Disrupt Yourself, With a New Introduction: Master Relentless Change and Speed Up Your Learning Curve

If you’re well-read (especially in the areas of business, strategy and human behavior), Disrupt Yourself is a good read that synthesizes much of what you know into a structure that is simple to recall and put into practice. As I read, there were many “Oh, I know that…” moments followed by unexpected, “Huh, didn't think of it that way though…” moments. I appreciated having my old, latent knowledge reframed in a different way. It was like finding gold – eureka! Plus, Johnson includes plenty of anecdotes and real-life applications of her ideas, which makes it easier to translate theory into practical use.<br /><br />Disrupt Yourself is not a long book. In fact, I thought it would be a perfect bedside read. But, the layout of the content was dense. I felt compelled to really study the book with highlighters and pens in hand—marking key points, making notes in the margins, etc. Disrupt Yourself is the kind of book you’ll likely want to go back and read snippets of later, but because of the layout, you’d need to re-read the whole thing unless you annotated during your first read. Perhaps in future rounds of publishing the book can include more bullets, bolded content, call-outs and end-of-chapter summaries.

A quick read by Whitney Johnson who is working together with Clayton Christensen (Innovator's dilemma). In this book Whitney talks about how you can apply some of the start-up techniques to your own life to so to say disrupt yourself. A lot of the theory is based on the s-curve (normally used for adoption of new technology) and how you in life need to find new s-curves to continue to grow.<br /><br />It's based on the following 7 rules:<br />take the right risks - competitive vs market risk - think red vs blue ocean, always best to go for blue.<br />play to your distinctive strengths - what skills have helped you survive? what makes you feel strong? what exasperates you about others? what made you different, even an oddball, as a child? what compliments do you shrug off? what are your hard-won skills? -&gt; match your strengths with unmet needs<br />embrace constraints - constraints lead to faster feedback, constraints help us solve for one variable at a time, constraints help us stay focused. constraints to consider: money (a great prototype for bootstrapping is pluralsight), knowledge, time, etc constraints give us something to push against<br />battle entitlement, the innovation killer - cultural entitlement - antidote: transplant yourself to new cultures. the highest impact papers are those that mix conventional knowledge and novelty, novelty being defined as the references cited goes beyond the usual suspects. - brian uzzi and benjamin jones - emotional entitlement - antidote: be grateful - list three things that you are grateful for every day - intellectual entitlement - antidote: practice hearing dissenting voices -&gt; disrupt yourself before disrupting others <br />step down, back, or sideways to grow - 80% of success is just showing up. Groundbreaking paper - success defined by the number of citations in other works, is directly correlated to the number of papers that the scientist has written, not to the IQ of the scientist. - grit<br />give failure its due - carol Dweck praise for performance vs praise for effort. learn to fail or fail to learn - tal ben-shahar. learn from failing - validated learning - eric ries. 5 why's - Toyota explore cause and effect<br />be driven by discovery - conventional planning from a to b, vs discovery-driven planning - McGrath and MacMillan 1) create a reverse income statement 2) calculate the cost 3) compile an assumption checklist 4) prepare a milestone chart - failure is an opportunity to recalibrate<br /><br />Mandelbrot - financial prices have a memory (movements in stockprices today will influence the movements tomorrow), the company has a memory (what a company does today - influences what it will be in the future), you have a memory. If you disrupt today, then the probability that you will be disruptive tomorrow increases. momentum creates momentum.

I honestly did not expect to enjoy this book ...<br /><br />At a cursory glance, the author's business background and a distinct emphasis in some early reviews on innovation, financial analysis, and so on turned me off. I tend to go for more of a leadership and personal development focus and this seemed way too "businessy", if that word exists.<br /><br />However, I had the opportunity to hear the author in a webinar and my attention was fully engaged from the first minute. Whitney Johnson is a successful businessperson, but beyond that she is someone who wants sincerely to help others. As I began to read the book, learning started to occur and has not yet stopped. That is possibly the highest praise I can give a book.<br /><br />The beginning of the book introduces us to a graphic called the S-Curve Model, which originated with E. M. Rogers. This simple and graceful upward curving line provides both understanding and comfort for those of us who sometimes struggle with the pace of learning and change. <br /><br />Anyone who takes the time to learn this model will benefit both personally and professionally ... if nothing else, we will have an easier time as we travel through transition.<br /><br />The bulk of the book is taken up with deeper dives into the heart of her book: "... seven variables which can speed up or slow down the movement of individuals or organizations along the curve." Each chapter is a gem in itself, and they are organized to follow the upward sweep of that curve.<br /><br />This books contains elegant and practical learning, not always two things found together. My personal favorite section was on "distinctive strengths". I have some affinity for anything which talks about "strengths" versus "weaknesses”, because I believe that when we focus on identify, building, and using our strengths, we will receive maximum return on our investment of time and energy.<br /><br />"Distinctive" is a key word here. We may have strengths which are things we do well which do not set us apart from others who also do those things well. We may also talk ourselves into considering something a strength, when it is really something we enjoy doing, regardless of skill level. <br /><br />Distinctive strengths are self-determined, but Johnson provides six dynamite questions to help you identify what makes you an effective competitor. She then advises on how to match your distinctive strength with an unmet need, which seems obvious, even though we often do not do this. Finally, she plants this particular point firmly and clearly on the S-Curve, to help us understand the developmental nature of the model.<br /><br />Johnson could have written an entire book or at least an extended professional article focused just on the one variable I mentioned above and the rest of the chapters are equally rich. <br /><br />"Disrupt Yourself" is simply one very useful little book and I can easily recommend it to anyone who wants to change, needs to change, or works with those who want or need to change. If you are a leader, want to be a leader, or develop leaders, you better buy this book, memorize it, and sleep with it under your pillow … and yes, I am serious here.<br /><br />Disclaimer: I received a copy for review, but am happily investing in several more copies to share with coaching clients who need to grow and change effectively<br />

Disruptors have to be driven by discovery. <br /><br />I recently had dinner with Tai Tran, Forbes 30 under 30 in Marketing. What impressed me the most about him was that he has fully discovered himself in terms of his personalities and what he can and cannot do. The book Disrupt Yourself helped me better understand the power of self-discovery and how we can disrupt ourselves through discovery-driven planning.<br /><br />Discovery-driven planning is what interests me the most about this book. Rather than calculating cost, and revenue, then profit, you would do the reverse order and think: to achieve my baseline level of happiness, what do I need accomplish and what am I willing to give up in order to make this happen? <br /><br />I got to know this book from Tai, and I would totally recommend this book to others who are ready to jump and disrupt themselves.

I read this book at the recommendation of intentional living expert Tara Mohr, who I adore. I was disappointed by the book because it leans VERY heavily on business strategy (not surprising because it was applying a business tactic to individual development, and the author comes from the world of high finance). I found very little, in the strategy and examples of individuals who had "disrupted" their lives, to apply to my own life. Part of me thinks this isn't the fault of the book, which is clear and well-written and would probably engage an MBA sort, but I also believe that the author could've addressed a larger audience by using more examples from outside the finance/tech world, and feature individuals whose "disruption" didn't have a solid base in business. In my opinion, this book didn't do enough to apply the business theory to individual development, it was just another book on disruption theory (which isn't why I bought it). Her argument is valid, but if you aren't motivated by business, I suspect you would get just as much out of reading an article summarizing this book, and instead pick up a copy of "Daring Greatly" by Brene Brown.

Disruption, like many other business concepts, is well known and well understood. As is often the case, we don't naturally think of applying this concept to our own personal brand or career. Johnson gives a simple and fresh perspective for doing just that. I especially appreciated the content about taking risks, leading with strengths, and leveraging failure. This book reads fast, makes you stop and thinking, and is worth every second spent on either of these.

Great read. I highly recommend it for those who recognize that if they don't intentionally disrupt themselves on a regular basis, life will disrupt them.

This was the perfect book with which to close out 2019 and anticipate a new year and decade. Whitney Johnson, one of the nation's leading business thinkers and thought leaders, makes a compelling case for the importance of constantly challenging one's self and seeking ever-increasing personal growth and learning.<br /><br />Using the the "S-curve" model that is typically used to explain how, why, and at what rates ideas and products spread and grow, Johnson's theory is that every individual can also find, and accelerate up, "S-curves" of growth in their personal lives by implementing seven strategies: 1) Take the right risks; 2) Play to your distinctive strengths; 3) Embrace constraints; 4) Battle entitlement; 5) Step back to grow; 6) Give failure its due; and 7) Be discovery driven. Johnson devotes a chapter to each strategy, giving both examples from both her personal experience and that of others to demonstrate the various concepts.<br /><br />In the afterword, Johnson writes: "Learning is not linear, but exponential: there is a cumulative and compounding effect. If you do something disruptive today, then the probability that you can be disruptive tomorrow increases. Momentum creates momentum." I believe in this principle wholeheartedly, and Johnson's book is a great resource for anyone looking for some applicable and effective tools to compound both learning and growth.

I was really underwhelmed by this book, perhaps because I expected to like it.<br /><br />Whitney Johnson applies Disruption Theory—a theory that explains how low-end companies disrupt industries—to individual persons. By thinking about S-curves as analogous to competencies, she suggests that you can make big changes, take new jobs, and feel confident that you <i>will</i> make progress.<br /><br />It's a fine idea, but I didn't think there was a lot to the book.

There comes a point in your life, no matter what you do, when the question 'What next?' becomes a recurring one in your mind. While the 'What' is something you can figure relatively easily, the 'How' usually becomes the more daunting question. This book helps you answer that.