Quick Review: The 80/20 Principle by Richard Koch

Results and effort are unequally distributed , and if you exploit this fact then you can both be lazy and get massive results. Welcome to the world of The 80/20 Principle.

In this book review you will learn how this books can change how you choose to spend your time to get more done with less effort.

The 50/50 Fallacy

There is a natural expectation that causes and effects ought to be equally balanced. We tend to assume that 50 percent of our efforts lead to 50 percent of the result. While this is the case in some instances, it is usually the exception rather than the rule.

This fallacy —- the 50/50 fallacy – is one of the most harmful and inaccurate beliefs you can have.

Effort and results are unequally distributed

This is the 80/20 principle: a few methods, causes, ideas, inputs, or uses of time, money, manpower, will lead to great results; most will lead to poor results.

The point of 80/20 is this – identify the few methods, etc., which will lead to great results, and use them alone. Avoid hard work. Don’t push water uphill. Be very selective in what you do. Have a great life

Examples of The 80/20 Principle

80% of a business’ profit comes from 20% of its products
80% of Booklab traffic comes from 20% of its articles and videos
80% of your training results comes from 20% of your training time (effort)

The art of using the 80/20 Principle is to look for the small inputs, causes or efforts which have large results.

Video Review of The 80/20 Principle

Video Review of the 80/20 Principle by Richard Koch

How I use the 80/20 Principle

Here are some examples of how I use the 80/20 principle in daily life.

80/20 Content Creation

When looking to optimizing and polishing my content I look for the 20% of the content that generate 80% of traffic. This relationship is true for content both on my website, and on my YouTube Channel.

The top performing 20% of the content I spend time on updating, adding links to, and improving as much as I can. When those 20 precent is top-notch, then I don’t continue with the rest of the posts and videos, but ask myself: what else? What else can I do right now to further my goals and purpose? It’s unlikely that the answer will be to continue with what I’ve been doing. It’s time to move on to the next 80/20 activity.

80/20 Gym Workouts

At the gym I use the 80/20 principle. I go to the gym during lunch break which doesn’t give me much time long workouts. What I used to do was to derp around, doing exercises here and there, and dabble with iPhone in between. This regiment didn’t give much in terms of results.

Now I get better results in shorter time. I do a few exercises that activate large muscle groups; deadlifts, squats, bench presses. All exert with heavy weights.

Being more efficient at the gym also free up time for me to use the sauna before heading back to work. Sauna is an activity that I enjoy. Enjoyment also adhere to 80/20. 20% of leisure activities give you 80% of the enjoyment. And visiting the sauna is apart of those most enjoyable 20% for me.

80/20 Reading

Books can be read faster. Richard Koch’s tutor at university told him to never read a book from cover to cover except when reading for pleasure. Here’s the 80/20 way to study:

“Read the conclusion, then the introduction, then to conclusion again, then dip lightly into any is interesting bits”

80% of the value from the book usually an be found in 20% of its pages. Absorb the pages that and you save yourself a lot of effort and time.

80/20 is not scientific!

“The Pareto Effect is not scientifically proven” is a comment I often get when posting about this book in social media, “and should therefore be ignored.” I don’t think that way. Science is cool and all —I read a lot of scientific materials — but the main concern for me is if a mindset or mental model is useful or not.

The distribution between input and output might not be 80/20 exactly. Sometimes it’s 95/5 and sometimes 70/30. But that’s not the main point. The main point is that effort and results often i unequally distributed and if you keep an eye out for situations where this is true, then you can gain tremendous results with fairly little work.

Book Verdict:

The author forgot to use the 80/20 principle when he wrote this book. It could have been much shorter. It doesn’t have to be this long to convey a simple ideas like the 80/20 rule.

I know that a lot of people hate books that repeat information and try to make the same point with different examples. If you are one of those people then stay away from this book or read a summary of it. For me, hearing the same idea applied in various different scenarios helps to hammer it into my thick skull. I need the repetition for information to stick.

The 80/20 principle is a concept everyone should know about. If you don’t use it in your daily life, then it’s should be a top priority to learn about it. But if you choose to read a 400 page book about it, or research it in some other way, is up to you.