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Book Review: 9 Things a Leader MUST DO - Dr Henry Cloud

This is a follow on book from his book "Nine Things You Simply Must Do: To Succeed in Love and Life"

9 Things a leader must do is a smaller book and a good reminder. I think I enjoyed his first book more and the 9 things are basically the same, although they have different titles. I have included the titles from the first book in brackets. To me, they are simpler and easier to remember.

'9 Things a leader MUST DO' is an easy read, and covers most of the elements of the first book. If you are looking for a slightly more definitive, well sold approach I would start with "Nine Things You Simply Must Do: To Succeed in Love and Life"

The 9 things are:

1. Excavate your soul (Dig it up)- Invest time into what you are passionate about
2. Yank the Tooth (Pull the Tooth)- Do not allow negatives to take up space
3. Play the Movie (Play the Movie)- Look to the future
4. Put Superman out of a job (Do Something)- How can I make this better
5. Embrace your inner insect (Act like an Ant) - take small steps in the right direction
6. Earn a black belt in hate (Hate Well) - Hate the right things
7. Forget about playing fair (Don't Play Fair)- Give back better than you are given
8. Quit Self-Exaggerating (Be Humble)- Don't appear to be better than you are
9. Ignore the Popularity Polls (Upset the right people) - Don't make decisions out of fear of people

9 Things a Leader MUST DO
Dr Henry Cloud
Genres	Leadership
Pages	128
Readability	2	(1 = Easy, 5 = Hard)
Enjoyment	4	(1 = Never Read, 5 = Remarkable)

A yacht called erewhon

I have waxed lyrically in the past about waking up on a yacht, in calm seas. I am also one of those weird people that got up at 1am to watch non-critical matches in the Americas Cup. Its so boring most people would shout, though most of those people are fishermen with whom I have a deep philosophical issue with when they use the word boring.

Any Kias brought me this book for my birthday and I read it after I had my wisdom teeth out.

It is the story of a family who find the hull of an out j-class yacht in farm land up north. They recover it and rebuild and race it in a series around the time of the Americas Cup in 2000.

It is an enjoyable read, although it does have a little bit of airy fairy in it at times.

Kias, thanks so much for the book. It was a great choice at the right time!

A yacht called Erewhon
Stuart Vaughan
Genres	Fiction
Pages	352
Readability	4	(1 = Easy, 5 = Hard)
Enjoyment	4	(1 = Never Read, 5 = Remarkable)

         
            
   
 

Catching up on blogging.

Its been awhile and I am catching up on reading other people blogs. I stumbled across this image which is amazing. Its a ship encountering the forces of nature. Have a look at the other two shots here.

Blogging from a cellphone

I (agoge) purchased 2 second hand imate k-jam phones off trademe this week.

V cool and now I can blog direct from my cellphone.

Don't get too excited not sure if it will lead to more frequent posts ...

Becoming an expert at what you do!

I read listen to this on a Brian Tracy CD yesterday about being productive.

We live in a knowledge based, information based society.

Successful people are simply those who know more than their competitors. One of your most important responsibilities is keeping up to date with your chosen field and staying ahead of the pack, by continually taking in more information.

The amount of knowledge in every field is at least doubling every 7 years. That means you must double your knowledge every 7 years just to stay ahead.

The basic rule is; to earn more you must learn more. Or to put it another way; you are earning all that you possibly can today with what you now know.

You need to become an information gathering person to achieve and maintain excellence. If you want to be the best you must pay the price in terms of reading, listening, learning and growing.

You have gone as far as you can with what you now know. If you want to go further than you are now, you can only do it by taking in and applying new information.

He goes on to say that everyone who wants to get ahead should read for at least an hour a day. If you do this he suggests you will be regarded as a national authority in your field within 5 years.

In terms of the quote above. I think that there is portability to every role. Imagine if you wanted to be a leading sales person, what would happen if you studied that field for an hour a day. Just by the mere fact you are learning new things and continually challenging yourself you must improve!

What if you want to be an awesome mum and studied that topic for an hour a day. What about a leader or a pastor or an accountant?

The hard part. Resolving to do it!