Portfolio A World Without Email

Email makes you sad. Email distracts you. Use less email. Use Trello instead.You do not now have to read the book.

The title of this book held out great promise and so did some reviews and so I ordered a copy. I soon found that this book does not have a central theme. The best one can construct a theme out of the massive, disjointed rubble is that we should not be a slave to the email. But is that not common-sense? The author keeps citing his own books and articles. At page 239 where he cited his article, 'Is email making Professors Stupid?', I checked the author's other works, and among the ones he did not cite in this book are, 'How to Become a Straight A Student', and 'How to Win at College'. More importantly, I realised why his style seemed familiar. I read his book 'Digital Minimalism' a couple of years ago and was disappointed by it as I am of this book.I wish there are some useful parts that I can recommend about this book. There are, but they are commonplace knowledge, and not worth buying a book to read about them. Newport tries to make this a scholarly work by constant references to technological jargon and words like, 'The Hive Mind'. He also refers to historical events such as why Charlemagne's grandfather Charles Martel seized lands (to raise a cavalry) and why that is regarded as a myth - the question is, how is that at all relevant? It is not clear at all. The book is filled with disjointed commentaries like this story of Charles Martel.

This book introduces the big problem of email in our work and personal lives and offers insight into how our approach to working with email can be changed.I have been in jobs where the rate of email and the expectation of quick responses has meant that I am constantly checking emails and reacting to requests. From the start of day, till the end of the week, all the attention and work is around email. The issue with this is you are constantly in reactive mode, spend more time on reading and responding to emails than actual work on tasks. This is what Cal refers to as the Hyperactive Hive Mind.If you have read Deep Work then you will appreciate how important focused time is to produce high quality output and workplaces today with their constant focus on email or IM communications means that people are constantly trying to multitask and have divided attention spans. In the first part of the book, Cal presents the evidence of how Email reduces productivity, makes us miserable and has a mind of it's own.The second part of the book focuses on the principles to allow for solutions for this. It also has case studies of organisations where they have adopted these principles and dramatically reduced the need and use of email. The four principles covered are the Attention Capital Principle, The Process Principle, the Protocol Principle and Specialization Principle.The book has an academic style of writing which you will be used to if you have read Cal's other books and I think it really helps do a great job of painting the picture of how email communication became the problem it is now, how it impacts as and what we can do about it. The solutions aspects of the book aren't revolutionary but combined with the case studies and examples of what can be done, they provide a great framework for a change of attitude towards email and what can be done to actually improve productivity in the workplace.If you are an employee you may not have as much influence in some of the solutions but you may be able to influence those you work with to understand the detrimental effect of email and other solutions including the use of collaborative software. Organisation leaders and owners could really get inspired with what is possible without email to start bringing in changes to how they work. It is not an easy change but one that is desperately needed. I urge you to read this book, also read Deep Work if you haven't and listen to Cal Newport's podcast - Deep Questions which are a great resource to help to adopt this mindset. I will continue to revisit these three resources and play my part in my workplace setting. We can collectively start to make things better. Let's not give in to the norm of the Hyperactive Hive Mind and create changes to support us to work in a more productive and focused manner.

It is rare that a book I read actually girds me into action, but this one did. With the pandemic has come the most awful email storms I have ever experienced, and feeling my brain colonised by what Newport refers to as the 'hive-mind' has been uncomfortable and disconcerting. As he admits, getting away from it is really hard, and that sometimes the best we can do is to neutralise its effects, but he presents alternatives and different ways of thinking that require some determination to carry out against the tidal flow of email. The notion of cognitive demand is an important one: it is finite and splitting our attention up isn't a very good way of doling it out or being effective or productive. We have just slipped into a way of doing things and extracting ourselves from this is going to be difficult (notwithstanding those who actually like working this way: always reactive, always on, always vital, email appeals to the sort of work martyrs I prefer to avoid). He is very good on the importance of persisting with alternatives and planning the demands on your time rather than simply giving in to them. A real help.

This first part of this book explains how and why email isn’t all it cracked up to be. In summary, email, if used appropriately and correctly can be great. If it’s not, email can be disruptive, unproductive and harmful.The second part of this book provides case studies and ideas on better ways to work and the role of email. There are some really good ideas in here but it just goes on a bit.A good book, just one I thought needed to be cut by 25%.