I was off to a great start on my book-a-week reading and blogging this year – 12 books in 12 weeks – then encountered a hiccup with my plan. Riding the recumbent bike with a book in hand gave me a major neck strain that took me to the chiropractor a few times and took quite a while to heal. Darn! So I lost about a month of good reading time using that method, and didn’t get back into a good reading rhythm until about mid-May. Now that summer is in full swing and I’m doing a lot less carting kids around, it’s easier to read. Here are a few of the books I’ve finished recently, all of which I would highly recommend:

• The Glass House by Jeannette Walls. This is a beautifully written memoir that reads like a novel, about a young woman growing up in very challenging circumstances who became a successful writer. Thank you to Lou Heckler for recommending it to me!
• Are You Fascinated?: The Four People You Need to Succeed by Kenneth Tucker
• Thriving Through Ministry Conflict by James Osterhaus, Joseph Jurkowski and Todd Hahn
• You2: A High-Velocity Formula for Multiplying Your Personal Effectiveness in Quantum Leaps by Price Pritchett. This is one I read several years ago and found a lot of value in reading again.

And some of the books I’m in the midst of reading right now include:

• Goals! by Brian Tracy
• Animals, Inc.: A Business Parable for the 21st Century by Kenneth Tucker and Vandana Allman
• Leadership from the Inside Out by Kevin Cashman

I may or may not blog about my reading over the summer, but I’ll certainly continue to enjoy reading. Here’s to good books!

Book Number 12 on my Book-a-Week list for 2011: What Got You Here Won’t Get You There: Discover the 20 Workplace Habits You Need to Break by Marshall Goldsmith

Marshall Goldsmith is not just any executive coach. He has been named one of the five most-respected executive coaches by Forbes, and a top-ten executive educator by the Wall Street Journal. Goldsmith has worked with some of the most influential leaders in Fortune 500 companies. He works with only C-level executives, focuses only on permanent behavioral change, and gets paid only when his clients improve. He has had some remarkable success stories, and he outlines them in the book. He has also learned from his challenges and mistakes, and he tells those stories, too.

The book outlines the twenty most common bad habits Goldsmith has seen leaders exhibit in all his years of coaching. Many of the habits stem from a core habit of wanting to win too much. This over-developed desire to win can cause a person to exhibit a lot of other rotten habits like Habit #2, Adding too much value or Habit #3 Passing Judgment, or Habit #4 Making destructive comments.

Because I am a firm believer in the power of leveraging our strengths, and not trying to fix weaknesses, I must admit I was somewhat resistant to embracing the book at first. I much prefer reading stories of how people have developed their talents than how they have overcome weaknesses. However, I am a realist and I know that while our strengths prevent the best opportunity for growth, we do need to manage our weaknesses so they don’t interfere with our ability to perform at our best. And that’s really what Goldsmith’s book is about. Even more importantly, the “weaknesses” he helps people fix are really just bad habits, not true weaknesses. He helps them make behavioral changes that have a lasting impact on their lives and the lives of others they live and work with.

Most leaders will exhibit one or two or three of the twenty habits, certainly not all of them. I found it interesting to think about all the leaders I’ve coached over the years and which of these habits we have worked on together in one way or another. And I also found it interesting to try to be honest with myself about which of the habits I sometimes exhibit, both at work and at home. It’s an enlightening list!

Goldsmith’s book is a great reference, filled with ideas not just to understand what the habits are, but how to take action to correct them. As an executive coach, I find the book to be an invaluable resource that I’m sure I will consult over and over again. And as a human being who, like all human beings, shows some bad habits on occasion, it’s a great reminder.

Book Number 11 on my Book-a-Week list for 2011: How to Become CEO: The Rules for Rising to the Top of Any Organization by Jeffrey J. Fox

I know Jeffrey Fox is an incredible talent with amazing experience and credentials. And I know this book is full of practical and useful tips for rising to the top. In fact, it is organized into 75 very short chapters, each with its own tip. While I’m always up for an easy and informative read, and this is one, I can’t say it’s one of my favorite reads. I am fond of stories that help make ideas stick, and this book is almost completely devoid of stories. The chapters are very “do this” “don’t do that” without a lot of connection to actual instances when the doing and not doing were implemented. I find stories make the concepts easier to understand and allow me to more easily see myself in the situation.

That said, a few of the tips were refreshing to find in a CEO guide book, and did make me appreciate the depth of Fox’s wisdom. Some of my favorites included:

• Do Something Hard and Lonely (like learning a language, getting a certification, etc.)
• Think for One Hour Every Day (not at home or in the car, but in the office)
• Organize “One-Line Good-Job” Tours where executives in the company tour your department and share one-line compliments with your team.
• Go to the Library Once a Month (to get caught up and avoid distractions)
• Ten Things to Say That Make People Feel Good

Fox has written several other best-sellers as well, including How to Become a Rainmaker, How to Be a Fierce Competitor, and How to Get to the Top, and he clearly has enjoyed huge success. I’ve not read the other books, but I’m now curious about them so will try one soon.

Book Number 10 on my Book-a-Week list for 2011: Monday Morning Leadership for Women by Valerie Sokolosky

This is such a delightful and helpful book for female leaders. I’ve read it three times now, and each read brings new insights. Author Valerie Sokolosky  is a seasoned business veteran who, like so many women, had to learn early in her career how to navigate the challenges of leading a successful business along with the challenges of marriage and motherhood. The book shares Valerie’s wisdom in a creative and easy-to-learn way, through a series of conversations between two women: one a mentor, the other, her mentee.

The book’s subject is a woman named Taylor Grant, a young, recently promoted manager who is happily married with two small children. Her recent promotion, at first, seems to be an easy and natural transition, with the team performing extremely well. But suddenly, the economy turns, business slows significantly, and competition gets tougher. Her team no longer responds to her the way they had in the past, and her stress level at work spills over into her home life.

Fortunately for Taylor, she meets a wonderful mentor named Suzanne Chambers, who offers to help the overwhelmed young manager through a series of Monday morning coffee meetings, in which Suzanne shares the wisdom she has learned over the years. From time management, to hiring, to managing change, to achieving balance, Suzanne and Taylor discuss many of the most pressing challenges facing female leaders today.

The book is practical, refreshing and timeless. I recommend it wholeheartedly!

To order a copy, click on this link:

http://www.valerieandcompany.com/publications/2.html

Book Number 9 on my Book-a-Week list for 2011: Tested in the Trenches: A 9-Step Plan for Building and Sustaining a Million-Dollar Financial Services Practice

by Ron Carson, CFP, CFS, ChFC, and Steve Sanduski, MBA, CFP

If you are a financial advisor who wants to grow your practice, this book is a must-read. Ron Carson and Steve Sanduski provide a practical, step-by-step guide to achieving big success as a financial advisor. Carson and Sanduski are principals of Peak Productions, a financial advisor coaching, software and consulting company that has worked on five continents. Carson has 20 years experience as a financial advisor with over $1 billion in invested assets. Sanduski is considered one of the country’s leading authorities on financial services marketing and practice management. Clearly, these guys know what they are talking about!

To give you a glimpse of the book’s contents, here are the 9 Steps they reference, and that their chapters are built around:

• Step 1: Gain Personal and Professional Clarity Through the Blueprinting Process
• Build the Foundation, Identify and Live by Your Values, Find Your Meaningful Purpose, Develop a Compelling Vision for Your Future, Develop a Personal and Professional Mission Statement, and Set SMAC-Certified Goals
• Step 2: Get the Right People on the Team
• Put More Science into the Art of Hiring and Compensating Staff
• Step 3: Systematize Everything
• Elevate Your Service by Following the System
• Step 4: Improve Your Effectiveness
• Differentiate between the Vital Few and the Trivial Many; Get and Stay Fit
• Step 5: Build Your Brand
• Move Your Business from Commodity to Singularity
• Step 6: Build Relationships and Communicate
• Reach Out and Touch Your Clients and Prospects
• Step 7: Focus Marketing Efforts on Top Clients and Prospects
• Get the Most from Your Marketing
• Step 8: Deliver Client Events
• Deepen Relationships and Have Fun Doing it
• Step 9: Follow the Habits of Top Achievers
• Do What Works; Putting it All Together

Throughout the book, the authors provide entertaining, relevant, easy-to-understand stories and examples that make their points stick, and make you excited about implementing the steps. For example, one of the opening stories illustrates what they call “Love Affair Marketing.” Carson tells the story of a time when he and his wife were getting ready to host a big party, and somehow the 12-pack of root beer he had purchased didn’t make it home with the rest of the groceries. When he called the store to report the problem, the young clerk on the phone asked if it would be o.k. if he delivered the soda to their home in the next 30 minutes. Not only did the clerk deliver it in less than 30 minutes, he brought a gallon of vanilla ice cream to go with it so they could make root beer floats! Because of this extraordinary and unexpected service, Ron became an evangelist for this particular grocery store. And this, he says, is what we want our clients to be for us. The book is full of ideas to help you do that, and questions that help you uncover how you can implement “love affair marketing” and each of their other concepts, in a way that feels authentic to you.

For financial advisors who truly want to grow, this book is a fabulous consulting guide. I highly recommend it!

Book Number 6 on my Book-a-Week list for 2011 – GO Put Your Strengths to Work by Marcus Buckingham

This book was a fun and enlightening read for an action-oriented, strengths-loving person like me! Buckingham outlines six very clear steps to achieve outstanding performance through truly leveraging your strengths. Each of the six steps is represented by a chapter, complete with tools, templates and even accompanying video, available on-line, to help you take action on the steps. Throughout the book, Buckingham references the story of Heidi, a top-notch brand director for the Hampton Hotels chain, who finds herself burned out on her work because she is working in her areas of greatest weakness most of the time, instead of her strengths. Happily, through applying the process described in the book, Heidi learns to transform her current role so that she can leverage her greatest strengths. In doing so, she not only finds her joy again, she also produces much greater results for her company.

Buckingham’s 6 Steps to achieve outstanding performance include:

1. Bust the Myths: Myth #1 is that as you grow, your personality changes. In truth, as we grow, we become more of who we already are. Myth #2 is that you will grow the most in your areas of greatest weakness. In truth, we grow the most by leveraging our greatest strengths. Myth #3 is that a good team member does whatever it takes to help the team. In truth, being “well rounded” is not the best way to serve your team, but rather by focusing the most on what you are really good at, so you can help the team truly excel.
2. Get Clear: This is about really knowing what your strengths are, which only you can decide. Buckingham references the 4 signs of a true strength: Success in doing it; Instinct, meaning you are instinctually drawn to it; Growth, meaning you easily learn and grow when doing this type of activity; Needs, meaning this type of activity is one of your greatest personal satisfactions. Note the first letter of each of the 4 signs spells out the word SIGN.
3. Free Your Strengths: This is about making the most of the activities that strengthen you. Buckingham recommends writing Strengths Statements that help you define the specific areas in which you “feel strong.” Heidi’s #1 strengths statement reads: “I feel strong when I help a hotel manager take a good hotel, or hotel group, and make it #1.” This was an eye-opening discovery for Heidi because what she had been spending her time on was just the opposite: trying to help struggling hotels get their performance up to an acceptable level. She found this activity to be extremely draining. Again, Buckingham uses a four-letter word, this time FREE, to describe the steps in this model: Focus, Release, Educate and Expand.
4. Stop Your Weaknesses: This step is about making sure you are very clear about all those activities that drain you, or as Buckingham puts it, “make you feel weak” so that you can avoid them whenever possible. It’s important to not assume that just because you hate doing something, that so does everyone else. I recently led a team meeting centered around understanding and leveraging talents and strengths. In the discussion of tasks and who should be doing what based on their strengths, one woman blurted out, “I hate doing all this paperwork!” The team member sitting next to her replied, “Really? I love doing paperwork. Can you teach me how to do yours?” While we have to be careful not to appear as though we want to dump the rotten jobs on to everyone else, it is important to recognize the activities that drain you and figure out ways to get rid of them, or at the very least, minimize the amount of time you spend doing them. Again, a 4-letter word (STOP) to help you remember how to do this step: Stop doing the activity all together and see if anyone notices; Team Up with others who are strengthened by this activity; Offer Up a strength of yours and steer your job toward it; Perceive your weakness from a different perspective.
5. Speak Up: Share your strengths and weaknesses in your work team, and encourage others to do the same. Buckingham outlines specific steps and even scripts for what can be very challenging conversations, especially when having them with your boss.
6. Build Strong Habits: This step is about making the strengths focus last. Buckingham suggests things like: Every day look over your three Strength Statements and your three Weakness Statements; Every week complete a Strong Week Plan; Every quarter look back at how well you used your strengths.

I enjoyed this book because it builds on the other books I’ve been devouring lately related to maximizing strengths. The story of Heidi made Buckingham’s 6  steps particularly real and compelling. The happy ending for Heidi was great affirmation that we must all take care to do what we are best at and love the most. It’s the only way our unique purpose can truly be fulfilled. 

Book Number 5 on my Book-a-Week list for 2011 – Making Your Dreams Come True by Marcia Wieder

Marcia Wieder’s mission is to help people have dreams again, and to teach them how to make their dreams come true. She founded Dream University over 25 years ago, and has many impressive credentials, including author of 14 best-selling books, 3-time guest on the Oprah Winfrey show, and personal success coach to Jack Canfield, author and founder of the Chicken Soup for the Soul book series.

I’ve had the privilege of meeting Marcia and hearing her speak on three different occasions. I feel especially fortunate that her endorsement now appears on the cover of my book. It says:

 Making Your Dreams Come True is a step-by-step guide to figuring out what your dreams are and determining the steps you need to get there. Marcia’s formula for making your dreams come true is actually very simple:

1. First, get clear about what your dream is.
2. Second, remove the obstacles, especially the limiting beliefs.
3. Third, design the simple steps to make it happen.

Of course the individual steps take some work, but Marcia makes it clear that they don’t have to be as hard as many people think they are. And she walks you through the questions you need to ask yourself to complete each of the steps. Marcia teaches about the “Passion Pyramid”, a tool to help you align the “four P’s” that can ignite your dreams: purpose, passion, possibilities and power. The book is also filled with many real-life examples of people Marcia has worked with over the years to help achieve their dreams. These are not people of great financial means or great genius. They are just ordinary people who got clear about their dreams, removed their limiting beliefs about them, and put plans in place to make them happen.

Perhaps the message of Marcia’s that resonates with me the most is her message about living your life on purpose. She says that one of the requirements for achieving your dreams is to live your life on purpose. And to live your life on purpose, you must do three things:

1. Have a spiritual practice. In other words, spend time every day connecting with your spirit and the whispers of your soul through prayer or meditation or some other means.
2. Know what is unique and special and great about you (and I call that the Reasons Why YOU ROCK!)
3. Live your life in service with your greatness

An inspiring and yet practical read. I definitely recommend it.