Jake Knapp on designing nonfiction worth reading

In this Useful Books Community Q&A, we’re joined by Jake Knapp, designer extraordinaire (Google Ventures and more) and author of Sprint and Make Time.

Timestamps & topics

• 0:00 Well here we are
• 0:26 Why Jake is great
• 1:14 Where the books came from?
• 4:11 On starting to write (& NaNoWriMo)
• 6:00 Business & reputation
• 7:58 Self-doubt, de-risking, and blogging as book v1
• 9:49 Education vs. entertainment
• 12:02 Structure, organization, & clarity
• 14:44 The one-week prototype & ToC
• 15:40 Learning from experts & friends
• 18:13 Audience & marketing
• 19:51 Word of mouth and what publishers can’t do
• 23:35 Why not selfpub?
• 24:46 Perils of cover design
• 27:48 On writing something that works
• 30:23 Devin being handsome & Jake laughing

This interview was originally published on Useful Books