Customer Reviews

Time Management for the Creative Person: Right-Brain Strategies for Stopping Procrastination, Getting Control of the Clock and Calendar, and Freeing Up Your Time and Your Life

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I expected this book to provide innovative, useful information; after all, I'm a creative professional, always have a million projects going on at the same time, and really could use some help. Unfortunately, instead of original advice targeted to people in creative fields, this book is geared to harried housewives and disorganzied hobbyists. It is crammed full of platitudes, cliches, anecdotes about quasi-celebrities ("As a stand-up comic, Gary Shandling enterains audiences by poking fun at himself..."), quizzes (Are you right-brained or left-brained?), quotations, items ripped directly from press releases ("According to a survey by Select Comfort ...") and bulleted lists of hints (focused primarily on housekeeping and automobile maintenance) including:

* Stop to smell the flowers (yes, he actually says this)
* Brush your dog or cat while watching your favorite TV show
* Choose plants that are easy to grow
* Make enough for two meals when you cook and freeze the second meal
* Use paper plates and cups
* Hire a cleaning service
* Get more sleep

Probably the worst piece of advice this book offers, though, is "the future will take care of itself." No, it won't, especially if a deadline is looming and the rent check is due! If you work in a creative field and are looking for advice about enhancing your creativity and/or better managing your time and projects, skip this book. It is a complete waste of time and money.

Before I got this book I was five minutes late to practically everything, and was chronically overdue on deadlines. I tried to file, spent $$ on a file cabinet, which sat empty while various things sat on top of it. I have a daily planner, which really works (when I remember to use it). If this sounds like you, you might really benefit from this book.

I got this book as a companion to the much more left-brained Julie Morgenstern's Organizing from the Inside Out. They are, for me, the perfect companions. Morgenstern helps me to figure out why things aren't working, but Silber is better (for me) at helping me to figure out how I can make my life more efficient and productive.

Silber's approach is based on some very useful quizzes, which help you to see the weaknesses and incompatibilities in your own organizational strategy. This enables you to create your own personalized, individual time management plan. I would estimate that the chapter "Timing is Everything" saves me about 2 hours of needless wandering around a week (grocery shopping on Tuesday or Wednesday really works). Tickler files (both daily and monthly) have transformed my life: I no longer lose bills, important pieces of paper, or track of things I want to do.

If other time management systems have failed you, give this one a try. It really works for me!

If typical time-management advice leaves you cold, this book offers a refreshingly different perspective, and tons of practical ideas that are based on creative and abstract thinking, not linear, robotic instructions. This is for those of us who are usually 5 minutes late, who search the house for a slip of paper with vital information, and who find day-planners to be tedious and inconvenient. And this book never makes you feel guilty or inadequate for not following traditional advice on "productivity."

This book proposes that organization and time management strategies should be personalized and comfortable. They should be empowering, not restrictive, and make your life more relaxed, not more stressful. Until reading this book, I had not considered that this was possible. I have adopted many of the author's ideas and specific suggestions, and I have continued using them for over a year since I first read it. I've increased my freelance earnings, created a workspace I love to work in, and reduced the stress in my life. If you cringe at most time-management books, please read this one.

If a friend hadn't given me this book and said "READ THIS!" I would have been skeptical. As a creative person who considers herself organized, I didn't think that this book would speak to me - but I was mistaken! and what a pleasant surprise! One of the most entertaining books I've read in a long time (and how often do you hear that in a description of a "self help" book) - I've read it twice! . Since the author is also a creative type, his writing is extremely "user friendly" which is one of the reasons this book is so enjoyable. I found the layout of the book extremely useful. Lee Silber understands that creative types/the right brain thinkers do not like to necessarily do things in a specified (linear/left brain) order - therefor the book is organized in such a way that you can jump in at any chapter and skip around at your own pace. I also enjoyed the fact that certain ideas are mentioned more than once (another good thing for those of us with a short attention span!). By repeating specific ideas throughout, it makes it possible for them to actually sink in! (you can't be organized if you can't even remember how or where to start). When reading through the book, you actually begin to feel that the author is in your workspace, taking it all in - with his specific right-on-target suggestions of how to free up the clutter as well as your time - which he reminds us is the one of the most valuable things in your life (the time, not the clutter! ) It doesn't matter what type of creative person you are, his ideas are applicable to all people of varying creative tendencies. This book will help you get to the point where you will be able to spend more time on the creative things in your life. I highly recommend this book !

No matter how long your to-do list is, this book will double it. It is nothing more than a long list of items with a little "creativity-slang" thrown on top. I only gave it two stars because someone who has never looked at time management in depth may find it useful; however, choosing any other time management book, even with eyes closed, would be a better choice.

I read a reveiw of this in an on flight magazine. Finding it interesting, I wrote the name and author down on a piece of paper and crammed it into my pocket with the other pieces of paper. A couple of weeks later, I found the chit and ordered the book only to be sadly disappointed.

First, the book is difficult to read. The multiple fonts and never-get-to-the-point prose make it burden.

Second, the mundane tests are useless (See Cosmo Mag for more and less expensive examples). For instance, the test on pages 27-28, "Are You a Workaholic" is pointless and poorly constructed. Silber never states exactly what is wrong with being a workaholic. This particular quiz also has an editing error.

Third, Silber writes as if the ability to be more efficient in your use of time means that you will be able to do the things Silber apparently likes to do. Refering back to the workaholic quiz, what if I want to be more efficient in my work, perhaps because I like my work? I may want to accomplish more and still work 90 hours a week. Is that bad? Perhaps if you don't fit the mold and stereotype Silber is attempting to appeal to. Silber also seems to dislike certain forms of entertainment and apparently believes that time freed up to enjoy those forms of entertainment is somehow misspent. What is wrong with watching more TV? I hate most TV but if that is what a person wants to do with free time, so what?

Finally, the book is full of flirtations with the creative, telling us how wonderful and misunderstood we are. WE KNOW THAT- THAT IS WHY WE BOUGHT THE BOOK. I couldn't tell if this was supposed to be some sort of pop psychology self-esteem builder or a book that would provide some ideas on how to better manage my time and be more effective in my personal and professional life. Too bad those apparently weren't Silber's goals as well.

Why two stars instead of one? While reading "Time Management for the Creative Person, I just imagined the book to be a very bad sarcastic ode to the creative. Knowing that it was intended as a serious work instead made me laugh out loud at various points. Sort of a new millenium version of "Refer Madness". However, don't mistake this book as anything less than a rehashing of the standard left brain time organizational manuals- but with platitudes to the creative and the dysfunctional use of multiple fonts.

Forget it. You aren't going to convince me. I am well known for completing an awful lot of stuff fairly quickly but I still always have much to learn about time management and organization. Lee Silber's Time Management for the Creative Person is a treasure trove of little tricks, hints and exercises to get you on the organized straight and narrow. Stop denying you have a problem and go look through your closets. Or ask your best friend. They will tell you. Seriously, from the badly rattled to the mildy behind schedule this book helps all kinds of creative people to become inspired to set goals from themselves in an organized and timely fashion, and with Silber's usual sense of humor and fun. A quote used in the book: "A lot of frustrated artists are people who didn't take the opportunity when it was presented." - Jimmy Buffett. Don't miss out on the opportunity of this book.

This book will only confuse the creative person more, not help their time management skills. As both a creative person and a highly organized person, I became afraid for the plight of the disorganized creative with each word. Tips such as writing "to-do" items on individual pieces of paper, then taping these pages to the office wall, will only create more mess and inhibit ease of use.

The format itself is disorganized, in that chapters are not easily distinguished one from the next. The tips seem more like a collection of tips from women's magazines piled into one book instead of a useable guide to organization.

Skip this book as your first step to time management.

As a full-bore right-brainer for my whole life, I have struggled with trying to fit accompishment into a linear society. I've also spent almost 9 years as an advertising creative, and have often gotten burned with not being able to manage my time well enough to meet deadlines. For the first time, I'm inderstanding that in order for me to be efficient and successful, I don't have to try to fit into someone elses mold. I can use what makes me a good creative and still handle a myriad of things as well as the proverbial "Franklin Planner' types. As much of a problem solver that I am, I never really thought that time management could be the domain of a right-brainer. I figured that what makes me creative is also prevented me from being able to plan, goal set and accomplish. This book (this will sound very trite) has given me new hope that I can get my busy life on track and nail the successes one by one. Thanks Lee!

I have always been disorganized. I could never remember to mail things, pen-pals disappeared because I never wrote them, I could never find anything and the guilt about being so messy just bugged me. Then I found Mr. Silber's book and what a change. I had looked at a few other time management books but never really read because they were so dry. The difference between those other books and Mr. Silber's? It's okay to be a little messy, just don't let it control your life. Right-brain people look at the world differently and this book helps them rein everything in. I LOVE it! And I know a whole group people I can recommend it to.