So Good They Can’t Ignore You: Why Skills Trump Passion in the Quest for Work You Love by Cal Newport
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
If you’re someone who’s been plagued by the thought of not having known your passion or not having able to figure out what your passion is, then the lessons from this book would be extremely valuable for you. And this is really the case with a lot of Indian kids, where you’ve been part of a rat-race growing up. Scoring high in school, studying hard to crack the college entrance exams, doing well in college and studying again to get a good job in the industry. But often we hear this from the content in West (be it series, movies, etc) that we should find our passion and match our work to it. But this far from the reality where hundreds and thousands of people are far-more pressed to provide for themselves and their family by making a decent living.
However, this book dispels all such notions about how it’s not absolutely necessary to find your passion and find work to let your work in that field. The idea is simple - look at all the knowledge you’ve gained over the years, see how it all comes together (actively or passively) to an area where you’ve been learning and growing ‘rare and valuable skills’ all through the years and become so good at whatever you do in the right market that you command a level of autonomy or control that gives you the highest order of happiness.
These lessons are corroborated with numerous examples in the book. Most noteworthy and well-known among all is that of Steve Jobs. It was not passion that led Steve Jobs make Apple the iconic company it is today, in the first place. It started out with a simple need to make money by assembling and selling computers with help of his friends. It was over a period of time that by doing this and making such exceptional looking computers that they started to gain traction and move on to now well-known history of Apple.
It’s important to note at this point that Steve Jobs did not start out in 1976 with the vision of making the world’s greatest computer company. Similarly it’s not necessary to know in advance what your passion is and then work towards it. You can simply get so good at whatever you do that you cultivate your creativity, have the impact and give you the control that makes your work great.
In this book, Cal Newport is a wonderful author who’s written (in a true spirit of a computer-scientist) an algorithm that defines the steps to enable you to find and enjoy the dream job elixir - something that makes it seem to the outside world that you’re following your passion but you’re merely doing your work so good that they couldn’t ignore you.
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