Book review of: ‘It Doesn’t Have to Be Crazy at Work’ By Jason Fried and published October 2018.

This book is a must read for anyone working long and stressful hours at any company (OK that’s everyone working in IT Right?). SQL Server Dbas and all other IT folks will be mumbling Duh, uh-huh and no kidding as they read the book. You will look at your company culture and management policies much differently after reading this book.

I broke some of the points in the book into 3 categories. Fried gives interesting background and solutions to these points.

Management
• Employees should not work after hours and 40 hours is enough.
• Perks that keep you at the office are evil.
• Salary negotiations are a load of BS and so are bonuses.
• Open office plans invite distraction and hamper productivity.

Team
• Team communication does not need an immediate response.
• Keep team dependencies minimized.
• Less meetings and meetings with agendas only.
• Focus on improvement vs. goals.
• Projects with inflexible scope and deadlines suck for everyone.

You
• Set up daily free time hours to avoid constant interruptions.
• Don’t waste time on group chat, emails and other notifications.
• The quality of your work is what you get paid.

While I don’t agree with all the points I highlighted in the 3 categories, many of them are right on the money. The book is a thumbs up read.

The author Jason Fried is the CEO of Basecamp. He made changes written in the book at Basecamp to make it a desirable place to work. You would be so lucky to find another company like Basecamp to work at your next job.

Perhaps you should suggest this book for YOUR upper management reading list. Right?