Productivity
The First 20 Hours Summary & Review: Get Usefully Good Fast
The First 20 Hours summary: Josh Kaufman’s method for getting usefully good at any skill in twenty hours of focused practice —…
Read Summary →Josh Kaufman
"Business literacy without the $150k degree"
Josh Kaufman built The Personal MBA as a website first: a reading list for people who wanted business literacy without a two-year, six-figure program. He worked at Procter & Gamble, then turned the list into the 2010 Portfolio book. He also wrote The First 20 Hours on rapid skill acquisition.
2 books·Rapid skill acquisition & business literacy
Books by Josh Kaufman
Our in-depth summaries and reviews of his work
Productivity
The Personal MBA Summary & Review: Skip the Degree, Learn the Five Parts
The Personal MBA summary: Josh Kaufman’s five-part model — value creation, marketing, sales, delivery, finance — and a 7-day plan to learn…
Read Summary →Key Ideas & Recurring Themes
Five parts of every business
Create, market, sell, deliver, finance. If one part is missing, it is not a business.
Iron Law of the Market
If nobody will pay, effort does not count. Find a customer before the full version.
Perceived value
Dream outcome times likelihood, divided by delay and effort. Raise the top, cut the bottom.
The first 20 hours
You do not need 10,000 hours to become useful. Twenty hours of focused practice gets you past the frustration barrier.
Notable Quotes
"If you don't have something people want, you don't have a business."— The Personal MBA
"Value is what the customer thinks it is — not what you think it is."— The Personal MBA
"The major barrier to skill acquisition isn’t intellectual. It’s emotional."— The First 20 Hours
Book Author Josh Kaufman
The First 20 Hours Summary & Review: Get Usefully Good Fast
The First 20 Hours summary: Josh Kaufman’s method for getting usefully good at any skill in twenty hours of focused practice — deconstruct, remove barriers, push through the frustration barrier.
The Personal MBA Summary & Review: Skip the Degree, Learn the Five Parts
The Personal MBA summary: Josh Kaufman’s five-part model — value creation, marketing, sales, delivery, finance — and a 7-day plan to learn business without the degree.