Work doesn’t happen at work.
That’s what Jason Fried says. The office in its actual form, norms, ceremonies, dynamics, rituals, communication styles, endless meetings, you name it…. isn’t a good place to do meaningful work. Jason and David Heinemeier Hansson, co-founders of 37signals and the builders of Basecamp and Hey, have produced many insightful perspectives on this topic over the years.
Here are my 4 go-to insightful resources that changed my thinking on Slack, Meeting, Email Culture….well…. how to work.
- Resource #1: Why work doesn’t happen at work TED Talk by Jason. If you pick one of these resources, I’d suggest watching this one. In his talks, he calls out the two main offenders (call them the M&Ms), why work doesn’t happen at work and offers three suggestions to make the workplace a place to work. Super insightful.
- Resource #2: Group Chat: The Best Way to Totally Stress Out Your Team. The headline from the article: “Group chat is like being in an all-day meeting, with random participants, and no agenda” I mean, come on. Can it be described any better? In this eye-opening piece, they talk about some positives of chat, but mainly plentiful unnoticed cons of the chat. I guarantee you never think about Slack, Teams, Discord, or whatever chat tool you use in your day-to-day life – from this perspective.
- Resource #3: Status Meetings Are the Scourge. In this piece, they shed light on why status meetings are the worst. Those are the most common meetings in every team, in every organisation. You’ll question and come up with some alternatives after learning how and why to eliminate them and the insight that you’ll know more, save a pile of money, and regain dozens of hours a month.
- Resource #4: It Doesn’t Have to Be Crazy at Work [Book]: If you have come this far, and if you ever said, “It’s crazy at work.” before then I’d highly recommend reading this very well-written and by far one of the most insightful books on management. You won’t regret it.
Emre Guney 