Tag: #business

Book review posts, Uncategorized

Read This Before Our Next Meeting

amybenoit

“Read This Before Our Next Meeting” was written by Al Pittampalli, the founder of the Modern Meeting Company, which has helped organizations hold more effective meetings. This book was direct and to the point.

In a world with fewer meetings, we’d have more time for our real work, the work we do that actually propels our organizations forward.

The modern meeting:

  • doesn’t make decisions. Leaders do. Consult others via e-mail or one-on-one and make a preliminary decision.
  • has two primary functions: conflict and coordination
  • moves fast and ends on schedule. Strong deadlines force parties to resolve the hard decisions necessary for progress.
  • limits the number of attendees.
  • rejects the unprepared. Prepare an agenda.
  • produces committed action plans. No minutes are required; you only need to know the decision and resulting action plan.
  • refuses to be informational. Reading memos is mandatory.
  • works only alongside a culture of brainstorming

The modern meeting is for finalizing your preliminary decision, generating buy-in, and agreeing on next steps. In advance of the meeting, inform attendees of the decision you plan to make as well as the reasoning behind that decision.

During the meeting, allow attendees to ask questions, voice concerns, and propose modifications. If all goes well, a consensus is achieved, a decision is resolved, and an action plan is coordinated.

Invite only the people who are absolutely necessary for resolving the decision that has been presented. If you have no strong opinion, have no interest in the outcome, and are not instrumental for any coordination that needs to take place, you don’t need to attend.

Prepare an agenda. Every meeting should require pre-meeting work. The modern meeting is about conflict and coordination, two activities that hinge upon preparation.

8 principles of the modern meeting:

  • Only after you’ve reached a preliminary decision can you call a meeting.
  • Get everyone on the same page and create an action plan.
  • Enforce firm meeting end times. The meeting ends, a decision is resolved, and participants get back to work. Start on time.
  • Only people who are critical to the outcome are invited to the modern meeting. Small numbers allow decisions to be resolved quickly and plans to be coordinated smoothly.
  • The modern meeting rejects the unprepared. An agenda is distributed well in advance and establishes the decision being debated or the action being coordinated. You must carefully think through different scenarios and come up with thoughtful responses.
  • The modern meeting produces committed action plans. What actions are we committing to? Who is responsible for each action? When will those actions be completed? It’s the meeting leader’s responsibility to follow up and hold participants accountable for their commitments.
    • If no action plan is necessary, neither is a meeting!
  • Informational meetings aren’t necessary. Managers must write memos instead. Everyone must commit to reading them.
  • The modern meeting is about decision and the narrowing of options. Brainstorming is necessary.

Amazon and Google are both notable in their meeting practices and share many elements of the modern meeting.

This was an interesting book. I agree with some of it, as I have had to attend several meetings just so that management or clients could “check a box” from their weekly to-do list that a meeting was held. This is not effective. However, in my current role, we occasionally have virtual video meetings so that we can get to know and see others we don’t see in person. I enjoy having time set aside for that.

I look forward to reading, learning, and sharing more with you soon!

Book review posts, Uncategorized

December 2024 Reads

amybenoit

I read six books in December, some of which were short and easy reads. Here is a blurb of each of the books I read in December.

“The Fire This Time: A New Generation Speaks About Race” was edited by Jasmyn Ward, an author and associate professor of Creative Writing at Tulane University who has won several writing awards. This book demonstrated the power in words – the power in asserting our existence, experience, and lives through words. This book was selected as a book club read for my employer. Here are some quotes that stood out to me:

  • [During an internship at a magazine that was more than 150 years old] “Sometime during the end of my first week, a chatty senior editor approached me in the corridor. During the course of our conversation, I was informed that I was almost certainly the first black person to ever intern at the magazine and there had never been any black editors. On good days, being the first black intern meant having my work done quickly and sounding extra witty around the water cooler; it meant I was chipping away at the glass ceiling that seemed to top most of the literary world. But on bad days I gagged on my resentment and furiously wondered why I was selected. I became paranoid that I was merely a product of affirmative action, even though I knew I wasn’t.”
  • “I accepted the reality that the historic colonial houses – now the business residences of attorneys, hairstylists, insurance agents, and doctors – were considered by more people to be more valuable than the bodies below them.”
  • “Empathy requires us to dig way down into the murk, deeper than our own feelings go, to a place where the boundaries between our experience and everyone else’s no longer exist.“
  • Rules of walking – “no running, especially at night; no sudden movements; no hoodies; no objects – especially shiny ones – in hand; no waiting for friends on street corners or standing near a corner on the cellphone lest I be mistaken for a drug dealer“

This book provided thought-provoking perspectives of race and minorities.

4 out of 5 stars

“Employment Law: A Very Short Introduction” was written by David Cabrelli, the professor of Labour Law at the University of Edinburgh and the author of 5 books. This book contained a decent overview of employment law, and I learned about other countries; however, I learned much more in my Employment Law class this semester. Here are some main points:

  • Employment contract = employment relationship and rights. No employment contract = no employment relationship and rights. The various roles governing the constitution, classification, variation, contact, performance, suspension, and termination of the employment relationship are all derived from contract law.
  • There is a rise of atypical workers in the labor markets of advanced Western economies, such as the U.S. These independent contractors work very flexibly and as and when they want and often suffer from low pay, little or no job protection or security of earnings, and are subject to the control of those hiring their labor.
  • British legislation enacted in 1971 protects employees from unfair dismissals. The USA remains an exception to most countries. The USA has an employment-at-will doctrine, which safeguards the liberty of the employee to resign and find another job without liability and allows the employer to discharge the employee without sanction.
  • One thing that stood out to me, that I hadn’t considered previously, is the quote that “Employers operating at below a living wage are free riding on the back of the public purse.”

This book was a very general overview of employment law, but other books cover much more information.

3 out of 5 stars

“Learning to Disagree: The Surprising Path to Navigating Differences with Empathy and Respect” was an insightful book written by John D. Inazu, a Distinguished Professor of Law and Religion at Washington University in St. Louis. Multiple studies have shown that Americans have a growing disdain for those who differ from them politically and ideologically. We deride our political, religious, and ideological opponents as dangerous or evil and retreat to digital foxholes. This book is a necessary read for many people and a reminder to treat people as humans. Here are some main takeaways:

  • Good lawyering requires empathy for adversaries. You don’t have to like the other side, but you do have to understand them. How are you going to persuade a judge that you have the better story? The better you understand the other side of an argument, the better you can critique it and the more strongly you can defend your own position.
  • Assume the best of someone to open the door to deeper understanding and an opportunity to learn from those who see the world differently. Distinguish people from the ideas they hold. Other people are humans with whom you share many things in common. That doesn’t mean you will always share – or even respect – their ideas.
  • Recognize the limits to your knowledge and understanding. Embrace the likelihood that you won’t be able to convince everyone who thinks differently that you are right and they are wrong.
  • Well-intentioned people can have differing beliefs without being evil. In a country as large and diverse as the United States, every one of us holds beliefs and opinions that other people think are beyond the pale.
  • Practice repentance, grace, and forgiveness.

I highly recommend this book and will post a more detailed book blog about it sometime.

5 out of 5 stars

“About Time” is a book of poems by Neil Hilborn, a best-selling author and the most-watched poet ever (with over 150 million views). Neil has performed in 41 states and 8 countries. Neil is one of my favorite poets and is incredibly talented; with that said, I did not enjoy this book as much as his prior books. Here are some quotes that stood out to me:

  • “Ask the thoughts what they want: Why am I going to kill myself and if I do, go all the way to the logical end: Who will it hurt, what gets left behind, what good remains undone; dissect the bells, separate the ringing into a flat expanse and not the towering blaze telling you it is . . . “
  • “The Prozac makes me less tired but I’m still pretty tired but maybe that’s cause depression makes you tired.”
  • “I know why, but why is it that the pills will keep me alive but they give me enough to kill myself?“

To quote my favorite TV personality slash parasocial therapist slash mommy? Doctor Robin Zasio of Hoarders fame: You’ve got to feel it to heal it. As it relates to hoarding, I think she means that if you never throw out things you accumulate then you don’t have to deal with the emotional context around those things.

Many of the poems were somewhat depressing, but this poem provided humor.

4 out of 5 stars

“The Little Book of Sleep: The Art of Natural Sleep” was written by Nerina Ramlakhan, a professional physiologist and sleep therapist for 25 years who runs sleep and wellness programs at Nightingale Hospital in London. This book was a quick, easy read. One description reads: “Drawing on Western science and Eastern practices, this beautifully illustrated guide to sleep teaches that, by making better choices in our waking hours, we can positively influence our sleep.” Here are some tips from the book.

  • Sattvic describes the type of sleep we should be getting – pure, deep, natural, and healing. This is the kind of sleep where you wake up feeling refreshed, filled with vitality, and looking forward to the day ahead.
  • The journey back to deep sleep is about working on yourself to create an inner core of safety and making lifestyle choices that will help your nervous system to recalibrate and shift back into safety mode if you’ve been running on survival mode.
  • Tips:
    • Eat within 30 minutes of waking.
    • Reduce your caffeine intake to less than 300 mg per day. The half-life of caffeine is 5 hours. Avoid any caffeine until you’ve eaten.
    • Drink plenty of water.
    • Take breaks from technology. Withdraw from technology an hour before you get into bed. Don’t keep your phone in your bedroom or watch TV in bed.
    • Create a sanctuary in your bedroom. Think soft, relaxing colors, essential oils, and cool and well-ventilated.
    • Try breath awareness exercises.
    • Increase your oxytocin levels by expressing your feelings, getting a massage, hugging someone, stroking your pet, and engaging in activities that make you feel at your best, happy, and carefree.

4 out of 5 stars

“The One Minute Manager” was cowritten by Ken Blanchard and Spencer Johnson. Ken Blanchard is a prominent, gregarious, sought-after author, speaker, and business consultant. Spencer Johnson, M.D. is the author or coauthor of numerous New York Times bestselling books. This book was an insightful and easy read, although it could have been more concise. Here are the main habits of a one minute manager:

  • One Minute Goal Setting – set goals with their people to make sure they know what they are being held accountable for and what good performance looks like
  • One Minute Praising – try to catch their people doing something right so that they can give them a One Minute Praising
  • One Minute Reprimand – reprimand people immediately and tell people specifically what they did wrong then remind them how much you value them and reaffirm that that you think well of them but not of their performance in this situation.

I look forward to reading, learning, and sharing more with you soon!

Book review posts, Uncategorized

How I Built This: The Unexpected Paths to Success from the World’s Most Inspiring Entrepreneurs

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I really enjoy watching Shark Tank and listening to the podcast “How I Built This with Guy Raz.” This book is based on the highly acclaimed NPR podcast “How I Built This with Guy Raz” and offered insights, inspiration, and incredible stories from the world’s top entrepreneurs on how to start, launch, and build a successful venture. This is a must-read for people who dream of being entrepreneurs or those who want to learn about business origins, challenges, and successes. In this post, I will share some of the most valuable insights from this book.

Anyone can be an entrepreneur. Entrepreneurs aren’t chosen. They are made. Self-made.

Customers don’t pay for passion. They pay for things they can use. The way to get startup ideas is not to try to think of startup ideas. It’s to look for problems, preferably problems you have yourself, and solve them.

The scariest thing about starting a business is the unknown. Either stay in your job until your startup demands more time than you can spare OR have a backup plan. It’s a way to have another shot at doing something you’ve already done before so that you don’t go broke while you gather yourself to try again.

The most successful founders know their stuff: their product, their business, their customers, their industry as a whole.

Every entrepreneur should look for a cofounder. You need a partner whose skillset complements yours. Someone who not only shares your vision but elevates it and holds you accountable to it, who does what you cannot, who thinks and sees things in a way you don’t, whose strengths compensate for your weaknesses.

Even if you could do all the work yourself, you need colleagues to brainstorm with, to talk you out of stupid decisions, and to cheer you up when things go wrong … the low points in a startup are so low that few could bear them alone.

Paul Graham

Bootstrapping involves using what you have at your disposal to get yourself where you want to be. Ex: credit cards, personal savings, cycling profits back into the business + keeping control of your business as long as you can.

With some rare exceptions, bootstrapping will only take you so far. There will come a time when you need something that you can’t do yourself and you don’t have the $ to pay for even if you could. You may need other people’s $, manufacturing, mindpower, manpower, and marketing.

Fundraising is brutally hard at every level. It taxes your time, your energy, your ego, and sometimes your relationships. You can use crowdfunding sites. Once you’ve convinced people in your personal network to part with their money in support of your idea, that’s when the pressure to succeed really begins.

Every business is a story. The story connects everyone to the thing you’re building. The store goes from the name and logo to the function of the product, to the partners who founded it, all the way to the customers who patronize it!

All businesses are stories, and all stories are a process.

iteration – the incremental evolution of a product or service; tweaking a product based on feedback until it catches on.

Be open to relocating your business. Where you live matters. Sometimes you want to go where the industry is NOT. Ex: Ben & Jerry’s, Barre3

The first thing to understand is that raising venture capital is about making a promise: a promise that you have a product or service that people will pay money for, that you have a plan to reach as many people as possible, and that in exchange for lots of $, you will bust your butt to reach them. Prepare to answer:

  • How do you expect to scale this?
  • Where is the growth going to come from?
  • Who is the customer for this?
  • Doesn’t something like this already exist?
  • How will you get costs down?
  • Where will you manufacture?
  • Where will you be based?
  • What’s your marketing strategy?
  • Why does anyone need this?
  • Why would anyone do this?

As uncertain as the business world can be, one surefire way to know you’ve built something great that is primed to grow and scale is when your competitors start either copying you or suing you, sometimes both.

Mistakes/recalls – the only reliable way through that critical “before and after” moment is through quick, decisive, transparent action that puts people first and public perception second.

More work is never the real answer. To succeed as you scale, you have to leverage every person in the organization. And to do that, you have to be very intentional about how you craft the culture.

Reid Hoffman

You don’t scale. Only your idea, your story, and your values do, as long as you know them and share them. Know your values so you can make consistent decisions.

Guy Raz

Thinking like a parent and a partner is a skill every aspiring founder should cultivate in preparation for the challenges they will face with potential co-founders because they will invariably pour as much of their heart and soul and energy and money into building their business as they will into starting a family. If you would gladly sacrifice and do whatever it takes to protect your family, why would you not do the same for your business?

Guy Raz

Some people say, ‘Give the customers what they want.’ But that’s not my approach … people don’t know what they want until you show it to them. That’s why I never rely on market research.

Steve Jobs

One of my favorite company stories in the book is that of 5-Hour Energy, a product I’ve never personally used. Manoj Bhargava, the founder of 5-Hour Energy, was at a natural products trade show and looking for inventions he might acquire or license. He came across a 16-ounce energy drink that was better than others on the market. With the help of scientists from a company he’d founded for the express purpose of finding inventions just like this one, he had a comparable energy drink formula in a matter of months. It would turn out to be the easiest part of the process. The hardest part was getting his invention into stores. He knew that the beverage space is particularly challenging due to limited space.

He realized that he wanted people to get energy without having to drink or chug a 16-ounce energy drink, so he came up with the idea of shrinking his product from 16 ounces to 2 ounces. At that size, it wasn’t competing with others in the beverage market, it didn’t need to be refrigerated, and it didn’t take up much shelf space. In fact, it could be on a counter right next to the cash register. His ingredients were also less about energy and more about focus – “vitamins for the brain” – so he positioned his product outside of the convenience and grocery channels, and the first place to sell 5-Hour Energy was GNC, the largest vitamin store. After being a hit at GNC, 5-Hour Energy started being sold in drug stores, convenience stores, and grocery stores.

I highly recommend this book!⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

I look forward to reading, learning, and sharing more with you soon!