“And what Covey does is talk about setting your objectives and having some sense of goals and priorities.” It’s a bigger-picture view, and a must-read if you’re trying to figure out what the point of being efficient is at all.īut that doesn’t mean it’s all abstract recommendations. “It doesn’t really make any sense to say whether you’re productive or not, except relative to some set of meaningful priorities for you,” he explains. MIT professor and author Robert Pozen likes this title because it helps define a framework for your productivity. Writer Laura Vanderkam calls this book “a classic, more about being a good person than trying to will the universe into finding you good parking spots,” and it was the most-recommended title by our panelists, with three votes of confidence. These are seven of our panelists’ most-recommended titles on productivity and time management, along with a few Strategist-approved honorable mentions. That list includes Sophia Amoruso, founder and CEO of Girlboss and author of # GIRLBOSS Daniel Clark, CEO of Brain.fm Justin Kerr, author, most recently of How to Be Great at Your Job Aishwarya Iyer, CEO and founder of Brightland Jake Knapp, author of Make Time and Sprint Candace Nelson, co-founder and pastry chef of Sprinkles Cupcakes and Pizzana Robert Pozen, senior lecturer at MIT Sloan School of Management and author of Extreme Productivity Gretchen Rubin, author and host of the podcast Happier With Gretchen Rubin Jane Stoller, life coach and author of Organizing Your Lifestyle Laura Vanderkam, author of several books about time management and productivity, including Off the Clock and Juliet’s School of Possibilities and Heidi Zak, co-founder and co-CEO of ThirdLove. So for this reading list on the best productivity books and books on time management, I reached out to a broad range of experts from academia, business, journalism, and tech. And what helps one person stay on track might be the productivity tool that successfully guides another. That’s because productivity is such a slippery concept, with a different meaning for every person, depending on what they ultimately want to accomplish. Deciding to “ be more productive” is one of those goals that sounds really good - because who doesn’t want to get more done in fewer hours or waste less time on social media? - but is actually hard to do well.

Books on how to organize your life