The Platinum Rule - Tony Alessandra,Michael J. O'Connor

Subtitled: Discover the Four Basic Business Personalities - And How They Can Lead You to Success. Only the book is so much more than that. But you don't know that until you read it. You don't even believe that until you read it. My highly tolerant and very patient mentor has told me about this book for years. But it took a dramatic turn in our working relationship to actually motivate me to buy the book and read it. And now I feel like such a fool for not having read it sooner.

As the title suggests, this is a twist on "The Golden Rule" which we all remember from elementary school as being: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Only that's a bit misguided. Because how I want it done unto me might not be at all how you want done unto you. Hence the "Platinum Rule" is about doing unto others as they would choose to have it done. That is a deceptively simple idea. Because how do I know what it is that you want?

We have to learn first about our own styles of communication and motivation before we can understand what drives other people and how we must adapt our communication style to deliver what they require. In the very last chapter of the book, the authors point out: "By choosing how we act, we can encourage others to respond more positively. This works not only for adults in the workplace but for people of all ages in all of life's other arena's: home, school, sports, shopping, you name it! . . . Being the best person you can be by treating people the way they want to be treated pays off enormously." Deceptively simple, but you won't believe this until you read the book.

This was very life changing for me. Mainly because I had to look at, and then own, the personality type that I am: a Socializer. Or more precisely within the subcategories, a Directing Socializer ("The Enthusiast") on the borderline with a Thinking Socializer ("The Impresser.") After I got over being defensive about this assessment and climbed out of my pit of denial, I could start to understand the fundamental truths of what the book was saying. This is not to say that I agree with all of their broad generalizations about the four personality types, only that I agree they exist, and that learning to adapt to other people's communication styles and ways of thinking is extremely beneficial to everyone involved. This is sensitivity training at it's very best and it's very practical. This is very much a "how to" kind of book: First the what, then the why and finally the how.

My coach and mentor is a Thinker. He works so hard to make me understand, accept and implement what he knows to be true. And I resist. But I never understood until now that he is grounded in logic and I am grounded in feeling. He's brought me a long way, but I have to meet him halfway. And I couldn't do that when I didn't understand how we were approaching the same subject from different perspectives. He has worked to adapt to my communication style, but I never realized that there were different styles that needed to be adapted to!

Not long ago, I was having a conversation with a client who is also a friend. It was not a business related conversation, but in the middle of emphatically stating my opinion, Nancy said: "But it's not about you Catherine. It's just not all about you." And I was stunned, but totally got the message. It was a bulls eye. The center of my universe might be me, but no one else will be joining me there. And my coach has probably said that a hundred different ways in as many situations and I never heard the message. I understood he was speaking English, but I wasn't getting it. I got it now.

This book is invaluable. I can't believe it took me so long to get around to reading it. It can open up a whole new world of understanding in why we speak but are not heard, and why we "listen" but do not hear. We need to focus on the needs of other people - not just our own. This book shows us how to recognize what it is that other people need and to adapt our own behaviors to provide that level of communication so that they "win" and so do we. It is indeed life changing. Don't wait as long as I did to read it.

The Paradox of Choice - Barry Schwartz

Subtitled: Why More is Less. How the Culture of Abundance Robs Us of Satisfaction. I heard Barry Schwartz speak at Brand ManageCamp '07 in Chicago this past September and was so impressed with his presentation I immediately ordered the book. It's taken me awhile to get to it, but it was worth it. There are so many wonderful concepts put forth here, backed up by excellent research and anecdotal illustrations. It's a very engaging book and his writing style makes it very easy to read. There are some similar threads and research in this book that also appear in Stumbling on Happiness (Mar. 08) and The Wisdom of Crowds (Dec. 07).

One of the most memorable and important of his theses is dividing people into those who are maximizers and those who are satisficers. They are fairly self explanatory labels but the book does an excellent job of giving examples of the types of behaviors exhibited by both. Maximizers tend to experience anxiety in the process of making choices: they are constantly assessing the "best" of the choices, sometimes paralyzed by considering the options both real and imagined, and often less satisfied with what they choose because of constantly considering all the options that weren't chosen. Satisficers on the other hand decide what is "good enough" and make their choices based on that standard and then move on. It's not that satisficers have lower or lesser standards, only that they can make a choice that meets the standard they have set and move forward without second guessing or regretting all the choices that were rejected.

When you grasp these concepts, suddenly you can see these behaviors everywhere. I spent a long weekend in Boston with two long-time friends from high school. I was explaining the book and this particular concept to both Stu and Wayne, who immediately assessed where they were on this spectrum. And it is a spectrum of behavior. Stu is on the maximizer end, I am on the satisficer end and Wayne was somewhere on the spectrum closer to satisficer than maximizer. But as we went through our 4 days together deciding what to do, where to go, what to eat, we were suddenly hyper aware of how we made choices and how that affected our level of satisfaction with the outcome. Being self aware of how we make decisions is key to understanding why we feel the way we do about the results.

Schwartz takes the position that we are overwhelmed with decisions both large and small on a daily basis. The number of choices we are faced with every day is vastly greater than what our parents or grandparents had to face: cellphone plans, 401(k) plans, paper or plastic, smoking or non-smoking, credit or debit, fixed rate or adjustable rate, the warranty plan or not, upgrade to first class, and hey would you like to super size that? We tend to assume that more choice and more autonomy makes us happier. But the research and statistics say otherwise. In countries around the world, the increase in material wealth and standard of living has not made people happier. In fact, the rate of depression and suicide has risen sharply in recent decades in countries like the United States.

Some of this is due to a difference in objective well being and subjective well being. Objectively, it's easy to measure that we have more of everything - food, medical care, better housing, education, transportation, technology. But subjectively, those things don't make us feel better. All the time saving devices in the world from dishwashers to computers have not made us feel that our quality of life is better, or that we are somehow happier than our grandparents were.

The book is quite fascinating and I got a lot out of it. The final chapter is suggestions on how to tackle this overwhelming amount of choice and sort out what is worth expending time and energy in deciding, and what is not. Maximizers tend to apply the same of amount of time and energy into choosing just the right coffee maker that they do in buying a car. Somethings are not worth the investment of that kind of time, energy and anxiety. We need to adopt different behaviors for the times in which we live and that's really what this book is all about. I highly recommend it.

Way of the Peaceful Warrior - Dan Millman

Subtitled A Book that Changes Lives, it was originally published in the late 80's and took a long time to build a following - mostly by word of mouth. Well, life changing or not, it certainly provides a different perspective which is essential to making life changes. This book is one of those wonders that appeared when I ordered a very different book through Amazon.com. One of my favorite features of Amazon is not only have they tracked every book I've purchased on their site since 1997, but they provide those highly targeted recommendations based on what I am clicking on. So that is how I came to order this book. Or maybe it was Karma.

It goes hand in hand with some of the other books I've read this past year involving the theme of personal journey. One of the themes that resonated with me in The Daily Six (Sep. 07) was the idea that we should focus our efforts on being someone rather than something - that we are not the sum of our job title, our skill set or our assets. This book goes one step further, saying we should stop focusing so much on being someone, and concentrate on being at one with everything around us. And I very much like that message.

I've come to realize that we are what we think about. Hardly a new idea, but my mind whirls constantly with the number, variety and complexity of thoughts that I don't seem to be able to control. Meditation would seem to be the answer to that, but it goes beyond even the simple practice of meditation to understand how disconnected we are from the physical world around us. One of my favorite lines in this book, toward the very end, is when Dan says, "I lost my mind and came to my senses." That very much resonates with me. I live a very cerebral sort of existence with much of my life centered around my thoughts. It needs to be balanced with an awareness and appreciation of all that exists that has nothing at all to do with thoughts.

The book is a great read and very engaging because it's sort of an autobiography that reads like a novel and it weaves in themes that make you ponder. Well, it made me ponder anyway. The central character in the book is the author's spiritual mentor whom he calls Socrates. In this character, I recognized many traits of my own mentor. I could see he is like Socrates in many ways, while at the same time he is like the student Dan. He's farther along in his journey than I am, but we both still have a ways to go.

The quest for enlightenment and transcendence is centuries old. Each new generation seems to produce new writers, thinkers and spiritualists engaged in their own personal search that mirrors the particular time and place in which they find themselves living. This tale is both ancient and modern. Has it changed my life? Well, not yet. But it's definitely had a major impact that is potentially life changing. I really loved the book.

The Wisdom of Crowds - James Surowiecki

This is such a great book and so very timely! Originally published in 2004 and this edition in paperback having come out in 2005, the information is as timely in 2008 as it was when written. Of great interest to me is the amount of space at the very end of the book that is given to the stock market and the political process.

The main thesis of the book is that the collective opinion of any crowd, when averaged out, is more accurate and far wiser than the most intelligent individuals within that group. Time and again research supports this assertion statistically, and there are studies and examples throughout the book that illustrate how collective decision making has both triumphed and failed.

Central to the collective wisdom of any group is diversity. No matter how small the group, no matter what the task, diversity is key. Even the least knowledgeable and inexperienced individuals in a crowd bring much needed perspective and balance to the whole. James Surowiecki, the book's author and a New Yorker business columnist, points out that this concept is counter intuitive to what we believe about intelligence and the decision making process. This is why often it is not employed in situations where it could prove to be most helpful. Corporations are a great example of how decision making tends to be placed in the hands of an elite few, and the people on the front lines and those closer to the product or service are not involved in decision making. This leads to a poorer quality of decision than might otherwise have been reached had all opinions been taken into consideration and then averaged out.

This is an enjoyable and engaging book. Even the chapters with material that was quite foreign to me - like betting and point spreads - I was able to grasp and understand. It's also one of the best tutorials I've ever read on how the stock market functions, particularly how bubbles form and then bust. I highly recommend the book and can't think of any organization or group that would not benefit from understanding the wisdom of crowds.

Stumbling on Happiness - Daniel Gilbert

This is a great book! It's a fascinating read that is also laugh-out-loud funny. I had to read it when I could steal the time away to do it, which meant taking the book to the hair salon, the nail salon, the Dept. of Motor Vehicles and Jiffy Lube. You know - all the places you are forced to sit still. And I would sit there and find myself laughing out loud surrounded by other people. Now that's a good book!

The book is well researched and full of empirical data supporting the theories put forth by Gilbert, a Harvard University psychologist. It's not an easy read because it makes you stop, think, re-read what you just read to see if you are really understanding it, before you can go on. It took me awhile to finish this book, but I loved every minute of it.

It's full of interesting concepts that make you want to share the book with lots of other people you know. In fact, when I told Dan Heath, one of the co-authors of the book Made to Stick (reviewed here in May '07), that I was reading this book and thought it was just fantastic, he emailed me back that it was one of his favorite books of 2007! Need I say more?

Well yes, I'll say a little more. Everything Gilbert talks about in this book made absolute sense to me. I can't say that I will suddenly be able to experience my life differently after understanding some of the common mistakes of perception and belief that I am now aware of. But I think I will be more conscious of how I perceive things and what factors affect my judgment and my ability to accurately project future outcomes and how I will feel about them.

Page 242 had a very enlightening section that I have shared with a number of people. This is how how he introduces the topic: "The belief-transmission game explains why we believe some things about happiness that simply aren't true. The joy of money is one example. The joy of children is another that for most of us hits a bit closer to home." Yes, and how!

The book is a fascinating, informative and enjoyable read. I agree with Dan Heath's assessment. This was one of my favorite books of 2007 as well!

The Alchemist - Paulo Coelho

I was just in Borders with my son buying him some books he had to have tonight, when I saw The Alchemist on a shelf near the front of the store. I read that book for the first time last month. I thought it was wonderful, but for some reason it never occurred to me to write about it here. I suppose it was because I was in a strange place, both literally and figuratively speaking, when I read it.

I had agreed to house-sit and pet-sit for a friend while he was away for a week or so around Labor Day. The first night I was at his place, which is a beautiful rural property that's rather isolated, my mother passed away in Georgia. For the next week, I was alone with the dog and the cat and a lot of books. And it was a very peaceful and introspective time for me. I read some novels as a treat to myself, and then I started reading what was lying about the house. The Alchemist was sitting on a stack of books. I was lucky to be in the home of a reader and there were books everywhere. So I picked it up on my way to the hot tub one evening. It's a slim volume and an easy read, so a couple of nights in the hot tub, with a fair number of Coronas, in the middle of a pastoral setting under a setting September sun was ample time to read it cover to cover.

If I had to pinpoint one thing that resonated with me the most, it was about listening to one's own heart. That sounds a bit pat, but it doesn't in the context of the book - which is a parable. The book also talks about "living your own Personal Legend" which for me immediately conjured up images of Don Quixote. I remembered vividly working on the show "Man of LaMancha" the summer after my freshman year in college and for days I kept hearing all the songs from that show running through my head.

The book deserves to be the bestseller that it is. It speaks in simple terms of simple truths that most of us seem unable to comprehend - much less live. And life is a quest. For some of us, it's a quest filled with drama (complete with a Greek chorus, sets and costumes.) There are those of us who knew from the beginning we would not lead "lives of quiet desperation" that Thoreau recognized among "the mass of men." But if not the life lived as the masses do, then what?

It's a thought provoking book. And like other books of its kind, it will truly impact only those with open minds who seek to understand and learn. That's not everyone.

As it has been with other books that I've read that made a deep impression, I will remember the place and circumstance of my reading this book as much as the book itself. I keep listening to my heart and wondering if I can believe what it tells me. Right now I think maybe it's in the wrong location. And in real estate, it's all about location, location, location . . .

The Daily Six - John Chappelear

Subtitled: Six Simple Steps to Find the Perfect Balance of Prosperity and Purpose. This is small but powerful book - 130 pages. I picked it up on impulse at the Olsson's bookstore at Reagan National Airport back in August when I was flying down to stay with my mother. As it turned out, my mother was moved to Hospice the day after I arrived and this book was one of two that I read while sitting in her room for a week as she slowly slipped away. My mother was a great one for saying that everything happens for a reason: good or bad, whether you can figure it now or perhaps only later, there's a reason.

Written by an entrepreneur who made and lost both a fortune and his family, the text rings genuine and authentic. This is his journey to rebuilding his life and doing a better job the second time around. This book is in fact as transforming as it claims to be. Or I suppose it can be transforming if one is open to the message about re-focusing life pursuits in a way that is both spiritually as well as financially rewarding. The two things that struck me the most from this book were the concepts that happiness can be found through gratitude, and that our life goal should be the pursuit of being someone and not something. My mother understood both of those principles without ever reading this book and it's how she lived her life.

The second book I read while sitting there at Hospice was The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls. I had actually gotten the book for my mother based on Amazon.com's recommendation, which kept popping up when I selected books for her that I had already read and loved. My mother liked the book so much that my sister-in-law Carol read it, then insisted that my brother Tom read it, after which Tom said my sister and I ought to read it, so Wendy got it first and I got it last.

While not a business book per se, The Glass Castle is a story so well told that I can't imagine who could walk away from it untouched in some way. I don't believe I could do adequate justice to try and describe this memoir, but the lesson I think it had for me and my family is that it's possible to overcome the most adverse of circumstances and make the choice to embrace what is good about your family and your life, and let the rest go. As a family, we have done that to a great degree. But not to the degree in which Jeannette Walls has. What happens to us in life, and how we feel about it and how it affects us, is really about choice. My mother understood that happiness is not something you earn, or deserve, nor is it a gift that's given or something someone else makes you feel. It's a choice. And she chose it over all of the other options even when things were terrible. Jeannette has chosen it as well and this book is a wonderful telling of an amazing life's journey.

I highly recommend that the two books be read in tandem as I think it makes the message of each more powerful.