Book Review: The 4 Hour Work Week
Posted on June 11, 2007 by LJ
Book Information
Title: The 4-Hour work Week: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich
Author: Timothy Ferriss
Rating (of 10): 4
ISBN: 0307353133
Book Summary
Tim Ferriss, founder and CEO of a sports supplement company, shares how he got out of his own way and reduced his work week to 4 hours. From this reduction of work and streamlining his business model, he is able to live anywhere and take mini-retirements as he chooses.
His plan is based on four principles:
- Definition
- Elimination
- Automation
- Liberation
The book goes through each of the principles and gives examples both from his life and lives of others who are living this type of lifestyle.
Review
The title intrigued me. I have long dreamed about working for myself in the type of way where I am not at the beck and call of anyone. I saw this book at a particularly stressful point in my current project, and was fascinated that this could be done at all. The book itself came up in three blogs that I read and an email from a friend, so I took the cosmic hint and bought it.
However, in the first few chapters, the author talks about how he won the gold medal at the 1999 Chinese National Kickboxing Tournament having entered the sport only a few weeks before. The story he tells goes to illustrate his point: that rules can be bent. However, the story of how he managed to weigh more than his opponents and use that advantage to push them out of the ring for technical knockouts really bothered me. No, it wasn’t against the rules…in letter. But what he did was still, to me, ethically dubious.
Unfortunately I couldn’t shake that feeling as I read the rest of the book. He made some good points about outsourcing, and also about how getting rid of problem customers is OK (I’ve long felt that kowtowing to a customer whose behavior is unacceptable is not worth any amount of money). However, his methods are way over the top for me.
All in all, I say it is worth a read, but be careful and weigh everything he is saying against your own standards of conduct and sense of right. (As you should any book…but particularly this one).
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