Rework – Book Review

There are many business books you could potentially read if you are interested in starting your own design business (or a business of any kind). But there is one that I read recently that is a must for any creative who wants to start a business as it provides straight forward advice the you can actually use.

Rework by 37Signals founders Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson is pitched as turning conventional business wisdom (write a business plan, seek investors etc…) on it’s head. The funny thing was that when I read it, it all seemed like the most straight forward, logical and no nonsense way to do it  and I immediately wondered why someone hadn’t written such a straight forward, to the point book like this before on the subject.

The two founders of 37Signals, a company that creates cloud based software for collaboration, project management, contact tracking, organisation and communication for small businesses, have taken everything they have learnt so far in their business journey (turning 37signals into a successful business) and put it into this book. Rework covers how to start a business, how build a business and how to grow (or not grow) a business. The whole book is broken down into small, easily digestible sections, complete with simple and often amusing illustrations, that put forward one idea at a time, making it an easy read. The ideas inside it’s covers provide a great blueprint for designers (or anyone else) to follow in their business creation endeavors.

The traditional jargon you often find in business books has been dispensed with and the 95% of the book is in plain english (bar one or two pieces of software geek terminology, but that can be forgiven) making it even easier for anyone to quickly wrap their heads around the ideas and get into actually implementing them in their own business endeavour.

Rework is the sort of book you can just pick up and read random bits of when you are in need of inspiration or information. Alternatively it can be read from cover to cover (quickly too, I read it in a couple of hours) if you really want to get through the ideas and onto creating or working on your business. Rework is the kind of book you will refer to again and again as all the concepts within it just make sense and thus you don’t need to spend forever trying to unravel the web of jargon or mess of ideas traditionally present in books from this subject area.

Rework is an excellent resource for designers looking to start a business as it provides straight forward, easy to understand business advice from entrepreneurs who have successfully built a company by practicing what they preach. Put simply Rework is an indispensable book for any designer wishing to start a business.

Rework is available via Amazon or Fishpond.