A summary of things you should know about The Business Romantic according to Tim Leberecht: Introduction In this episode Tim Leberecht takes a deep dive into his book, The BusinessRead More
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]]>In this episode Tim Leberecht takes a deep dive into his book, The Business Romantic, where he argues that we underestimate the importance of romance and that it can be found through business.
In his book Leberecht takes an intriguing yet challenging look into the emotional side of business through the compelling stories of very successful innovators of our times. The goal of the book is to give you a different look on how you pursue your dreams while helping you develop a meaningful life, create something greater than the status quo, and rejuvenate your worklife.
This book is perfect for entrepreneurs who are experiencing boredom in their work lives and are seeking an uplifting yet provocative approach to creating a radically unique life.
What’s difference about The Business Romantic is that it is a business book and it isn’t. It draws from the liberal arts, from philosophy, and it’s a very personal book that I’ve been meaning to write for years. It really is a reflection on the state of business philosophical discourse and yet at the same time it does provide very specific concrete tools and techniques. In terms of the argument that I’m making, My book is about romance which includes suffering a little bit, it includes a sense of danger and risk taking, so it’s not only about having a strong inspirational mission.
I think the reader can read it from front to back or cherry-pick as they go.
One thing that is really important is that we understand that we have the power of framing our experience in business. So the way we view our encounters at work is really important. We are the masters of our narrative; we have the power to make sense in what we experience in business and I encourage the reader to appreciate that and use it. The second thing I would say it to have the courage to be vulnerable and the experience you have will be much more meaningful.
The book starts with my own experience in 2014 working as an Advance Press Chief for the Olympic torch relay in Athens and it was probably the most formative professional experience that I had. It was very intense and I remember thinking in the intensity of the moment that that was exactly the kind of sentiment that I wanted to have for the rest of my career. And that became my question for the following 20 years or so. How can you keep the flame a light during the middle when routine and processes kick in and the magic of the beginning is gone? And this book is trying to find an answer to that.
The first chapter is called The New Desire for Romance in which I explore why I believe that the time is right for a re-enchantment, why there is dissolution with business. And what the parallels are of this mindset. It’s not a book against technology but it cautions us not to mistake the algorithmic world we live in with the old truth in business.
In the second part of the book I then introduce a number of business romantics. One of the greatest experiences that I had as I was writing this book is that it gave me a reason to connect with other people who were kindred spirits and it was very rewarding to see that I am not the only business romantic.
In the third part of the book, The Rules of Enchantment, is the gist of the book that provides the reader with 10 rules that he/she can apply in his/her respective work environment. These rules range from give more than you take to keep the mystique. Another principle I introduce is suffer a little bit which is pointing out that romance is not the same as happiness. The last rule of enchantment is called Stand by, Stand Still, Do Nothing, and it’s talking about solitude and the importance of doing nothing.
The book then concludes with a discussion about why business has become one of the main operating systems of our lives and it examines some of the ethical implications of romance in business.
The book offers an appendix which is called The Business Romantic Starter Kit. It’s almost like a library of books, films, and music that the reader can read up on to get into the business romantic mood. It also provides the 15 steps to becoming a business romantic.
NOTE: That was just a summary. To get the full deep dive, play the audio clip at 06:38
“There’s a crack, a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.” – Leonard Cohen
I have been working in marketing for almost 20 years now, mainly in professional services. I worked for Frog Design for seven years which is a leading product design and innovation strategy firm. Most recently I’ve been working for an architectural design firm called NBBJ. I am a passionate marketer and that’s also the reason why I wrote this book based on my experiences in that field.
I’m a business person, like I said I’ve been in business for 20 years, and at some point I’ve realized that I’m also an unapologetic romantic. I believe we need more romance in our life and I believe we can find it and create it in and do all that through business. The romance I am talking about is notion experiences where your heart beats faster and you have adrenaline rushes, and moments in which we fall in love with everything. I believe it’s very important that we romanticize business and be enchanted because I believe we are facing a great disenchantment. So my book is making a case for more romance in business within the framework of business and then proposes these specific rules of enchantment that everyone can use to make their life at work more meaningful.
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Buy The Business Romantic by Tim Leberecht on Amazon today
Visit TheBusinessRomantic.com to learn more about Tim and his book
Follow Tim Leberecht on Twitter and Facebook
Download the full transcript here (coming soon)
Listen on iTunes, Stitcher , and SoundCloud
Related books:
Zero To One by Peter Thiel and Blake Masters
The Happiness of Pursuit by Chris Guillebeau
Memoirs of Normalcy by Joleene Moody
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]]>A summary of things you should know about Mindset according to Carol Dweck: Introduction In this episode world-renowned Stanford University psychologist, Carol Dweck, shares all her insights on her book,Read More
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]]>In this episode world-renowned Stanford University psychologist, Carol Dweck, shares all her insights on her book, Mindset, where she explains why it’s not just our abilities and talents that bring us success–but whether we approach them with a fixed or growth mindset.
In her book Dweck provides a checklist to assess yourself and shows how a particular mindset can affect all areas of your life, from business to sports and love. The goal of the book is to teach you how to reach your own personal and professional goes while developing a love of learning and resilience that is the bases of great accomplishment in every area in order to achieve ultimate success.
This book is perfect for entrepreneurs who are trying to figure what it is that makes them tick and would like to increase their own feelings of success and fulfillment.
There are a lot of books on how to be successful and they are wonderful books but they don’t tell you the mindset, the way of thinking that can lead you on the path to success or failure. And they don’t tell you how to change your mindset to be more successful.
I am told that it’s a very quick read. I am also told that many CEO’s read it all the way through and read it every year to remind themselves of the mindset lessons.
I would want the reader to know that their abilities can be developed and that their abilities are developed through taking on challenges and sticking to them.
The book opens by describing the mindsets. How do people differ and why do some people love a challenge and others want to play it safe?
The first mindset is a fixed mindset where people believe that talents and abilities are just these fixed traits, you have a certain amount and that’s it. When you have this fixed mindset you really, really care where your intelligence and talents are fixed. So you’re always trying to look smart and avoid mistakes that might make you look foolish. Your life is organized around looking smart and not looking dumb and when this permeates an organization we call it a culture of genius.
The other mindset is a growth mindset. In this mindset people believe that their talents and abilities can be developed. In a growth mindset you believe your basic talents and abilities developed through hard work, good strategies, and mentoring from others. Instead of worrying if you are going to look smart or not, in the growth mindset you jump into challenges because that’s how you learn. You choose things that are hard and you stick to them and you end up accomplishing more. This growth mindset also creates better teamwork because you believe in growing abilities through collaborating with others. In the long run people with the growth mindset not only accomplish more but they foster accomplishment in others.
Then in the book I go through how these mindsets actually work. So we talked about taking on challenges verses avoiding them, and another thing is effort. In a fixed mindset effort is a bad thing and they belief is if you were really smart things should come easily.
I then go into mindset in sports and it turns out that most of the really, really successful athletes have had a growth mindset. Many of them were naturally talented but they didn’t coast on it and they capitalized that by working hard and developing it.
The next chapter is on business and I do case studies of leaders with growth and fixed mindsets.
The book also talks about mindsets and relationships and how a fixed mindset can really derail a relationship whereas a growth mindset can help solve problems over the course of the relationship.
The next chapter deals with parents, teachers, and coaches and how to foster growth mindset in kids.
The final chapter is on changing mindsets. All of us are really a combination of fixed and growth mindsets. We can have fixed mindsets in some areas and growth mindsets in others. Or we can even change from situation to situation when we feel we are being measured and judged. It teaches us how to be aware of those mindsets and how to bring ourselves more into a growth mindset when that’s desirable.
NOTE: That was just a summary. To get the full deep dive, play the audio clip at 4:13
“It’s for you to decide whether change is right for you right now. Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. But either way keep the growth mindset in your thoughts then when you bump up against obstacles you can turn to it, it will always be there for you showing you a path into the future.” – Carol Dweck
I am a Professor of Psychology at Stanford University and I have been studying why people succeed and fail for over 40 years.
I have been doing research for many years on why some people are go getter’s and jump in whereas others, just as talented or able, shy away from difficulty and end up not fulfilling their potential. After researching this for many years I came to the discovery of the mindsets as the cause of these differences. My students told me I had to write this book after benefiting from this knowledge and wanted others to know about it.
Developing Talent in Young People by Benjamin Bloom
The Mismeasure of Man by Stephen Gould
Buy Mindset by Carol Dweck on Amazon today
Visit MindsetOnline.com to learn more about Carol and her book
Follow Carol Dweck on Twitter and Facebook
Download the full transcript here (coming soon)
Listen on iTunes, Stitcher , and SoundCloud
Related books:
How To Succeed in 12 Months by Serena Star-Leonard
The Happiness of Pursuit by Chris Guillebeau
Body of Work by Pamela Slim
Relevant advice and tips:
10 Bad Habits That Successful People Avoid
What did you like and not like about this episode? Fill out this one minute survey here.
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]]>10 Bad Habits That Successful People Avoid We all know those successful people in our lives. Our bosses, our friends, or even clients who come in, they are all successfulRead More
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]]>We all know those successful people in our lives. Our bosses, our friends, or even clients who come in, they are all successful and you may wonder how they do it. You know they must be hard working, determined and goal oriented to have made it to where they are today. These are all traits that we can admire and look up, and hopefully take a lesson from. There are a lot of bad habits that get us off on the wrong track and away from success, but successful people know what bad habits to avoid and deter from so they stay on the path to success!
In order to be very successful here is a look at some bad habits that successful people avoid:
One of the worst habits that people have is waiting for success to land in your lap or looking for quick and easy schemes that never really work. Successful people know that you have to work hard for what you get, and you have to work even harder when you have a goal in mind. Waiting for opportunity to arise causes you to often lose sight of the end goal, and can often leave you questioning your choices when other opportunities have passed you by while you waited for one to land in your lap. Don’t sit around and wait, get up and go get it!
Not setting priorities or setting yours below someone else’s is one of the worst habits that successful people will avoid. They don’t let someone else’s set priorities interfere with their own. Successful people know what matters to them (promotions, projects, financial plans, goals) and they know that by letting other people’s priorities (be it values, promotions, etc.) get in their way, they are setting themselves up to fail. Of course, they know that giving a help hand isn’t a bad thing, but they don’t let anyone else’s pace slow them down!
One of the biggest downfalls of success that prosperous people avoid is resistance to change. The way the world grows and the technology in it and the process by which people get things done, it is always changing. Those who resist that change are often doomed to failure or to falling behind. Successful people know that change is a good thing and the growth potential that comes with it is huge! By allowing change to happen, grasping it and moving forward with it, you are advancing yourself and your goals.
Successful people are those who are not powerless. They are strong-willed, willing to stand for what is right, and aren’t afraid to speak up with their opinions. By letting others dictate the way things go, you are not being successful. However, by giving good input, dictating the way you want things to go, and giving and articulate strong point of view, you are showing others a new way of seeing or doing something, and that is huge potential for your success.
Those who are successful are not pessimists who see the worst in the world. They take the world (and the people, places, and situations in it), see it for what it is, and set out on a path to make it better. They find the good in situations and if there is none, they create it. They push forward in tough times, showing that there is strength in leadership. A good outlook and a strong sense of willpower and well-being will set you on the right path to success and often will make others follow.
Being jealous of others successes will only hold you back in the long run. Being jealous often leads to endless self-doubt, questioning many decisions, and often making you stray from the successful path. Successful people are happy that others are succeeding and will praise them. They will listen to others successes in hopes that they can learn something new that will further their own achievements and get them closer to their goals. Being glad for someone else’s achievements eases the mind and heart, giving you an overall feeling of well-being, which will boost your internal go getter side!
Those who are on the path to success do not talk down about others or gossip. Not only does gossiping lead to lies, mistruths, and twisted versions of things that have happened, but it makes you look less successful. To stand on the rumors of someone else makes you appear to be climbing the backs of those around you just so you get to the top. Successful people don’t gossip, they praise the works of others and give good impressions of others characters.
Those who are successful have goals in mind. They know what they want and have made a plan to get there (and maybe have even made a few back up plans in case something doesn’t work out with their initial plan). They realize that there are no wrong turns, just more opportunities to learn something new, to see things in a different light, and to push yourself to get to that goal when things do get tough. Those who want it, will get it!
One of the best qualities about a successful person is their humility. They don’t tout their successes from the rooftops or make others feel beneath them because they haven’t reached the same success. Those with humility will appreciate the gratitude, but will also share in the success. Those who have succeeded will rejoice with others and thank them for their help in assisting the successful person of making their goals happen. It always takes more than one person to reach your goals, no matter how independent you are.
When success has been reached, successful people don’t just stop trying. They don’t say, I have made it and have nothing more to do! No, they take the day for what it is, and then wake up anew with a fresh goal in mind. They don’t stop, they don’t pass by new opportunities. They know the keys to success and how to reach those steps and goals. With a path and goal in mind, and a determination in your heart and mind, you can be as successful as you want to be!
Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill | Check out Don Green’s book preview here
Charisma on Command by Charlie Houpert | Check out Charlie’s book preview here
The Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod | Check out Hal’s book preview here
The Greatness Zone by Jay Forte | Check out Jay’s book preview here
The Happiness of Pursuit by Chris Guillebeau | Check out Chris’s book preview here
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]]>A summary of things you should know about The Happiness of Pursuit according to Chris Guillebeau: Introduction In this episode Chris Guillebeau takes a deep dive into his book, TheRead More
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]]>In this episode Chris Guillebeau takes a deep dive into his book, The Happiness of Pursuit where he reveals how anyone can bring meaning into their life by undertaking a quest.
In his book, Guillebeau shares his journey around the world where he found ordinary people doing extraordinary things and reveals their secret motivations. The goal of the book is to challenge you to take control of your life and help you find what it is that makes your life count.
This book is perfect for entrepreneurs who not only want to make money doing things that they love, but want to make an ever-lasting difference throughout their lives.
Special note: In celebration of the 100th episode of The Entrepreneurs Library we are giving away free books. Lots of them! Listen for the special announcement inside the episode for more details.
It’s not primarily an “entrepreneurial” book. It’s something that’s much more about creating meaning and purpose in our lives. This book is much more about the meaning behind why I started a business and part of the reason was because I value freedom. I valued that freedom because it allowed me to do other things.
It’s probably easier to start at the beginning and read all the way through.
There is something greater out there and a calling for all of us and the more we take steps toward it, the easier it becomes. Don’t stop or ignore that calling.
In the beginning of the book I started with a story of me going to Guinea-Bissau in West Africa. After many obstacles and difficulty of getting there I begin to really ask myself why I am going through the trouble. It was then that I reminded myself that I am honoring this quest that I have chosen to go on and decided to finish it. I realized along the way that the greatest thing that came out of this adventure had nothing to do with be but rather from all the great people I met throughout the journey.
I begin talking about others who took on a quest and share their success stories. I talk about this guy who took on the four year MIT Computer Science Curriculum which is supposed to be one of the most difficult computer science curriculum and he did it in one year. I talk about why he did that and what he learned through that process. I also talk about a guy who walked across America and a guy who produced the world’s largest symphony. Throughout the book there are 50 stories that try to draw the reader in.
I organize the book around three sections. The first section is Beginnings. This section talks a little bit about my journey and about how people come to a quest. Each quest should involve challenge, difficulty and a possibility of failure. I talk about how a lot of people are discontented and that’s how they come to their quest.
The second section of the book is called Journey. In this section there are a lot more stories and it looks at the values that these people have. I not only tell the stories but also what we can learn from it and how we can apply it to our own lives. I tried to focus on what I call everyday adventure and showing how people can cultivate the value of adventure in their own lives even if they aren’t ready to do it just yet. I talk about how people do these quests, how much money it cost and how much time it takes. I try to help people strategically craft a quest for their life no matter who they are or what their situation is.
The last section is called destination and that is about arrivals. I talk about when I came to the end of my quest and what exactly that was like. Often that moment can be bitter sweet so I show the ready how to process that and give advice on what to do next.
In all three sections I am essentially trying to give the reader tools for how they apply this in their own life and their own pursuit. My goal in writing this book is for the reader to walk away and take action. I want inspiration combined with action.
“It’s better to be at the bottom of a ladder you want to climb than the top of one you don’t.” – Steven Kellogg
I am a writer, traveler and entrepreneur. I have spent the past 10 and ½ years on a personal quest to visit every country in the world. I also wrote a few other books which are The $100 Startup and The Art of Non-Conformity.
This was probably my most personal book yet. It took me a little bit longer to write than the other two. I came to this 10 and ½ year journey and as you might imagine that was such an incredible experience for me personally. And so when it came time to write about it I didn’t want to just write a travel memoir but I wanted to look at something deeper. The model that we used for The $100 Startup was essentially a case study model of looking at all kinds of people who have started a business without going in to debt and without going to business school. I really liked that model because we pulled out all these different examples and showed how people had done it very specifically. I use this same model for The Happiness of Pursuit, and I look at all kinds of people who have taken a quest and try to understand why they did it and learn about their obstacles along the way. The goal was not just to provide a bunch of stories the goal was to present this agenda to the reader. Ultimately the focus of the book is on the reader and why a venture can be a good value for our lives.
Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder
Wishcraft by Barbara Sher
Buy The Happiness of Pursuit by Chris Guillebeau on Amazon today
Visit ChrisGuillebeau.com to learn more about Chris and his books
Follow Chris Guillebeau on Twitter and Facebook
Download the full transcript here (coming soon)
Listen on iTunes, Stitcher , and SoundCloud
Related books: The Greatness Zone by Hal Elrod | Dream Year by Ben Arment | Vision to Reality by Honree Corder
Relevant advice and tips: 7 Signs That You Have What It Takes to Be An Entrepreneur | 5 Personal Qualities That Make Up A Lifestyle Entrepreneur
What did you like and not like about this episode? Fill out this one minute survey here.
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