The Fifth Discipline of Building Your Cheese To Last While Searching For Excellence
Take a trip into any book store or glance at the shelves of most middle and upper level managers and you'll see that business books are huge business. Stroll down the shelves and you'll find books from CEOs, professional consultant, sports coaches, college professors, and even a cartoonist or two. You'll find titles like Built to Last, In Search of Excellence, Good To Great, and Who Moved My Cheese. Each of the books is full of pithy advice, sage systems, and guaranteed methods of turning your career, your business, and everything you touch into the next big thing.
Unfortunately, the truth to running your business will NOT be found within those pages. Every executive who scans the pages of the best selling tomes that populate the lists in Business Week looking for answers to life's problems will most likely come up short.
The simple fact of life is that successful businesses are built on hard work, good ideas, lots of luck, and good people. In some form or fashion, you'll find much of the same advice in all of these books, usually wrapped in some system a savvy author has created to market and try to sell to the masses.
This isn't to say the advice is bad, or that reading these books is a waste of time. However, realize that many of the business exaulted in these books will find hardship down the line and that many of the people writing these books are in the business of writing books.
The best way to read the books is with a highlighter and a notebook. Take down the stuff that touches your heart and mind, and chuck the rest. You know your business better than any author out there. Remember that.
Unfortunately, the truth to running your business will NOT be found within those pages. Every executive who scans the pages of the best selling tomes that populate the lists in Business Week looking for answers to life's problems will most likely come up short.
The simple fact of life is that successful businesses are built on hard work, good ideas, lots of luck, and good people. In some form or fashion, you'll find much of the same advice in all of these books, usually wrapped in some system a savvy author has created to market and try to sell to the masses.
This isn't to say the advice is bad, or that reading these books is a waste of time. However, realize that many of the business exaulted in these books will find hardship down the line and that many of the people writing these books are in the business of writing books.
The best way to read the books is with a highlighter and a notebook. Take down the stuff that touches your heart and mind, and chuck the rest. You know your business better than any author out there. Remember that.
posted by Rob at 9:12 PM
0 comments
