Slow Productivity is Cal Newport’s 4th book looking at how to be productive and maximize your career. As such it blends portions of all the previous books, adding a few bits and rehashing many of the same principles explore in earlier books.
As the title suggests it focuses on working a slower pace, on fewer things, and striving for excellence in those few things you take on. Out of all the Newport books I’ve read this does the best job of addressing those that have children, or don’t have control over their jobs. He makes more than a passing attempt to address these situations, but still doesn’t go very deep on how you work to get some autonomy over your working life.
Just like other productivity books, the author assumes a certain level of affluence from the reader which would come with some autonomy over their working conditions. If you’re struggling to make ends meet and want to dig out of that quagmire, I’m not sure that this will read as much more than pie in the sky wishes for what your job could be like, which is what any productivity book I’ve read is like.
For those struggling to have any breathing room, maybe Scarcity will help you assess the problem and find a way to change your decisions so that you can have autonomy. Yes Newport wrote So Good They Can’t Ignore you, but I felt that book relied heavily on the trust that any reader would be affluent in many ways and have autonomy already.