Category: Book review

Book review, Mindset

#ReadingGoals

Seneca

“To create future, we need triggers. I believe two things can change the course of our life – books that we read and the people that we meet. Books and people are an amazing source of triggers, so if we are not reading, we are certainly missing out on a terrific source of triggers for future.”

Reading continues to change my life for the better. Reading has made me a better leader, worker, husband and father. This year I can say with a ton of confidence that reading has saved my life. That’s the thing…You never know which book or even sentence will be the one that changes everything. I have gone through some duds this year but the good books are game changers.

Last year I set a goal to read 100 books and I read 106 books this year. I don’t have a top ten list but these books have changed my perceptions, challenged my assumptions and helped me in my journey to become a better human. Here are the best books I have read this year in no particular order:

The End of Heart Disease: The Eat to Live Plan the Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease by Joel Fuhrman

A River in Darkness: One Man’s Escape from North Korea

The Story Telling Animal by Jonathan Gottschall

The Truth About Leadership by James Kouzes

The Four Agreements: Practical Guide to Personal Freedom by Miguel Ruiz

A Passion for Leadership: Lessons on Change and Reform from Fifty Years in Public Service by Robert M. Gates

Thinking in Systems: A Primer by Donella Meadow

Radical Candor by Kim Malone Scott

Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert

The Art of Possibility by Rosamund Stone Zander and Benjamin Zander

Dear Madame President: An Open Letter to the Women who will run the world by Jennifer Palmieri

Focus: The Hidden Driver of Excellence by Daniel Goleman

Blueprint For Revolution by Srdja Popovic

Search Inside Yourself by Chade-Meng Tan

The Fifth Risk by Michael Lewis

What to Say When You Talk to Yourself by Shad Helmstetter

I would love to have a more in depth conversation about any of these. Just hit me up on messenger. Next year I will reduce the goal to 80 as my developmental focus has shifted a bit. If you want to set your own reading goal I suggest joining the reading challenge on goodreads 😀. Here is to 2019!!!

Book review, David Brooks

Virtues

Seneca

I am currently reading a powerful book. Road to Character by David Brooks is a thoughtful piece of work. It hits you right away in the first couple of lines. Brooks writes :

” The résumé virtues are the ones you list on your résumé, the skills that you bring to the job market and that contribute to external success. The eulogy virtues are deeper. They’re the virtues that get talked about at your funeral, the ones that exist at the core of your being—whether you are kind, brave, honest or faithful; what kind of relationships you formed. Most of us would say that the eulogy virtues are more important than the résumé virtues, but I confess that for long stretches of my life I’ve spent more time thinking about the latter than the former.”

What virtues do you want to be remembered for? What virtues do you spend your days thinking about? What virtues do you spend time working on?

Have a great Saturday…

Book review, Mindset

The Importance of Self-Awareness

Seneca

Are you self aware? For years I thought that life and leadership began with mindset. I thought that is where it all began. You learned about fixed vs. growth mindset and then charted a path on how you would obtain and maintain the growth mindset. On my journey I often consume books, articles, and speeches that in one way or another have supported this piece of my philosophical foundation. Recently I have read something that has made me think that something comes before mindset.

How does one get to that point? How does one come to the realization that they have a fixed or growth mindset? A recent book I have read has just rocked me and the bedrock to my life and leadership principles. It will also fundamentally change how I teach and coach others on leadership. The book “Insight” by Tasha Eurich is going on my all time list and will be a foundation of my life and leadership principles.

You can get it here: http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/545088/insight-by-tasha-eurich/9780451496812/

The book is all about the all important but overlooked trait of self-awareness. The book states (and I agree) “the most important, and yet least examined, determinant of success or failure at work and in life is self-awareness. Self-awareness is the ability to understand who we are, how others see us, and how we fit into the world.  Research shows that while 95% of people think they are self- aware, the real figure is closer to 10-15%. We all can tell when others lack self-awareness but we tend to be terrible judges of our own knowledge, performance and abilities.” Without self-awareness we have no idea what skills we have or need to improve on in life. So I will ask you again? Are you self-aware.

One can think they have a growth mindset and that they deal with mistakes, challenges, and feedback well but it seems like 85% of us would be wrong. Without self-awareness we wouldn’t really know if we were getting better or getting worse at anything. We wouldn’t know who are true friends are and who has best interest at heart. We wouldn’t know if our significant other is happy in the relationship. We wouldn’t know how to conduct ourselves around other human beings. No one can really know 100% of what others think of them and that is ok. However,  The more self aware you are the more you can know, absorb, and deal with what others think about you. You can improve on what you are deficient and know for sure you are working on the right things.

Like mindset this is foundational in regards to continuous learning. As you know I feel continuous learning and growth is the core of life and leadership. You may be asking yourself … How do I become more self aware?

Like any other skill your self-awareness can be worked on. I will be posting much more on self-awareness but for now take ten minutes today and honestly ask yourself these questions. What are my strengths? What are my weaknesses? Where do I have room for growth? What am I most passionate about? Then ask your best friend, spouse, or trusted co-worker the same questions about yourself. It is a small action item for tremendous insight.

 

Book review, Mindset

Mindset by Carol Dweck

Seneca

Here’s the Rub: This is an all time favorite. This is an amazing book with a life changing message. This book the foundation of my approach and view on life and leadership. Much like the core value of this blog, it teaches you that the journey of success begins internally. It states that to be successful and to remain successful you must obtain and maintain a certain mindset.  The book lays out the differences of two mindsets: the “fixed mindset” and the “growth mindset.”

People with the “fixed mindset” believe their qualities, intelligence and potential are unchangeable or “fixed”. They believe that you are not in control of you own abilities.

People with the “growth mindset” believe their qualities, intelligence and potential are changeable and that they can improve over time. They believe that it starts with you. They believe that people who excel at something excel because they decided they wanted to be good at a specific thing and then worked hard to improve.

It really is that simple. It is also very powerful specifically when it pertains to leadership. I truly believe that the best leaders are the best learners and it all starts with your mindset. If you believe that your traits are fixed then you have given up before you started. If you think some people are born smart or they are born a leader then it gives you the excuse to not try and become better. This has a huge impact on the people you lead and how you lead them.

You have heard it before in your life right? You have heard people at work or in your family say. “That guy is a born leader.” or  when referring to someone who excels in certain subjects that “She was born with it.” It just isn’t true. Everything in life is learned and everything in life is earned. Everything.

At 8 hours and 34 minutes this book is a short listen and narrated brilliantly. At 288 pages it is also a read you can finish in no time. The lessons from this book are well worth the investment of time and money.

The first three chapters lays out the fixed vs. growth mindset. Dweck  gives you the research behind the concept. She discusses her work and studies with children and their approach to education and failure. It is fascinating stuff. She also lays out the definitions in detail of both mindsets and why starting here is so important. The reason your mindset is so important is because it is the foundation of your ability to learn. If you don’t believe you can learn and improve you will never even start the process and if you do you start …. you wont follow through. If you know that you can learn anything and then also become great at anything the world is full of possibilities.

The building blocks of mindset are your beliefs and your focus. These building blocks have enormous impact on the key factors to learning and growth which are effort, challenges, mistakes, and feedback.

Those with the fixed mindset believe skills are born and you cant do anything about it. These folks focus on outcomes and how they look to others. I like to call them output focused people. 

Those with the growth mindset believe skills and potential are built through learning and growth and they focus on the process. I like to call them input focused people. (Clever right :0 )

When you have a fixed mindset you don’t believe that you can improve so you don’t put in the effort. Setbacks and challenges are not temporary to those with a fixed mindset because they affirm the belief that excellence is predetermined at birth and not crafted through years of hard work and learning. Feedback on improvement will be useless to these folks as well because the don’t believe in getting better and they are not focused on the process…only the outcome.

When you have a growth mindset you believe that you can improve so you put in the effort. You are focused on the process so setbacks and challenges are a part of the learning process. A mistake is only temporary and just another opportunity to learn. Finally, when you have a growth mindset you crave constructive positive or negative feedback because it only helps you in the growth process.

Imagine believing that you can do anything humanely possible. Imagine knowing that this belief is backed by an overwhelming amount of scientific research. Having this mindset almost becomes a superpower.

The remaining chapters of the book look to the worlds of sports, business, leadership, relationships, parenting and education to show the concept in practice.

In the book you will hear the stories of many with both mindsets. You will hear stories about figures like Michael Jordan. Michael Jordan was famously cut from his high school team the first time he tried out. He then went on to work his tail off and become widely seen as the best basketball player ever. He would be the first one to tell you that he got there by hard work and the belief that he could always get better. Imagine if Michael had a fixed mindset. He would probably never picked up a basketball again after he was cut from the team. He also probably would have never quit basketball in his prime and tried to play baseball (a sport he was awful at and a topic for another article). A couple more stories about those who persevered with a growth mindset here – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLYECIjmnQs

You can look at many areas of life and see those who have a fixed mindset and those who have a growth mindset. They are everywhere. I think the most important factor within this concept is that fact that no person is completely fixed and no person is completely growth. Also no person is permanently fixed or growth. You must work hard to maintain the growth mindset and you must also work hard to make it reach into every area of your life. You can be growth mindset at work and fixed when parenting.  You can then read parenting books and listen to parenting podcasts on a regular basis and then implement what you have learned. This is the beauty of the concept ….that fact that it isn’t fixed.

All in all I couldn’t not recommend this book more and to consume any media that helps you learn and maintain your growth mindset. Mindset by Carol Dweck is a masterpiece.

This is the best video I have seen that summarizes the topic of mindset :

Train Ugly: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75GFzikmRY0