Book recommendation: “Deep Work” by Cal Newport

Are you frustrated because your work often seeps into your evenings or weekends? Are you on the lookout for new ways to get more done?

If so, I warmly recommend “Deep Work” by Cal Newport. It is a book that will help you create a productive and serene work environment. It is brimming with actionable ideas for working with great(er) intensity and is, ultimately, all about protecting your time.

 

What is deep work?

Deep work, as defined by Cal Newport, is a skill that allows you to quickly master complicated information and work with the concentration required for serious and cognitively demanding work. The opposite of deep work is shallow work.

Shallow work consists of non-cognitively demanding, logistical-style tasks, which are easy to replicate, such as spending too much time on unimportant emails, social media posturing etc. Such activities should be steered clear of or at least minimised, as they have little impact on your bottom line or your well-being.

 

Deep work: good for your bottom line, good for your well-being

According to Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, we feel most fulfilled after we have stretched our minds and abilities, for which he coined the term “flow state”. It explains why deep work feels so immensely satisfying:

“The best moments usually occur when a person’s body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile.”

But deep work doesn’t just feel satisfying; it is also the antidote to the frantic blur of shallow tasks and frazzled attention spans that characterise our modern, computerised world. Deep work is valuable, and it is meaningful.

Downtime facilitates insights and solutions to job-related problems 

By embracing deep work and thereby countering distractions, you’ll even be able to wrap up your day’s work earlier and enjoy more downtime. What’s more, Cal Newport argues that if you allow your conscious brain to rest, you empower your unconscious mind to begin sorting through your most complex professional problems.

For me as a translator, complex professional problems typically are tricky-to-translate terms or difficult-to-phrase sections in a text. Carving out downtime accordingly increases the likelihood that while I’m enjoying time away from work, the solution to a professional problem might suddenly pop into my head.

Working creatively with intelligent machines

Cal Newport interestingly makes reference to intelligent machines, which is also why I recommend “Deep Work” to knowledge workers as food for thought! Artificial intelligence is a hotly debated topic in the translation industry, where intelligent machines are disapproved of by some and welcomed by others.

Deep work equates to being ruthless

So how do you go deep in our chronically distracted and overwhelming world? Cal Newport suggests several strategies, all described in the book. One he recommends is the ruthless prioritisation of particular tasks, so you’ll inevitably be hard to reach for set periods of time.

The ideas put forward in books like “Deep Work” are useful to me in that they help me explain (and sometimes even defend!) my style of work towards my family, friends and colleagues. For I am either hard to reach or cannot be reached at all while I’m working or am up against a deadline. It is a deliberate decision on my part not to check my phone or answer non-work-related messages during such periods.

The book to my mind has only one drawback: Newport focuses tightly on his own university environment, and various suggested strategies therefore aren’t universally applicable to all our individual work environments. As he’s written “Deep Work” with his professor’s hat on, sections of the first part of the book are rather abstract; however, the second part is more accessible and practical.

 

If you’re looking for new ways to get more done in less time and create a productive, distraction-free and serene work environment, “Deep Work” by Cal Newport is the book for you! It sets out how to refine your ability to work with great intensity and, importantly, how to protect your time.

 

Cal Newport is a professor of computer science at Georgetown University. In addition to his academic research, he writes articles and blog posts on the intersection of digital technology and culture. Check out his long-running and popular blog, “Study Hacks”, here. 

 

I’ve previously published a blog post about “Digital Minimalism”, another brilliant bestselling book by Cal Newport, here.

Book recommendation: “Digital Minimalism” by Cal Newport

It is one of those books that you’ll probably want to devour in one go. In “Digital Minimalism”, bestselling author Cal Newport offers smart advice on how to ruthlessly strip away any online activities that don’t serve you, and how to regain control of your digital life.

Digital minimalism is a quiet movement and has been defined by Cal Newport as “a philosophy of technology use in which you focus your online time on a small number of carefully selected and optimized activities that strongly support things you value, and then happily miss out on everything else”.


Exhausted from leading a digital life

One word that came up repeatedly in conversations that Cal Newport had with people following the publication of his earlier bestseller “Deep Work” was exhaustion. Many people feel exhausted from leading a digital life.

And many people he spoke to mentioned social media’s ability to manipulate their mood. Let’s face it: constant exposure to our colleagues’ and friends’ meticulously curated portrayal of their lives, careers and activities will inevitably arouse the feeling that our own lives, careers and activities are somehow inadequate.

The deep-seated psychological vulnerabilities that every single one of us has

If you’re a social media user, this book will hook you in right from the first page. “Digital Minimalism” is a hands-on guide to minimising screen time and becoming more mindful about technology use. It sets out very clearly and in the most striking way how social media apps target the deep-seated psychological vulnerabilities that every single one of us (!) has.



Digital minimalism is based on 3 principles:

Principle #1: Clutter is costly.

Principle #2: Optimisation is important.

Principle #3: Intentionality is satisfying.


Cal Newport suggests initially performing a 30-day digital declutter. He describes how he was hoping that for his research 40 to 50 brave volunteers would sign up for a digital declutter experiment and commit to recording their experiences along the way. His guess was very wrong: more than 1,600 volunteers signed up! (This even made national headlines.)

At the end of the digital declutter, volunteers had the opportunity to allow optional technologies back into their lives, on the condition that such technologies served something that they deeply valued. Volunteers would, for example, not allow a feature of an app back into their life if it offered just some vague benefit.

The aim of digital minimalism is to no longer experience FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out). Instead, as a digital minimalist you already know which specific online activities provide you with meaning and satisfaction.

In “Digital Minimalism”, Cal Newport argues that unrestricted online activity has a negative impact on our psychological well-being. He suggests digital minimalism as an alternative approach: using technologies in a way that supports your values and goals – rather than letting technologies use you!


Cal Newport is a computer science professor at Georgetown University who studies the theory of distributed systems. In addition to his academic work, he writes about the intersection of technology and culture. He is the author of six books. His work has been published in over 25 languages and has been featured in many major publications, including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, New Yorker, Washington Post, and Economist.