3 Books to Add Value to your Business

3 Books to Add Value to Your Business

Reading during downtime provides a cost-effective way to gain new perspectives and methods to analyze your current business or dream about future plans. Whether it’s on a Kindle, ordered off the internet, or checked out of your local library, here are three books to stimulate your creative juices.

1. Never Eat Alone (by Keith Ferrazzi and Tahl Raz)

Basically, don’t live your life in a vacuum. This book teaches the reader the importance of relationship building and how to hone the proper skills to do it. Don’t waste your lunch hour eating alone at your desk. Instead, invite someone new or someone you’d like to learn more about out for lunch. The author details how to connect with people, what to do when connected, and perhaps most importantly, how to follow up. Once a connection is made, he explains how to turn them into “Compatriots” which results in them being in your network. You’ll also learn how to build your brand as he advises you to “be distinct or extinct.” This book helps the reader make the mindset shifts needed for social growth.

2. The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable (by Patrick Lencioni)

This isn’t your typical dry book about leadership. Lencioni presents the concepts in the form of a novel, taking the reader through the trials and tribulations of a female CEO of a tech company as she leads the executive team out of complete dysfunction. You’ll find yourself pairing the fictional characters with past or current coworker personalities as you read the situations she encounters. The author explains how to overcome behaviors that corrupt teams such as the absence of trust, fear of conflict, lack of commitment, avoidance of accountability, and inattention to results. This book is helpful for anyone struggling to build or manage an effective team.

3. The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don’t Work and What to Do About It (by Michael Gerber)

Gerber points out that most business owners are technicians rather than entrepreneurs. He illustrates the need to find a balance between the Entrepreneur, the Manager, and the Technician roles of the business owner, and the responsibilities that each of these roles must take to drive the business toward success. The emphasis must always be working ON the business rather than working in the business. Gerber steps through the importance of creating systems that can be replicated leaving nothing to chance. This book has been invaluable for many small business owners who have stepped back to look at their businesses differently.

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Missie Beach, CFP®, CDFA®
Senior Financial Advisor