2021
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This book gave me so much energy!
If you’re looking for a career mentor, this book is a good place to start! The thesis of this book is that skill trumps passion, but there were equally valuable notes on developing a) a personal career mission based on your competency, which is then critical in b) building a noteworthy & fulfilling career.
Also helpful, Newport also covers some of his regular habits which help him continuously build deeper expertise, including: writing weekly summaries of interesting research papers relevant to his chosen expertise, a daily tally of hours spent in deliberate practice of his skill, and keeping a fancy notebook of new theories he’d brainstormed.
Criticisms: While Newport’s argument that competency is the end all/be all for fulfillment in work is valuable, his stories seem to neglect the realities of other capital involved in a fulfilling career: financial and social capital. Many career decisions, especially early on, are made due to financial need, and many jobs with decent career or financial capital are soured by abusive coworkers or managers.
While he does touch on this briefly on page 56, when he covers “3 Disqualifiers for Applying the Craftsman Mindset,” finding another job which does qualify AND can provide for you financially AND not scar you emotionally with toxic colleagues is literally the bane of most people’s careers.
Overall, it seems like he plucked many extremely privileged people to profile, and neglected to ask them about these extremely common experiences (lack of funds, toxic coworkers, difficulty overcoming systemic bias, etc.). While he quick to highlight the financial plight of failures according to his system, he doesn’t touch on the potential mountains of student debt, family money, or wealth of successful examples.
“The more you try to force [your career mission],... the less likely you are to succeed. True missions, it turns out, require two things. First you need career capital....Second, you need to be ceaselessly scanning your always-changing view of the adjacent possible in your field, looking for the next big idea.”
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