Rework - Jason Fried, David Heinemeier Hansson

My book notes that influenced me a lot to for a decade to strive for simplicity, and take the pragmatic approach.

Less is more & Simplification

Design Software to be simple, most Software is too complex, has too many features, too many buttons, too much confusion

Keep features to a minimum, max. 2 people on a product, embrace constraints

Build half a product - Start chopping and cutting out things, getting to great starts by cutting out staff that's merely good

Constantly look for things to remove, simplify and streamline

Speed, simplicity, ease of use and clarity

Focus on what won't change

Underdo your competition - cmp. The Flip - solve the simple problems, e.g. low tech

Highlight that your product or service does less - be proud of it

Once a product does what it should do - get it out there

Q: If you had to launch your product / business in 2 weeks, what would you cut out?

Start at the Epi Center, at the stuff you have to do, not with what you could do or want to do

Focus your energy on making the epi center the best it can be

Prioritization

LONG LISTS DON’T GET DONE!

Chunk into smaller lists

Prioritize visibly - only focus on the top of the list

judo solutions: Solution with maximum with minimum effort - Timeliness is more important than polish or even quality, Good enough is fine

Don’t confuse enthusiasm with priority

• Collect as many grand ideas as possible
• let them cool off for a while
• don’t act in the heat of the moment
• write them down and park them for a few days
• evaluate their actual priority with a calm mind

Say no, use the power of saying no to get your priorities straight

“Don’t believe the customer is always right”

You can’t be everything to everyone - be true to a type of customer more than to a specific customer

Take a deep breath - no urge to panic or respond to bad responses

Execution

Decide what you're going to do this week instead of long-range planning

Quick wins instead of very long running projects - the quicker it’s in the hands of customers, the better

Q: What can be done in 2 weeks?

Don’t spend too much time on one problem - quit and let someone else have a look at it

Speed changes everything: Get back to people quickly

Decide - Make the call, make progress, and get something out now

What can we do easily right now that's good enough?

EXECUTE: What you DO is what matters, not what you think or say or plan! see Stanley Kubrick

Make tiny decisions - tiny mistakes -> instead of big decisions - big mistakes

Don’t estimate - break things into smaller things - the better to estimate

Focus on what really matters: getting customers and make money

There’s no overnight sensation - it will take years until you’re recognized the right way

Product creation and launch

Grow slow and see what feels right

Use Freemium model - let customers try your addictive product

Test products early with small markets, small audience - welcome obscurity

Ignore details early on, start with thick Sharpie marker

Product vision

Get real - instead of describing, draw it

Get the chisel out and start making something real, anything else is just a distraction

Product criteria

Be at-home good - instead of in-media or in-store good

Decommoditize your product - cmp. zappos.com Pour yourself into your product and everything

Pick a fight -> be the anti- to differentiate, even opposite of an entire industry, cmp. Dyson

Focus on you, not on competitors

Give your customers the feeling: "This makes my life better"

Create a great product or service you want to use, you know the problem and the value intimately

It's not about packaging, marketing or price. It's only about quality

Tone is in your fingers, it's not the gears and equipment that matters

Sell your by-products

Put everyone on the front lines - everyone should be directly connected to customers

Personal behaviour

Instead of being a workaholic, figure out to get things done faster

Instead of entrepreneur - be a STARTER - idea, bit of confidence, push to get started

Stand for something, believe in it and live it - instead of a Mission Statement

Commitment strategy instead of an exit strategy

No time is no excuse

Know what you believe, sell less but highest quality

Get enough sleep - to keep high level of creativity, high morale, focus

Send people home at 5 - you don’t need more hours, you need better hours - rock-star environment

Emulate chefs - write your cookbook - how you operate that’s informative, educational and promotional

Introduce alone zone - no messaging, phone, email, meetings

Recruiting

Do it yourself first - hire when it hurts

You need an environment where everybody feels safe enough to be honest when things get tough

Candidates - dedication, personality and intelligence instead of CV and experience in years

Hire Managers of One - come up with own goals and execute them - need low direction

Avoid hiring delegators - meetings are a delegators best friends

Clear writing is a sign of clear thinking and know how to communicate, make things easy to understand

Writing is today’s currency for good ideas

Test-drive employees! hire them for a quick project

Marketing

Marketing is not a department

Marketing is what everyone in the company should do 24/7/365 - every communication is marketing

Press releases are SPAM

Favor niche media over mass media, much higher performance

(Marketing: phone answer, e-mail, use of product, every word on your web-site, error message, invoice)

Out-teach your competition instead of Advertising, etc.

Build an audience - speak, write, blog, tweet, make videos - share valuable information

Own your bad news (if something goes wrong)

Meetings and Communication

Meetings are toxic - if really needed:

• Clear agenda and as few people as possible
• specific problems
• point to real things, suggest real changes
• end with a solution and someone responsible for implementing it

Business criteria

Less mass, to quickly change anything like business model, product, feature set, marketing message and your mind

mass is increased by:

• long-term contracts
• excess staff
• permanent decisions
• meetings
• thick process
• inventory (physical or mental)
• hardware, Software and technology lock-ins
• long-term road maps
• office politics

No outside money - this is Plan Z

Start a business, not a startup

Don’t copy businesses (?) not sure

The core of your business should be built around things that won't change

Misc

Checkup - page 100