In our regular series where we look at well-known books and pull out the practical lessons our alumni can use at work, this month we’re picking up Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown. If you read March’s piece on Cal Newport’s Deep Work and found yourself nodding along, this is the natural next step. Where Newport focused on how to work deeply, McKeown asks an even more basic question: are you working on the right things in the first place?
The Trap of Being Spread Too Thin
McKeown opens with a problem most of us recognise. We agree to things because we feel we should. The diary fills up. Each new request seems reasonable on its own. And before long, we’re doing dozens of things badly rather than a few things brilliantly.
He calls this the trap of the “non-essentialist” – the person who treats every demand as equally important, who can’t quite say no, and who ends up busy but oddly unproductive. Sound familiar? You’re not alone. Research published in the Harvard Business Review suggests that the modern manager spends a significant portion of every week on tasks that produce almost no measurable value.
The Disciplined Pursuit of Less
McKeown’s antidote is “essentialism” – the disciplined pursuit of less, but better. It’s not about doing less work. It’s about doing the right work, and being honest about everything else. He boils it down to three skills: explore (work out what actually matters), eliminate (cut the rest), and execute (build systems that make the essential easy).
The “explore” part is where most people skip ahead. McKeown argues that you can’t decide what to drop until you’ve taken proper time to figure out what genuinely matters. That means time to think – something most modern jobs actively work against.
The 90% Rule
One of the book’s most useful ideas is the 90% rule. When you’re deciding whether to take on something new, give it a score out of 100. If it isn’t a 90 or higher, treat it as a no.
Why so brutal? Because most “yeses” sit in the middle ground – not exciting, not awful, just there. And once you commit, those middling tasks crowd out the ones that would actually move the needle. The 90% rule forces you to be honest with yourself about which is which.
Try This: Next time someone asks you to take on something extra, before you reply, give it a number out of 100 based on how aligned it is with what you’re really trying to achieve. If it’s under 90, draft a polite “no” and see how it feels. You don’t have to send it. But you might be surprised by how clear the answer becomes.
Saying No Without Burning Bridges
McKeown spends a good chunk of the book on saying no gracefully – a skill we touched on in last August’s piece on protecting your time. He suggests separating the decision from the relationship. You’re not rejecting the person; you’re rejecting the request. Phrases like “I can’t take this on, but here’s who might be better placed to help” or “I’d love to, but doing it justice would mean dropping something I’ve already committed to” keep things warm while protecting your priorities.
Pro Tip: If saying no feels too direct, try a “yes, and” – yes, I can help, and to do that well I’ll need to push back X to next week. It frames the trade-off honestly and puts the decision back with the person asking.
Why This Book Is Worth Your Time
Essentialism isn’t a productivity manual in the usual sense. It’s a quieter argument – that the version of busy most of us live is a choice, even when it doesn’t feel like one. If you’ve ever finished a week wondering where the time went or what you actually achieved, McKeown’s framework offers a way of stepping back and choosing more deliberately. It pairs well with March’s Deep Work – Newport tells you how to focus, McKeown tells you what to focus on.
Less, but better. It’s a quietly radical idea.