The 80/20 Principle - Richard Koch

                   I happened to read this book titled 'The 80/20 Principle' and surprisingly the first book I have completed reading. But I must say, it was worth every page and every second I spent on this book. I would really like to appreciate Richard Koch, the author of the book for wonderfully putting across this mesmerizing principle that could transform millions of life including me.
                   Let me get straight to the point and tell you what exactly the book has to offer. It simply reveals you the secret of how to achieve MORE from LESS. From the very first page it is clearly understood what the author wants to convey.The book is divided into four parts, each delivering different aspects but on the common grounds of 80/20.
                   The first part talks majorly about what is the 80/20 principle. It basically means 20 per cent of the valuable inputs gives out 80 per cent of  the output, for eg. for a company, 20 per cent of the product yields 80 per cent of the profits. Similarly, 80 per cent of the consequences are because of the 20 per cent of the overall causes. The rule is simple, eliminate the 80 and concentrate on valuable 20.  The book also states how 80/20 is better than 50/50 and other proportions.
                   Moving onto the second part, it majorly discusses about how 80/20 principle can be applied in business life. It talked about how hooking the vital few sets of customers is beneficial than focusing on all the customers. This part is majorly helpful for business management and clearly indicates in which all areas can it be applied. The few things which I found remarkable in this part was that it suggests how the available  resources can  be filtered and the valuable ones can be applied or used to achieve greater productivity. Keeping it simple instead of complex is one of the things that I completely agree with the author. The author also quotes examples of his own professional life absolutely relevant in understanding the concept. The book also analyzes that  filtering the worthy staff/employees is imperative for company's growth. This part is crucial for the business oriented people and will benefit to a greater extent.
                  Part three moves onto to the personal lives and how it can be implied effectively. Most of us very often fail to balance among work, family and friends and that  is where the author suggests to apply the 80/20 principle. The book proposes that a person should discard most of the things that he puts effort into and  apply superior effort into things that remain. In simpler terms focus on things  that you love to do rather than everything. Always be selective in things that you do, be it a competition, work, friends, efforts or for that matter priorities.
                The book beautifully argues that time management is not the solution for everything, but identifying things that are essential and dedicating maximum time to those things which will yield greater productivity. As the author puts it, 80 per cent of the achievement is attained in 20 per cent of time. Also the right thing to do is multiplying the 20 per cent of the time that gives out 80 per cent of the results.
                 The next section is lot to do with 'your money, your life'. I would like to share a really profound quote from this chapter 'Things that matter most must never be at the mercy of things that matter least'- Johann Wolfgang. You need to ask some important questions to yourself, these are some of the questions - What are you interested in? Are you working towards your interest? Which type of career will make you the happiest?  these are some of  the questions that will direct you where should your maximum effort be used. But what is most critical to my view is you cant put in 80 per cent of your efforts into either your work or personal life. You need to be balanced when it comes to your work and personal life.
                  This section guides about the amount of relationships that should be maintained. Koch also gives out  numbers of personal  and professional relationships that  a person should have. Roughly eight personal and seven professional relationships, build those and make them stronger. About the rest? only if you see opportunities, maintain it instead of stressing out too much.
                  In the next section koch suggests how to choose a field narrowly. Also he firmly believes success requires knowledge and I clearly agree with him on this. More so while going through this section I reflected a thought that, you cant apply 80/20 principle in terms of knowledge, it has to be 100 per cent. Specialize on your core skills, is the overall idea of this section.
                  Chapter 14 is all about how to  multiply your money, it is an optional section in the book. But the author  fails to  give other alternatives other than investing your money in the stock market and also choosing the vital few companies to invest in. One of the phrase that I liked in the section is 'money begats money', this phrase conveys lot more.
                  Chapter 15 does not convince me much as it describes seven habits to be happy. I believe people can only describe the events than can be happier, but  nobody can tell you how to be happy. The reason why I say this is each one of us know what makes us happy, the only need is something to guide to that path.

                  The part four is truly interesting in my opinion, I sincerely appreciate the author for showing the other dimension of the principle. It addresses critical views that others had about the book. When I  analysed this principle, there are certain things to which I slightly disagree. I  agreed with the fact that you should always choose the vital few to achieve higher productivity, but you can't ignore the rest 80 per cent only  because it is not beneficial, instead why can't we improve that 80 per cent and filter it into more vital 20 per cent. Improvising can be the key to make the rest 80  per cent effective, but I know for the fact that it is very easy to say and extremely difficult to do.
                   To summarize it all, this book proposes thoughts that are imperative to today's world, as the tagline rightly says 'The secret of achieving more with less'. It incredibly suggests principle to achieve success in work as well as in personal life, which rarely people have succeeded in doing so.  The central premise of this book simply gives out the art of achieve  80 per cent from 20 per cent.  On a lighter note, I have not applied the 80/20 principle in reading this book, in manner of speaking I have read 100 per cent of the book and not 20 per cent and I am sure the author would not want its readers to read only 20 per cent of its book and presume to know 80 per cent of it.