So Good They Can't Ignore You
Cal Newport

Summary

Cal talks about ways to become indispensable at your company throughout your career, no matter what industry you're in.

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Notes

You need to be good at something before you can expect a good job

Things happen in stages

A job is a way to pay the bills, a career is a path towards better work and a calling is work that’s important to your life and identity

Focus on what value you’re producing in your job and you’ll begin to love the work

No one owes you a great career, you need to earn it and the process won’t be easy

Build up career capital: skills developed over time that are so good they can’t ignore you

Approach your job w/ a dedication to deliberate practice

Deliberate practice is often the opposite of enjoyable, but it has to be done

Giving people more control over what they do and how they do it increases their happiness, engagement and sense of purpose

Control acquired without career capital is not sustainable

Do what people are willing to pay for

Think small but act big

Make little bets, learn critical info with lots of small failures but also significant wins

Remarkable projects must couple people who encounter it to remark about it to others and it must be launched in a way that supports such remarking

The best missions are found in the adjacent possible: the region just beyond the current cutting edge

Become good at something rare and valuable and then invest the career capital into traits that make a job great

Strain is good and you need to have deliberate practice

Become more craft centric rather than productivity centric

Working right trumps finding the right work

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