what they need, and he interviewed them to find what they wished they'd gotten instead. Every chapter is based on years of studying how workplaces operate.

For people who find some of the recommendations challenging, Jensen offers Less O Meters, where he's asked a panel of experts to evaluate the Courage, Difficulty, and Yield behind implementing the steps. Not every recommendation is easy, but at least he tells you that up front and lets you decide. While this book is clearly aimed at how frustrated we all are with too much to do, and makes it easy to start immediately doing less, Jensen respects the intelligence of his readers.