Revolutionised the way I deal with email. It's worth a read for that alone. ( )

Alcott is offering here a solution to the email overload, the tedious meetings, the office politics and the general bedlam that is the modern working life.

He offers methods of dealing with your working challenges in todays office. There are solutions for getting you email to zero, the best way to run a meeting, methods of getting organised and suggestions on the best way to deal with your work load.

A lot of it is very similar to the GTD religion method as developed by David Allen, but Allcott brings a British slant and humour to his book. As a business book it is readable, as similar books can be humdrum and frankly dull, and this isn't. A useful book, in some ways, and one I may yet buy. ( )

Fun, engaging, with plenty of diagrams and a perky British sense of humour, this is one of the better productivity books I've come across. As others have noted in reviews, I felt that Allcott relied quite heavily on principles developed by earlier writers - David Allen's "Getting Things Done" loomed large, as always - and there's a far amount of simple common sense. Nevertheless, he brings it together in a playful fashion that is very much aimed at a UK audience. I always really appreciate this, as I've found many of the American books in this genre to be over-earnest and not really applicable to anything but a conventional office workplace. It's currently (2017) pretty much up to date in terms of the apps and technology it recommends, and it's good that it does suggest specific programs because David Allen's "Getting Things Done" deliberately steers away from this. However, that does mean it'll date pretty quickly. I don't think I'm committed enough to buy into the whole Ninja thing myself - I prefer making up my own system - but Allcott has some bright ideas, reinforcing and encouraging some of the principles I've picked up from elsewhere. Worth a look for a bit of light relief, or a more down-to-earth approach than some of the US offerings. ( )

Allcott's engaging book on productivity is a bit overlong, but his methods are mostly commonsense and easy to apply. He freely (with acknowledgements) borrows good ideas from elsewhere, such as the Zero Inbox, Big Rocks, and so on and weaves them together into a useful toolbox that you can pick and choose from--for the most part. You do need to adopt his CORD method--collect, organize, review, and do, however. Among the best tips here is the idea of a second brain, i.e., a to-do list of some sort, which could be a paper planner or an online/app productivity tool such as Toodledo, which he recommends, and which I ended up picking for myself after experimenting with a few alternatives. The key to the second brain (again, commonsense) is just to record those other nagging things you may need to do so that you can get back to the task at hand. This includes all those things sitting in your inbox that you are using as a proxy for a to-do list. Instead, process the ones that take less than a couple of minutes, add the others to your to-do list, leave your inbox at zero--and get back to work!

Allcott's writing is not overbearing, but also not overenthusiastic and annoying. It is very British, however, and hasn't been adapted for an American office. I hope you know that when he is referring to having biscuits at meetings--which he mentions multiple times--he is talking about a crunchy cookie. ( )

Lost a few points for not being particularly applicable to my job, but it did make me think about stuff and how to organise my work life better. I read this in short bursts and I did find it interesting and thinking fodder. I am in the middle of a stressful change path in work and needed this reminder to stop and breathe and just keep going. ( )