Bill Burnett

Dave Evans

designing-your-life

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The #1 New York Times bestseller for building the perfect career

Designing Your New Work Life

Designing Your Work Life

Designing Your Life

It's here! Browse the 2024 Penguin Christmas gift guide

A gem amid self-help dross... The authors make the case that design skills such as reframing, prototyping and brainstorming can help us make better career and life choices, or undo bad choices before they do more harm. One idea: keep a diary noting how much you enjoy each task — and think about how to do more of the tasks you love

You’re going to learn how to find a fulfilling career. You’re going to learn how to better navigate life’s big-moment decisions and kill your “wicked problems” dead... Design thinking, as rendered in the book, is about treating life in a more improvisational way. It’s a welcome counterbalance to the data-driven, engineering mind-set gripping the culture. Follow Mr. Burnett’s and Mr. Evans’s teachings, and the anxiety-ridden process of decision making suddenly seems more playful. Their method is experiential and accepts that failure is part of the process

Their philosophy is that by applying a Silicon Valley-tested design approach, we can all build lives that will suit us better – regardless of our age... I sketched my own plans, which unearthed dreams I’d never really articulated, or hadn’t thought about in over a decade. I drew an alternative life, in which I would work with photographers at a gallery or an art publisher. The process gave me an ego boost – maybe I’m not a one-trick pony – and filled me with a sense of possibility that reminded me of being a kid

A Designing Your Life class has become one of Silicon Valley's most popular courses... Two academic studies have now proved its ability to cut anxiety on the career front and help people each their goals whatever their age... Crucially, your life is not a problem to be solved. It's an experience, and the fun comes from designing it

Numerous studies suggest we’re generally miserable at work... The book was born out of the eponymous course Burnett and Evans teach at Stanford and uses techniques that anyone familiar with design thinking will instantly recognize to allow us to take control of our lives... With change likely to be a growing presence in all of our lives, the basic design principles outlined above could prove invaluable in helping us to create the kind of life we want

[Bill Burnett and Dave Evans] bring a rigorous approach to rethinking your life (with a major focus on work) and have been credited with revolutionising careers coaching in American universities... [Designing Your Life] teaches you how to change what’s not working by turning ideas on their head. I think of it as Bill and Dave’s Excellent Adventure: How To Stop Driving Yourself Mad With Unnecessary Drama And Anxiety

Bill and Dave's session was one of the highlights of FutureFest 2016. Hundreds of people packed into The Social Stage, a relatively small space, to see them; the laughter from their audience was heard throughout the venue. Clearly they made a significant impact as they managed to sell more books than all the other speakers at FutureFest combined

There is no design problem more challenging than figuring out what we are going to do with our life . . . Bill Burnett and Dave Evans are bringing their powerful insights to readers everywhere to help them create a productive and happy life . . . This [is] the career book of the next decade and . . . the go-to book that is read as a rite of passage whenever someone is ready to create a life they love --

David Kelley, Founder of the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford

Bill Burnett and Dave Evan’s wisdom will bring immense fulfillment, accomplishment, and happiness to all who read and apply it to their lives

Laura Arrillaga Andreessen, Founder & Chairman Emeritus of SV2

The go to book for young adults ready to create a life they love

Nicole Taylor; Executive Director, Thrive Foundation for Youth

In business, we have lots of ways of helping people become better leaders, managers and entrepreneurs in designing more effective enterprises. It's shocking in contrast how little help we give people in designing their lives. Design thinking at Stanford is making major contributions in many fields and Burnett and Evans have finally extended it to empower individuals to do "life design." It's about time—I recommend it highly

John Christensen; President, Foresight first, Inc

Imagine a conversation between Vaclav Havel and Steve Jobs—the playwright-become-politician who drew on an older wisdom about the good life lived in the modern world, and the iconic visionary who worked his dreams into the marketplace of the 21st-century—and you begin to get some sense of the importance of Designing Your Life. Playful and serious at the same time, the authors have drawn on years of working in the design world of Silicon Valley and years of teaching at Stanford University to invite us into an honest conversation about forming a well-lived life

Steven Garber, The Washington Institute for Faith, Vocation and Culture

An exciting, clear, and amusing guide to reaching your goals by designing your life. Engaging from the start, the book reveals a step-by-step method to teach the reader how to think like a designer and build a life to thrive in

The narrative and examples are well written and the key points are articulated in a manner that keeps the reader’s interested.

For Fans of Atomic Habits

Change your life in 2025 with the simple, scientifically proven method that has already worked for thousands of people. 
 
'Life has questions. They have answers' New York Times 
 
At last, a book that shows you how to build - design - a life you can thrive in, at any age or stage. A well-designed life means a life well-lived. Many of us are still looking for an answer to that perennial question, 'What do I want to be when I grow up?' 
 
Stanford innovators Bill Burnett and Dave Evans show us how design thinking can help us create a life that is both meaningful and fulfilling, regardless of who and where we are, our careers and our age. Designing Your Life puts forward the idea that the same design thinking responsible for amazing technology, products and spaces can be used to build towards a better life and career by a design of your own making. 
 
'[Designing Your Life] teaches you how to change what's not working by turning ideas on their head' Viv Groskop, author of How To Own The Room 
 
'An empowering book based on their popular class of the same name at Stanford University...this book will easily earn a place among career-finding classics' Publishers Weekly

Build a Life that Works for You

This really works! In book form for the first time, the simple, scientifically proven method that has already changed thousands of lives

Change your life in 2023 with the simple, scientifically proven method that has already worked for thousands of people. 
 
'Life has questions. They have answers' New York Times 
 
At last, a book that shows you how to build - design - a life you can thrive in, at any age or stage. A well-designed life means a life well-lived. Many of us are still looking for an answer to that perennial question, 'What do I want to be when I grow up?' 
 
Stanford innovators Bill Burnett and Dave Evans show us how design thinking can help us create a life that is both meaningful and fulfilling, regardless of who and where we are, our careers and our age. Designing Your Life puts forward the idea that the same design thinking responsible for amazing technology, products and spaces can be used to build towards a better life and career by a design of your own making. 
 
'[Designing Your Life] teaches you how to change what's not working by turning ideas on their head' Viv Groskop, author of How To Own The Room 
 
'An empowering book based on their popular class of the same name at Stanford University...this book will easily earn a place among career-finding classics' Publishers Weekly

Designing Your Life

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Bill Burnett

Dave Evans

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