*** Highly recommended by Yohan Hari, Song Gil-young, Shin Su-jeong, and Mickey Kim
*** New York Times bestseller
*** Amazon's 2024 Book of the Year
*** A new book by MIT genius engineer Cal Newport

"True skill comes out when you don't push yourself."
Work less! Keep your own pace! And, obsess over quality!

In 1967, New Yorker reporter John McPhee wrote about his story-writing process.
He said he spent about eight months researching one article, then spent the next two weeks sitting at a picnic table, meeting sources and organizing the story, writing only 500 words a day.
If a reporter were working like this today, he would be fired immediately, but surprisingly, this reporter won the Pulitzer Prize in 1999 and has written a whopping 29 books, two of which were finalists for the National Book Award.

In the introduction to his new book, Slow Walk, Cal Newport, a brilliant engineer from MIT and renowned journalist, introduces John McPhee and argues that our society urgently needs to revise its definition of 'productivity.'
For the past 70 years, we have applied the factory-style productivity standard of "increasing the speed of the conveyor belt increases output" to knowledge workers.
Due to the nature of knowledge work, where the products are not immediately visible, today's workers unconsciously become absorbed in "unimportant but visible chores" to prove that they are working, thereby preventing them from focusing their time and energy on the most important core tasks.
This led to a vicious cycle of sacrificing the quality of important work in order to 'look like you're working hard.'

Cal Newport strongly argues that knowledge work requires standards of 'productivity' appropriate to it, and proposes 'slow productivity' as a solution.
He doesn't just advocate a new work philosophy; he backs it up with rigorous scientific evidence, and he packs this book with practical work techniques that can actually help you reduce your workload and maintain your own pace.
Based on in-depth research into the working practices of a diverse range of knowledge workers, from the examples of traditional scholars like Galileo and Isaac Newton to artists like Jane Austen and Georgia O'Keeffe and the creators of the hit drama series CSI, this book presents three core principles of "slow productivity."
Only when you reduce your workload and work at your own pace can the quality of your work improve.
This book is a new work philosophy that is most needed in our time, breaking free from overload and pursuing meaningful achievement.

Just as John McPhee waited at an outdoor table for the insight he needed to compose an article to strike, Zyker's efforts demonstrate the definition of meaningful and worthwhile work that doesn't require a hectic pace.
The magic of what might be called a "slow" pace compared to the seemingly endless demands of similar productivity driven by the adoption of cutting-edge technology becomes evident over a long period of time.
--- p.43, 「CHAPTER 1.
From “The Rise and Fall of Pseudo-Productivity”

While moves to maintain remote work or reduce working hours help mitigate some of the worst side effects of pseudo-productivity, they rarely address the underlying problem.
This is tantamount to responding to the rampant fast food culture by demanding that McDonald's increase the nutritional value of its menu.
While this approach may help mitigate some of the health impacts of fast food, it doesn't challenge the culture that encourages us to rush through our meals in the first place.
A more sustainable way to address the burnout syndrome facing knowledge workers is to offer attractive alternatives.
To do so, we need to go beyond simply trying to limit pseudo-productivity and propose a completely new vision of what productivity means.
--- p.54, 「CHAPTER 2.
From "Slow Productivity"

Had Jane Austen not made the momentous decision in 1809 to turn the productive conditions in her favor, the world would probably never have known just how talented she was.
Austin's family, who had been plagued by complex problems for several years, decided to withdraw from the social circles of Chawton, providing a welcome respite that had a significant impact on Austin's work.
Escaped from the world and living in a small country house, suddenly and miraculously free from both housework and social responsibilities, Austin found herself with a real, meaningful space to think and write creatively for the first time in over a decade.
It was here, working at her modest writing desk by the window overlooking the street, that Austen finally finished the manuscripts of Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice and began Mansfield Park and Emma.
--- pp.71-72, 「CHAPTER 3.
From "Reducing Workload"

How do knowledge workers determine when to decline the constant barrage of requests? In modern office environments, knowledge workers tend to adjust their stress levels based on initial baselines.
Declining a Zoom meeting invitation carries a social capital cost, as it can cause minor inconvenience to your colleagues and signal that you're uncooperative or lazy.
However, if your workload is too much and you are very stressed, you may be able to afford this cost.
To justify the distress caused to the other person by refusing, the distress you personally feel must be that great.
The problem with applying a stress-based heuristic like this is that we rarely turn down incoming work until we realize that our workload has already reached an unsustainable limit.
--- pp.83-84, 「CHAPTER 3.
From "Reducing Workload"

In general, strategies that require others to do more work are effective in suppressing tasks.
For example, the "reverse task list" is a more appealing version of the method I proposed in the New Yorker article.
First, create a list of open tasks that correspond to each major task category you handle in your workplace.
When you ask someone to take on a minor task, instruct them to add it directly to their list of related shared tasks.
For example, instruct them to write in a shared document or create a new card on a Trello shared board.
First of all, it is important to make it clear that you must enter 'all' the information required to complete the task.
Using a reverse task list requires the requester to invest more time in specifying exactly what is expected of the requestee, which simplifies the process of fulfilling the request.
--- p.118, 「CHAPTER 3.
From "Reducing Workload"

Over short periods of time, like a few days or weeks, the efforts of historically significant thinkers like Copernicus and Newton can seem haphazard and lazy.
But over the long term, their efforts seem to have borne undeniable fruit.
In today's work environment, we are biased towards evaluating efforts in the short term.
As I pointed out in Part 1 of this book, as knowledge work emerged as a major economic sector in the 20th century, we responded to the shock of all this newness by applying the rushed productivity concept characteristic of industrial sectors.
To the great scientists of the past, the hasty nature of modern man would seem to be a madman and a source of trouble.
They were interested in the achievements they made over a lifetime, not just a specific short period of time.
Without a boss watching them or customers demanding their emails be answered, they didn't feel pressured to be as busy as possible every day.
Rather, I was able to spend a long time on the project and adjust my work pace to a more leisurely pace depending on the situation.
--- pp.146-147, 「CHAPTER 4.
From "Working at a natural pace"

In fact, humans are not very good at estimating the time required to perform cognitive tasks.
We have an innate, natural understanding of the time required to do visible tasks, such as making a hatchet or gathering edible plants.
But when you're planning something that you can't feel directly with your body, you end up guessing more than you realize, and estimating how long it'll take based on a best-case scenario.
Perhaps he enjoys the thrill of planning and imagining extremely ambitious schedules.
"Wow, if I could write four chapters this fall, I'd be ahead of schedule!" It feels good in the moment, but after that, you spend your days in confusion and disappointment.
You can counter this instinct to drift into unfounded optimism by adopting a relaxed approach of doubling your initial estimated schedule.
As a result, you can complete your plans at a more leisurely pace.
--- pp.168-169, 「CHAPTER 4.
From "Working at a natural pace"

In the context of knowledge work, perhaps the most famous example of a slow pace being sacrificed for high quality is Steve Jobs' triumphant return to Apple.
When Jobs took over as interim CEO in 1997, Apple's quarterly sales were down 30 percent.
Jobs believed that Apple's problems were related to its octopus-like expansion of its product line.
Jobs started asking his executives a simple question: “What model do you tell your friends to buy?”
When management couldn't come up with a clear answer, Jobs decided to simplify the product line to just four computers: business desktops and laptops, and consumer desktops and laptops.
This eliminates the confusion about which Apple device is right for you.
“Choosing what not to do is as important as deciding what to do,” Jobs explained.

--- pp.223-224, 「CHAPTER 5.
From “Obsessed with Quality”