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Why Work Sucks and How to Fix It: No Schedules, No Meetings, No Joke--the Simple Change That Can Make Your Job Terrific |  | Authors: Cali Ressler, Jody Thompson
Publisher: Portfolio Hardcover
Category: Book
List Price: $23.95
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Seller: atlanta-book-company
Rating:  39 reviews
Sales Rank: 158119
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1
Pages: 224
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 8.4 x 5.6 x 1
ISBN: 1591842034
Dewey Decimal Number: 658.314
EAN: 9781591842033
ASIN: 1591842034
Publication Date: May 29, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
Do you hate cramming all of your errands into the weekend?
Do you resent having to beg permission to watch your kids weekday soccer game?
Are you tired of seeing people who arent very good at their jobs get promoted because they arrive early and stay late?
Theres got to be a better wayand there is! Cali Ressler and Jody Thompson show that everyone benefits when we change the focus from hours to outcomes. Its just that our traditional definition of workMonday through Friday, nine to fivedoesnt make sense in the always-on global economy.
So, Ressler and Thompson created the Results-Only Work Environment. In a ROWE, you control when, where, and how long you work. As long as you meet your objectives, the way you spend your time is entirely up to you.
Suddenly, work isnt a place you go, its a thing you do. In a ROWE, there are no mandatory meetings or fixed schedules. You stop doing any activity that wastes time, and no one criticizes you for leaving early or coming in late. If you do your best work at midnight or on Sundays, go for it!
ROWE sounds like a fantasy, but Ressler and Thompson have already made it a reality at Best Buy, a Fortune 100 company. They have proven that ROWE not only makes employees happier but also delivers better results. And now the authors are helping companies implement ROWE nationwide.
Infused with passion and common sense, Why Work Sucks and How to Fix It will change the way you think about your job, your company, and your quality of life. Read it and join the revolution!
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 39
 Love the way you work! July 29, 2010
bulski.pl
This book is one of the best guides to modern lifestyle design I have read. As Tim Ferriss wrote: If you work, you have to read this book.
ROWE mens better quality of life, work and much much better results. With ROWE you don't need to think about work life balance..
 The worse business book I have read July 21, 2010
Richard Sharpe (Phoenix, AZ, USA)
2 out of 5 found this review helpful
"Why Works Sucks, and How To Fix It" is written by the two people who created ROWE (Results Only Work Environment) while working at Best Buy in the early 2000s. The book looks at current working practices and policies and questions if the organization is measuring workers in the best way to achieve the highest productivity.
The book starts by recognizing that we work in the information age but the workplace has not changed since the industrial age. I agree with this concept and was excited to begin reading what was wrong and how to fix it based on the methodology of ROWE, in effect concentrating specifically on results.
Unfortunately this was not the case. This book could have been 25 pages rather than 200. The authors continually state that ROWE is simply not about flexible working hours (one of the 13 ROWE `Guideposts') however half the book is a justification of why this is a good thing.
Most of the other half of the book discusses what the authors refer to as `Sludge' - comments or remarks made by co-workers that are not motivating to the good of the individual or relevant to the work.
For example, if someone was late for a meeting, the presenter may say `Nice of you to join us!'. This is Sludge as it infers that the person could not be bothered attending on time and serve to embarrass them
Whereas I can see why comments like this do not contribute to productivity, the authors simply state this should stop without any guidance on how to curb complacency. If I am continually late for meetings but no-one says anything, because I am hitting my results, then I can keep being late. According to ROWE: Unless my results are compromised, so what? - Never mind professional courtesy!
Guidance is missing in almost all of the Guideposts. Without time measurement many people will work longer hours to get the results done but no advise is given to aid management in stopping people working too long and causing burn out.
Actually there is nothing about measuring the results set and nothing about the possible issues of measuring against metrics1.
The examples of real world experience of ROWE are extreme in most cases and the root cause of these examples is not because people are working `traditionally'.
One example given: `If you have 15 projects, under ROWE you will still have 15 projects but you are in control of time and therefore can get these done more productively'.
The book states "[Under ROWE] you do not feel overwhelmed, stressed out and you do not get burned out even if you are under a mountain of work".
Not many of us are good at time management and none of us are excellent at multi-tasking2. The root cause may be determined by looking at why you have 15 projects, not necessarily changing the way you work to get them completed.
Their weak objection handling of comments from skeptics (through the book listed as `Yeah, But...') fails to impress and in cases fails to address the objection.
Although this concept is aimed at all industries, and there will be many objections from workers in specific industries, the authors do not discuss general issues of "Why Work Sucks" such as; MBAs and Management courses being based on the 19th Century Taylorism model (although Carnegie-Mellon and other Universities are currently addressing this), Right to Work contracts and other common policies that stifle innovation. - Things that from introduction I was expecting to read about.
For the IT industry, two things raised red flags to me:
Firstly, advocating `pulling all nighters' to get the work done so you can spend time doing what you want for the next few days. This does not address any quality issues (although you could argue that that could be in the results). The book never addresses quality at all, or how to set results. So I could have a measurable goal that is, say, to create x number of webinars a month, but nothing about the quality of these.
Secondly, their view of teamwork. The book dedicates one line to teamwork and is quite succinct - "Teams are overrated."
I am an advocate of many of the ideas of ROWE, just not this book. To me, this book is more of a marketing effort to try and sell the authors to come to your organization and consult rather than provide good practices on how to implement ROWE.
Following up from the book I looked at [...], a list of companies that have adopted ROWE. To date there are 10 listed with Best Buy (obviously) and GAP being notable. I could not find any references to how successful ROWE has been in these organizations.
Personally I would recommend Stand Back and Deliver by Pixton, Nickolaisen, Little and McDonald, for alternative project management, and The 4 Hour Workweek by Ferriss, both of which, in my opinion, are far superior.
1 - The Hawthorne Effect is a much cited study on how individuals react to set metrics and measurements.
2 - Facts based on biology and studies from `Pragmatic Thinking and Learning' by Andy Hunt.
 Liked the Idea of ROWE but the presentation could have been improved July 14, 2010
Shakeel Akhtar
The Idea of Results Only Work Environment (ROWE) has a great potential to make the workplace outcome driven rather than time driven. Putting in 40 hours a week or more without recalling any accomplishment or outcome at the end of the week is not the right way of working in the current environment of rapid change. So, I definitely get the idea that ROWE is a solution worth trying and if it worked for Best Buy during the same time Circuit City was going out of business then there is some merit to it.
I browsed through much of the examples as I was well aware of all the reasons why "Work Sucks" and what makes work suck. So, many examples were well-known and simplistic. A few Dilbert cartoons would have explained chapters one and two. Chapter three is more biographical in nature. Chapter four is where the book picks up with the Guideposts for ROWE. The 13 guideposts listed could have been combined into 4 or 5 guideposts because a few are repetitive like guidepost # 10 "There are no work schedules" is reworded as guidepost #6 "Arriving at the workplace at 2:00 PM is not considered coming in late ...." and as guidepost # 9 "Its okay to grocery shop on a Wednesday morning,.....". The concept of "Every meeting is optional" is thought-provoking and the reasoning behind this guidepost is explained very well.
All in all ROWE is a great idea and Kudos to Cali Ressler and Jody Thompson for dreaming up this idea and then putting it into practice so successfully. The reason this book gets a 3-star is solely because of the presentation. There was no need to fill up pages when you could have explained some of these concepts visually and taken the route of books like "One-Minute Manager". Short and concise.
Revolutionize your workplace November 24, 2009
Shaun Worcester (Kettering, OH)
This book has made me question how we are doing "work" in our business. We have always offered more flexibility than others, but we still have a tendency to measure performance based on time and other contributing factors. Now, I have a clearer picture of how we should be measuring performance and success at work - based on RESULTS ONLY. I'm still not 100% clear on how that's going to look in our company, but we will begin moving towards a ROWE and eradicating SLUDGE. I can't wait!
Welcome to the Workplace of the Future July 25, 2009
VA
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I knew that the traditional workplace was broken, but this book put the words in my mouth. It certainly isn't a quick fix, but a total overhaul of the system. But now I have hope. WHO CARES what we've always done? Let's figure out what works now and do that! The Results-Only Work Environment is working.
The world is moving ahead, but the workplace somehow got stuck in a time warp. It's time for a change. Once you read the book, you might become a workplace revolutionary, but that's what it's going to take!
Check out what's going on with ROWE (Results-Only Work Environment) here:
Authors' blog: [...]
Facebook page: [...]
ROWE in the Press (Forbes, Businessweek, Time, HR Magazine, etc): [...]
Showing reviews 1-5 of 39
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