Welcome to episode 141 of the Nerd Journey Podcast [@NerdJourney]! We’re John White (@vJourneyman) and Nick Korte (@NetworkNerd_), two Pre-Sales Technical Engineers who are hoping to bring you the IT career advice that we wish we’d been given earlier in our careers. In today’s episode we begin a book discussion of Deep Work by Cal Newport. We’ll help listeners understand what deep work is, why we should do it (based on the book), and share our reactions.
Original Recording Date: 09-26-2021
Topics – Show Format, Overall Reactions to the Book, Introduction to the Deep Work Hypothesis, Chapter 1 – Deep Work is Valuable, Chapter 2 – Deep Work is Rare, Chapter 3 – Deep Work is Meaningful
0:55 – Today’s Show Format

* This week we’re doing a book review episode on Deep Work by Cal Newport. This will be only part 1 and aligns with part 1 of the book.
* The book was referenced in Episode 108, our 2021 book goals, and in Episode 124 with Josh Duffney.

* For previous book reviews we’ve done see these episodes:

* Episode 87 – Book Discussion: Lencioni’s “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team”
* Episode 90 – Book Discussion: The Inner Game of Stress by Gallwey, Hanzelik, and Horton

* Cal Newport is a computer science professor at Georgetown and has published several books including Digital Minimalism, So Good They Can’t Ignore You, and Deep Work (full list can be found here).

* He has also started a podcast called Deep Questions that is quite good, often giving advice based on listener questions from his books.
* At this point John has listed to about 40 of the episodes (in chronological order).

* The format of this show will be as follows:

* John and Nick will give reactions to the book overall.
* Then we will go back and react to each chapter, answer questions like

* Do I believe this?
* Does this apply to me?
* Does it make me want to change behavior?
* What will I change to align myself with this idea?

5:39 – Overall Reactions to the Book

* John

* He found the book compelling, felt the hypothesis was valid. Once he started reading it was difficult to stop.
* John says the book definitely applies to him. Unless you concentrate on removing distraction, it is so easy to let it creep into your professional life. John felt like every description of a behavior was talking about him.
* It definitely makes John want to change. In fact, he wanted to make changes as soon as possible (very compelling).
* John has already started reorganizing how he works, what can interrupt him, and how he scheduled his time.
* Focusing your attention and not getting sidetracked is very difficult.

* Nick

* When Nick thinks about past guests, he believes they have done deep work in some form or another, even if they didn’t call it deep work.