Your Best Just Got Better: Work Smarter, Think Bigger, Achieve More

by Jason W. Womack

Imagine if your best just got better every single day In Your Best Just Got Better, productivity expert Jason Womack teaches readers that working longer hours doesn't make up for a flawed approach to productivity and performance. Workers need to clarify their habits, build mindset-based strategies, and be proactive. Womack's signature "workplace performance" techniques offer specific strategies to consistently and incrementally improve performance.

Readers

Understand the fundamentals of workflow and the principles of human performance Arm themselves with the tools and the processes to get more of their work done, on time, with fewer resources, and with less stress Making your best better won't happen overnight, but learning how to effectively manage just a few critical success factors lead to an effective workday and an overall successful professional career.

Genres: Business, Self Help, Productivity, Personal Development, Leadership, Nonfiction, Psychology

273 pages, Kindle Edition

First published December 29, 2011

About the author

Jason has the unique ability to take people as they are and focus their individual abilities to reach their very best. His compassion and empathy, two words not often used in productivity coaching, are immense and those attributes help to propel those he works with in-person, online and through his writings to new heights with little resistance and maximum effectiveness. Jason understands that each of us plays many roles – leader, partner, spouse, son, friend, community volunteer, athlete – and to succeed in each of these roles requires a core set of practical and actionable skills that can be learned and honed by anyone with a bit of direction, motivation and support.

He is the CEO and Founder of The Jason Womack Company, an advisor to leaders worldwide and author dedicated to helping individual contributors, entrepreneurs and executives work effectively and efficiently so they have the time, energy and focus to achieve more in work and in life.

MEd (Master’s in Education), MA (Master’s in Psychology),
Author (Your Best Just Got Better),
Founder and CEO (The Jason Womack Company)

Reviews

[Ken Montville · Rating 5 out of 5]

The title to this book promises a lot - after all, how can best get better - and it delivers.

It starts off with a prologue that portrays the author's life as an idyllic wonderland of affluence, abundant physical health and a close and intimate relationship with his wife along with work that is both spiritually and intellectually fulfilling. What's not to like? Too good to be true?

It turns out that this prologue is just an example of what Jason Womack is trying to teach in this book that is a cross between personal development and good business/work practice. It is an ideal day that he has written out for himself with the suggestion that we write out our ideal day, as well.

The book goes on, chapter by chapter, to make recommendations on how to truly "worker smarter, think bigger, make more". In fact, it's possible to bounce around in the book and read a chapter that might hold more interest or relevance for where you are right now.

It is that "start where you are and work with what you have" approach to business and personal development that attracts me most to this book and Jason Womack. It's not the "take massive action" that Tony Robbins likes to preach. Jason Womack's approach is to begin with small and consistent changes that you can work into your daily and weekly routines. It is by building these good personal and business habits, incrementally, that you will eventually see your life improve in so many ways.

I really liked the gentle approach that Jsaon Womack takes. Gone is the dogmatic, doctrinaire style of many personal development gurus. Gone also is the ethereal "your thoughts will create your reality" admonitions of old school personal development teachers. It's not that the author discounts the value of visualization and affirmations, goal setting and the like. He simply takes a slightly different approach that provides a gentler and more practical path.

Some may say this will allow too many a way out of doing the things that need to be done to improve. Maybe so. For me, it works well.

The flow of the writing and the conversational style is also a big plus. The book is understandable with plenty of anecdotes to illustrate a point. Bottom line: it's easy to read, easy to understand and, if you're so inclined, easy to follow the steps the author suggests in the book.

After reading this book, I also got hooked on the podcast Jason does every week based on this book. They're clear, concise, motivating and short (under 10 minutes).

If you're interested in personal and business development this is the book for you.

Disclaimer: I was given a free copy of the book in exchange for an honest review. The review is honest. I was not paid or "encouraged" to be overly positive.

[Jacob · Rating 4 out of 5]

I recently completed reading "Your Best Just Got Better" by Jason Womack. This book is full of golden nuggets of productivity and personal growth. When the author says, Work Smarter, Think Bigger, and Make More; it means that with all seriousness. The book flows together to help readers move through a progressive education designed to take you from the beginning to the end. At the same time each section stands alone to give you actionable insights to make you better at what you do.

Also, Jason's sincerity comes right through the pages. You can tell that he cares about his clients and he cares about helping the reader grow. I've been reading personal development books for a very long time but there are still new ideas in this book and lots of good reminders.

One of my favorite insights is the idea of writing down ideal days. Jason suggests that you envision what a perfect day for you would look like. Write it down. I've heard this before but never taken the time to do that. Jason mentioned in the book that he has written down 100s of ideal days and lived many of them. This may sound a little silly but in context of what the book teaches it makes perfect sense.

I also love Jason's suggestion of pondering and creating an inventory of "I'm At My Best When." When you truly understand what factors lead you to be at your best you can start to manufacture greater productivity.

Read this book and you will learn these and 100 other great ideas to make you better than you are now.

[Jay Oza · Rating 4 out of 5]

Full Disclosure: I received this book from the 12booksgroup.com book club to help with the discussion of the book during the month of February 2013 and provide a book review in several places, including Facebook, Goodreads, Amazon, Twitter, LinkedIn and my web site.

Key Takeaway: I recommend this book (4 out of 5 stars) since it is a practical self-help book that can help anyone get better in their personal and professional life if you follow Jason Womack's advice.


Jason Womack has written a practical self-help book titled, “Your Best Just Got Better.” Like any self help book, you have to judge it on whether the book is really helpful. On that basis, I would say it meets its objective in providing all kinds of ways you can improve with your personal and professional life.

The book starts with Jason asking you to write down your “Ideal Day.” The purpose of this exercise is that he wants you to imagine it, so that you can work towards realizing it. The author wants you to make a commitment by writing it down, so you see and will take action that he prescribes to make that day happen.

To help readers work toward realizing their “Ideal Day”,” Jason has organized the book into three sections: Work smarter, Think bigger and Make more. And he offers plenty of advice on how he has followed his own advice to get better. If you followed them, you can also get better, too. What he is asking you to do is to make changes in your habits so it sounds simple, but it is not easy to change habits overnight. It requires lot of discipline, diligence and perseverance.

Since this is a practical book reading will not result in you getting better. You will need to develop a strategy. I would recommend you read this book cover to cover the first time and then pick a chapter or section and put some of the tips and techniques into practice before moving on to another chapter or section. Without a game plan, this book can get overwhelming quickly and you are likely to give up, which would be a shame since there is lot of useful stuff in this book.

I recommend this book since anyone reading this book will come away picking up few good tips and techniques that they can put into practice immediately. The book is very honest and straightforward as Jason talks about practicing what he presents in the book and gives us several examples of how his clients have made improvements through his coaching. Jason also is very realistic in that getting better according to his approach is a lifelong effort and not a one day thing. But the start is very important. Stop reading and get started. Reading a book is a start but we all have to start doing. Reading is easy, doing is work.

We all need a life coach who can see things that could make us better and push us harder towards the goal we have set for ourselves. This book serves that purpose in helping us identify what we are doing and how we are doing it and challenges us to work towards improving what we are doing with Jason's proven techniques. And if we follow many of the tips and techniques Jason presents, then perhaps our best can also get lot better.

Good Luck!

[Sergei_kalinin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Книга не очень понравилась :(

Во-первых, ооочень много банальностей, кочующих из книги в книгу по саморазвитию. Книга производит впечатление глубоко вторичной :(

Во-вторых, книга какая-то очень фрагментированная, из "осколков". Такое впечатление, что собраны какие-то посты/заметки из блога и из них как-то слеплена книга.

Автор 6 лет проработал GTD-консультантом у Д.Аллена, поэтому понятно, откуда "ноги растут" у его идей. Но если GTD - довольно стройная и логичная система управления временем и самоорганизации, то в этой книге никакой системой даже и не пахнет :( Мало того, если заранее не знать, что такое GTD, то из книги чёткого представления об этой системе и не получишь :(

В-третьих, книга коротенькая, но автор умудрился напрудить в неё множество "воды". В основном в виде описания своей личной жизни - своего режима дня, своих занятий спортом и т.п. Написано всё довольно сухо, никакого образа "лирического героя" :))) перед глазами не возникает, поэтому лично мне читать все эти подробности чужого быта было смертельно скучно :(

Из "плюсов"...

1) "Фрагментарность" книги - не только её недостаток, но и сильная сторона. Книга даже перенасыщена какими-то мелкими "фишками", секретиками, тонкостями (и т.п.) самоорганизации.
Знаток в этой "россыпи" наверняка найдёт для себя 2-3 новые "фишки". Новичка, скорее всего, такое разнообразие советов только дезориентирует. Он начнёт применять сразу ВСЁ, и вряд ли от этого будет толк...

2) Автор - коуч. И поэтому в книге много прекрасных вопросов. Некоторые из них мне очень понравились, выписал их себе в рабочий блокнот крупными буквами, медитирую над ними :)))

Например:
- Что вы успеваете сделать (важного, первостепенного) до 10.00 ?
- Что вы успеваете сделать (на 100%) за 15 минут?
- Почему/для чего вы делаете то, что вы делаете (в настоящий момент)? и т.д.

3) В некоторых вопросах мы с автором совпадаем :) В своей книге я использую "формулу управления временем":

время работы = цель Х (методы + энергия) - помехи

Джейсон Вумек также пишет о том, что есть всего 4 ресурса самоорганизации: время, энергия, инструменты/методы и фокус (т.е. способность отстраиваться от помех).

И таких "совпадений" в книге я насчитал довольно много :) М.б. именно поэтому книгу мне было читать скучновато - всё уже знакомо...

Вывод:
- начинающему тайм-менеджеру лучше НЕ читать, т.к. книга очень сумбурная
- опытному тайм-менеджеру - читать!
- продвинутому :)) тайм-менеджеру - просмотреть по диагонали, отыскать для себя пару-тройку "фишек"

[Danielle Stevens · Rating 4 out of 5]

I just started reading this book by Jason Womack. It is one of the non-fiction books from my book club 12 Books.

I’ve only begun the Prologue and Introduction. My review covers those areas -

In the Prologue, Womack introduces the concept of an “Ideal Day.” It is, for each person, the perfect day including everything you love to do in the order that you want to do it in. I like the concept of an “Ideal Day” – it is like imagining a dream, then reviewing that dream every day on a path to make it happen. Part of my Ideal Day would include sitting on a comfy chair with a good cup of coffee and a good book near the end of the day. Since I do read something every day, this is not too farfetched to be doable.
The Intro includes some preliminary information about each section, Parts 1, 2, and 3. Based on the introduction – the premise of Jason Womack’s Your Best Just Got Better is to be more focused, more inspired, more of yourself so that you are better than your best.
Would I recommend this book? First, ask yourself this question, “Am I ready to do not just read about doing, to create actionable goals, with the necessary steps and follow through?” If you cannot answer that question in the affirmative, you’re not ready to read this book. I understand the desire to have someone else make the decision for me, I’ve been there a lot.

Would I recommend this book? Yes, but only to a specific set of people. And this recommendation may change as I finish reading this book.

Please visit http://techwriterabqnm.wordpress.com/... for the second part of my review. And my apologies for not finishing the book sooner.

[Mike Vardy · Rating 3 out of 5]

In an era where we have a ton of info flying our way every single day, Jason Womack offers some actionable and practical tips on making your best even better. Womack offers tips, tricks, and tools that will help you level up your best to be even better.

One of the biggest pieces of advice is Jason's idea of tracking things. I'm a big believer in that, and Jason further cemented that belief by pointing out that it creates awareness -- which can keep you better focussed on your goals and aspirations.

Besides awareness, intense and deliberate focus is key to making your best even better. I don't want to dive in too deeply with what Jason goes into here, but I suggest when you read it that you do.

Your Best Just Got Better is a great read for those who want to get the most out of themselves by following a how-to guide in a way that is easy to digest. Highly recommended.

[Judy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've been a follower of Jason's podcasts for over a year and was so glad when he finally wrote a book that compiles so many of the personal and professional self-management tools he's shared in the past. I credit his book for a lot of positive habits I've introduced into my day recently, especially the habit of writing down the chatter and mental lists cycling in my head that used to cause me so much anxiety and overwhelm.

It's well-organized and has lots of actionable ideas to take away with just a little time spent reading. Nothing overwhelming or time-consuming, just some good ideas and encouragement to just try a few adjustments to what you do in a day.

[Philski · Rating 2 out of 5]

"better" but not "best"
It was a decent read but a lot of the concepts were rehashed ideas from David Allen's "getting things done" except without the structure and philosophy presented in GTD. (Jason was a former employee of Allen). Allen's 'areas of responsibility' loosely became Jason's 'most important things', the '50,000 foot horizon' became the 'perfect day narrative' and other rehashed ideas. The book is different than GTD because it has a heavier focus on time management instead of idea management so it isn't a simple 1:1 comparison; I just felt like, having read GTD in the recent past, a lot of these ideas were simple rehashes/applications of the core GTD philosophy.

[loafingcactus · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book is a good overview to smooth out some of the bumps of common productivity tools and bring the focus back to what the purpose of those tools is. That being said, I wish the author had been more direct in relating to tools developed by others. The author is a former GTD employee and obviously there is a lot of carry over from GTD as well as some winked in criticisms. Likewise Pomodoro. I was sort of irritated to have to guess at all those relationships, and the reader who wasn't familiar with the mileau of productivity tools wouldn't get those points (and perhaps I missed some where I was not familiar with the tool/technique being tweaked).

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stuffed full of "obvious" ideas, except they're the kind of obvious ideas I rarely come up with on my own. I thought this was a great book with tons of ideas I hope to slowly try.

My one complaint might be the writing in some later chapters. I felt there were ideas that had little relation to the previous or following ideas, and I would frequently check the name of the chapter and try to work out why some particular tip belonged there.

[Peter Watts · Rating 5 out of 5]

An exceptional personal productivity book. The approach that Jason Womack takes is one that is simple, pragmatic, can be quickly applied, and produces real results.

I'd strongly recommend it.

[Extratijd Johan]

Great book - biased I know Jason

[deleted d · Rating 3 out of 5]

good book, basic wih the fundementals set goals and always ask why you're doing it

[Juan Chavez · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book. I have read many self help books, and this is one of the best. It should really be more a text book. A book where you don't read end to end but read, stop, implement, reflect, adjust...continue reading. Lots of great tips.
A couple of notable exercises and concepts.

- Everyday has 96 15 minutes blocks. Break down your day into these building blocks.
-I am at my best when....Know when you work best. They will help better use your 15 min building blocks.
- So that...know your why..and remind your self of why you do what you do. If its doesn't fit, it is probably not worth doing.
- Team you...who makes up your team? Who are your mentors, your team. Build it with intention.
- Practice writing your perfect day.
-MIT working on your MIT (Most Important Things)
GOLD:
1-“Would you know a great day if you saw one?”
2-One more thing: I define productivity as: “Doing what I said I would do, within the time that I promised.” The “more” that I want is to keep more of those promises.
3- See yourself in your goals. There are three kinds of goals: (1) goals you think about, (2) goals you write on paper, and (3) goals in which you actually see yourself.
4-You get what you expect.
5-I also like to surround myself with verb workers. Why? Because whether during a meeting, on a phone call, or in casual conversation, they are the ones who will pause and say, “You know Jason, that’s a good idea. Now, what are going to do about it?”
6-Alice and the Cheshire Cat: “Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?” “That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cat. “I don’t much care where—” said Alice. “Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” said the Cat. “—so long as I get somewhere,” Alice added as an explanation. “Oh, you’re sure to do that,” said the Cat, “if you only walk long enough.”
7-These are the four critical elements of productivity: time, energy, focus, and tools.
8-When you think about where you are going, talk about your dreams, write goals, and reflect on your efforts, you make significant progress.
9-Either way, it is absolutely essential, not to mention more effective and efficient, to know at the beginning of each day the level of pacing you need to set to finish your work on time, on budget, and “on purpose.”
10-There are three keys to effective practice: (1) visualization, (2) rehearsal, and (3) the five-day experiment. As you review these three significant aspects of effective practice, plan to apply them soon—perhaps even later today!

[Shams Khan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ideas learned: Consider this:
15 minutes is around one percent of a day. Or
10 minutes is around one percent of waking day.

It’s easy to see how having so many uncompleted tasks would drain your energy and draw you away from your goals. Ticking those distractions off your to-do list is a crucial step toward working smarter.

Try writing a daily assessment of the people you spent the most time with and how they affected your productivity and engagement. After a couple of days you’ll see which people truly inspire you. These are the people you should try and spend at least an hour or two with each week or month. This will keep you both motivated and open-minded.

The key message in this book:

Setting clear goals, eliminating distractions and valuing your time will allow you to work smarter. Your ambitions will never be out of reach when you keep your focus on them and surround yourself with people who inspire you.

[Karen JEC · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overview: Listened to the audiobook, which is read by a clear, even-toned, American male voice. It's a good book and provides a lot of tips for noticing and reorganizing your current reality. I get the feeling (and it was later confirmed) that the author wrote it in his spare time, nearly a memoir but with a few studies and personal stories thrown in to give it some examples and weight. That's fine, and it works, but it wasn't overly engaging as a result.

Favourite quotes:

"Productivity - doing what I said I would do, in the time I said would do it."

"1) Set a goal. 2) Be consistent. 3) Take action."

"Hurry up and fail so you learn what doesn't work... The most important part of this is developing the attitude and ability to move on after a failure."

"Our brains are designed to answer the questions we ask ourselves."

[photogrl2020 · Rating 5 out of 5]

"When you redirect your focus, your perspective changes, and when that happens, you have a significant option: You can begin to make things better. And, of course, if you change your direction, even a little bit, you could easily progress toward a new goal, achieve a big dream, or live a different life." That sums up the entire concept of Your Best Just Got Better.

I’ve been following Jason Womack for about a year now. My first encounter with him was when I caught part of his “Think Bigger, Make More” workshop on CreativeLive. I tend to be a bit of a self-help/productivity junkie myself so his stuff was right up my alley. Plus the timing of stumbling across this workshop was pretty fortuitous what with the place in life I was (and still am) currently in. After watching the workshop, I signed up for his e-newsletter & podcast (also called Your Best Just Got Better), followed him on Twitter, and added Your Best Just Got Better to my (insanely!) long list of “To Read” books on Goodreads. This summer, during my bus rides to & from school, I systematically listened through every single podcast he’s ever put out. By the end of the summer session, that was somewhere around 130 podcasts. I have no regrets about the way that time was spent, and I continue to keep up-to-date on these podcasts each week.

A couple weeks ago, I responded to a tweet Jason sent out saying that he would send a copy of the book to anyone who committed to posting an Amazon review of it. Um, yes! Almost seemed too good to be true, but I gave it a shot anyway. After reading the PDF of the first chapter (which he sent me almost immediately) and giving him my mailing address, I had my very own hard copy (he generously gave me my choice of ebook or hard copy) of Your Best Just Got Better in my hands within days! Not only that, but Jason personalized the book all the way through-going beyond even just signing the copy-handwriting several notes (some of which directed me to specific website pages in connection with that particular chapter, and adding in several business card/postcard-sized illustrated note cards inside the pages themselves that correlated to certain sections of the book. The interaction and tangibility of this aspect was just way too much fun, and I fully believe more authors should incorporate similar practices.

First things first, (great, now I have Iggy Izalea’s Fancy stuck in my head!) let’s discuss the overall structure & organization of the book. Jason’s divided the book into three parts, in connection with the subtitle of the book: Work Smarter, Think Bigger, and Make More. This makes a lot of sense logically. I found the book wasn’t very compartmentalized in the sense that everything he wrote about could be applied to any of those three parts of life, so for me personally, it didn’t make much practical difference other than having a better idea of where I was at in the book. Additionally, the book is separated into 10 chapters (I appreciate the round, even number, though that’s probably just my OCD-tendency showing), each with a different topic related to the theme of productivity: Improvement and Time, Improvement and the Social Network, Improvement and Tracking, Improvement and Focus, etc. If I’m going to nitpik, I think I would have preferred each title to just be titled “Focus” or “Time”, but that’s just me.

Now on to the fun part: the content. This is the most important aspect of any book, and where Jason does well. He covers pretty much every aspect of productivity you could think of in life-both work and personal. I especially appreciate the personal side because most “productivity” books are written only in terms of work. This was a much more holistic discussion in that sense, which I absolutely loved.

One important note here: this book is very interactive! Within each chapter, there are several action steps to take along the way. This really helps you put into immediate practice what you’re learning. It does, however, slow you down in the process of reading through the book, since you’re constantly stopping (hopefully) to complete the actions he suggests (often just stopping to spend 15 minutes to think about what he just discussed). So if you’re the type of person who just wants to read through a book and move on, this might not be the best book for you. Then again, you could always just skip those steps-though I would really advise against it. Even though I tend to be one of those people who doesn’t do the work in a book, I decided to go through with it on this particular one and I’m glad I took the time. The process of slowing down long enough to digest the material really made me deep dive in my thinking and this is where I got most of the benefit from the book. Again, if you really want to skip all that, you can, and I’m confident it’ll still be worth your time to read. Even if you don’t follow through on the actions within the book itself, the discussion it starts in your mind will lead you to very beneficial new thoughts you might not have had otherwise.

I have read enough self-help/productivity type books to say, this one is worth your time. The fact that the author himself is just so fantastic and always available to his audience (seriously, tweet, email, or even call his personal cell phone anytime and he’ll make time to chat with you! Trust me, I’ve done all these!) is just a ridiculously amazing and unique bonus! I’ll definitely be coming back to this book many times to reread-and that’s rare for me!

The main idea you get from Your Best Just Got Better can be summed up in this quote from the conclusion of the book: ”Your competitive advantage derives from what you think about and what you do about what you're thinking.” (emphasis mine)

[Rifa Coolheart · Rating 3 out of 5]

The key message in this book:

Setting clear goals, eliminating distractions and valuing your time will allow you to work smarter. Your ambitions will never be out of reach when you keep your focus on them and surround yourself with people who inspire you.

[Chu Qiao · Rating 4 out of 5]

good tips for work performance and productivity

[Rick · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved Mr Womack's writing style, at least for me I found it very inspiring. There were ideas through out the book the can be utilized no matter who you are and what you do for work. Good read.

[Anna · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book could have easily be just the last chapter! Enough said!

[Synthia Salomon, Ed.S. · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent reminder of principles you may innately have or practices you may have forgotten.

Takeaway: always utilize your downtime (waiting) and frequently express gratitude (thank you cards).

[Travis Ogden · Rating 3 out of 5]

Most valuable takeaways for me were insights about meeting effectiveness and being productive.

[Zaya · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some useful nuggets in here for self-improvement.

[. · Rating 5 out of 5]

First time I logged it, third read. Fantastic way to focus on your MITs so that you can pursue your best self. Great book!

[Jason T · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great read but should more be used as a workbook. I need to get a hard copy and not do the audio version.

[Lytton Bell · Rating 3 out of 5]

You could visualize your day as a block of 95, 15-minute increments. Or, you could view it as a mystery, a miracle, a wild ride that is coming once only. Are you living or are you "managing" your time? Henry David Thoreau once said that you cannot kill time without injuring eternity, and the same goes for "managing" it. We are dancing on the cliff's edge, just moments from the apocalypse. You are not required to be efficient and profitable. Productivity is not the same thing as success. Walter Pater once said, "To burn always with this hard, gem-like flame, to maintain this ecstasy, this is success in life." There is no map to where you are going. Passion flourishes in chaos, so let go and leap in.

[Robbie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I downloaded and read the first chapter of this book and was hooked. Even from the first chapter I could tell that this was a book I wanted to read in hard copy format rather than with an e-Reader in order to more fully interact with the book on a physical basis--highlighting, flipping back and forth--as this was information I wanted to put into long term memory. I read it straight through and now want to go back and not only begin to try out many of the exercises, but also to outline the book--it was that good.

This is not a book that tells you how to use a certain time management system; i.e., how to format your to do list. Instead, the focus is on steps you can take to become a better student of yourself and use that knowledge to increase your productivity.

While online reviews are important to all authors, one of the areas of emphasis in this book is on feedback. The author states that when someone tells him he's done a great presentation he asks them, "What one piece of information you learned today will have the greatest impact on your performance, leadership, or productivity?" I suspect for Jason Womack, online reviews not only can help with book sales (as they can with any author), but are a way for him to receive feedback. So I will try to answer his question. The problem is, I can't choose just one thing! It has been about a week since I have finished the book and these are the themes from the book that I have taken to heart: networking, the importance of personal analytics, and test driving habits for five days. As a shy introvert who feels uncomfortable with small talk, I appreciated examples of some specific questions we can ask people to help draw them out and get them talking about the important things in their lives.

Aside from the content, another strength of this book is the spirit of the author that comes through. For one thing, his tone is very positive, but not in a saccharine sweet sort of way. His positivity alone is a source of motivation. Second, I got the feeling that he really cares about people. Of course, his livelihood is dependent upon others contracting with him, buying his books, etc. and he does emphasize networking, but you never get the sense that he is in any of this just to further his own success in life.

In summary, I enthusiastically recommend this book.

[Casey · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book by Jason Womack as the monthly selection of the 12 Books Group with the expectation that I will write a review and post it in several places. This book is about managing your time to be more productive and includes several exercises on building and sustaining workflow habits that will help the reader accomplish the goal of the book. He points out that there are only 96 fifteen minute segments to each day and managing these blocks of time are critical.

The book is divided into three sections titled: Work Smarter, Think Bigger and Make More. Each section contains chapters that lead you through a process that Jason has developed based on his own experiences of what worked or didn’t work for him. Each chapter focuses on a specific improvement area filled with lots of thought provoking exercises where you need to stop, think and conduct the exercise in order to obtain the full value from the chapter. The chapters build on each other so that it is useful to complete the exercises as Jason refers back to them at different times. The approach that I am used, after trying some of the initial exercises, was to read through the entire book to get a feel for it and I am now going back and reading a second time and focusing on each of the exercises as they arise. Others may find it useful to pick a chapter and work on it, but I caution that many of the chapters refer to exercises completed in other chapters so it may be a little more challenging to do it this way.

This YouTube link will take you to a number of videos of presentations by Jason on the sections contained in the book.

This is a well thought out and presented book that I recommend to anyone who is looking to be more productive with the amount of time that they have each day. It is not only informative, but an interesting and entertaining read.

[Rachael Kelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Through my online book club 12books, I was given the opportunity to read and review this wonderful book by Jason Womack. After reading this book, I can with complete honesty say that this was one of the best personal development books I have ever read. The principle of this book is about evaluating your current habits and activities throughout the day and finding the opportunities where you can increase your productivity.

It was pretty powerful reading that we are given 96 blocks of 15 minutes throughout the day and how we choose to use that time is up to us. It really put it in perspective for me and I have found that using Jason’s tips and techniques has made an instant difference in my productivity. Setting that timer for 15 minutes on my phone or iPad really gets me to apply that focus to the task at hand. I found that also taking note of what I find as my “When I am at my best” moments, that I think throughout the day of little things I can do to ensure that I am indeed at my best. I could really go on and on in regards to this book and how much applying these activities is already impacting my life, but there would be just too much to say and talk about.

My recommendation is that this book can be beneficial to any individual. It does not matter whether you are a stay at home mother, an entrepreneur, a military member, or just an individual trying to learn how to make the most of your day. This book was incredibly well written and I will be recommending it to everyone I encounter in my day to day activities.