Counterproductive: Time Management in the Knowledge Economy by Melissa Gregg

Gregg, the Principal Engineer and Research Director for Client Computing at Intel, has written an interesting and perhaps controversial book that attempts to recast the narrative on productivity away from the individual to the group. In four chapters, using both a feminist perspective as well as the work of German political philosopher Peter Sloterdijk, Gregg elucidates the problems that an obsession with time management and productivity have created for the modern worker. Her intent is to cause readers to rethink the advice being offered in such titles as Alex Genadinik’s 20 Principles of Productivity: Focus, Motivation, Organization, Habit Building, Time Management, Apps, Psychology, Goal Setting, Procrastination and More (2017), and David Allen’s Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity (2015).