Well Brewed Advice

The Coffee Bean: A Simple Lesson to Create Positive Change - Jon Gordon and Damon West - (Wiley)

Bestselling leadership and personal development author Jon Gordon teamed with talented newcomer Damon west to serve up a handy, little, book version of West’s presentation The Coffee Bean, which details the challenges and stresses faced by a young student named Abe.

A teacher gives Ab a life-defining insight which asks the simple, if albeit confusing question; are you a carrot, and egg or a coffee bean? Without giving away too much of the story; think about those times when you feel like life is on full boil and how you react to those situations. Now think about what happens to a carrot, and egg and a coffee bean when they are brought to a boil. The analogy, while a first is not obvious, soon becomes striking in its simplicity.

At 112 pages, with illustrations, The Coffee Bean, is a quick read – think of it as a kicked up Powerpoint in a handy to access format. Some may squabble over the brevity or the perceived lack of depth in delving into the subject or it being too simplistic in its approach. While I would never quibble with your right to complain, I think in this case you’re missing the point.

The Coffee Bean, parable is really based on guiding the reader/student – in the book, the character Abe – to see that there are three paths that you can choose in life. The goal in my estimation is not to smooth all of the bumps in those paths, but to help you better understand what goes into the choices we all make and the outcomes or consequences of the choices we make.

In the end, isn’t that a message that is suitable to anyone at any age or personal/career development level? The fact that Abe is a student signals that basic fact. I am not sure how seriously I would take a book that somehow promises a one size fits all solution.

The Coffee Bean, for me, is one of those go to books I like to keep within reach and share with family, friends, mentees, clients, and colleagues who may be struggling with difficult questions or challenges, that can offer clarity, a sense of direction or purpose.

Avoid the Void

The Power of a Positive Team – Jon Gordon – (Wiley)

Have you ever been a part of a successful team?

How about a team that did not quite meet expectations or failed miserably?

Looking back at those experiences were you able to break things down and get to the bottom of what worked well, or where things went off the rails and failed miserably? It’s always a good idea to do that kind of postmortem break down to identify what works best.

In his latest book, The Power of a Positive Team bestselling, business and team guru Jon Gordon not only walks you through what the elements of a successful team are, and as the title suggests, how a positive team proves to be more successful. Now that may not sound like brain surgery, but as always, Gordon really offers some definitive insights, often based on scientific research about the mindsets that go into the chemistry of teams.

One of my go to stories when coaching teams or individuals, is about going to your favorite book store and asking for a book on how to be better at being negative, as I used in my review of Jon’s book, The Power of Positive Leadership. I spend a lot of time focusing on the impact of communication, good and bad, on businesses, and I love the chapter here that focuses on how communication impacts teams. Jon hits it out of the park when discussing how teams need to avoid the void; when there is a void in the process, more often than not, negativity will fill that void. He illustrates how effective communication within the team and its individual members can eliminate the void and cut down on negativity.

If you look at problem areas in most businesses, no matter what the business type or industry, communications are almost always at or near the top of the list. Gordon really drives home the point that while communication is “often the last thing you want to do” it is “the most important thing you must do.” He suggests a number of effective vehicles for communication among teams; it boils down to finding the method that works best for the team and the situation because it is not a once size fits all proposition.

Teams and team work comes in a multitude of varieties and Gordon offers great ideas and actionable steps the can help you keep those teams working in a positive fashion and with great results. This is a straight forward book, that you will want to keep handy so you can plug these steps into action.

A Change to the Positive

The Power of Positive Leadership: How and Why Positive Leaders Transform Teams and Organizations and Change The World – Jon Gordon – (Wiley)

Visit your favorite book store; depending on if it’s a large chain outlet or a local Mom and Pop shop, it’s likely you will find at least a rack full or an entire section dedicated to self-help, positive thought and changing your life in a positive way. While you’re there, ask the staff to point you in the direction of the books on how to be more negative. (Insert cricket sounds here…) It’s not likely that they will be able to point you to even one book that would fall into the category.

The reason is that we are generally wired to gravitate towards being negative. Let’s face it; it’s easy to look at what’s not working in our lives or in our businesses and chew on that for a while. Would it make more sense to focus on what it working well and then amplify that or see if there is a way to take what’s working replicate it in other areas of life and work?

Bestselling business guru Jon Gordon serves up a boatload of examples of how focusing on the positive has had a genuine impact on businesses and teams in his new book, The Power of Positive Leadership: How and Why Positive Leaders Transform Teams and Organizations and Change The World. It would be so easy to slip off into the Pollyanna of positive-ness, but Gordon avoids that by clearly delineating real world examples of how positive leaders, many of whom he has worked with, have super-charged results by making the choice to be positive in the way they approach business, competition and how they operate.

Unlike so many leadership and business books that have hit the racks lately, Gordon does focus only on how the big dogs do things, not everyone is Google or Amazon. Instead he gives actionable steps that any business leader at any stage of development can put into play and see a positive impact on their outcomes.

Gordon does a great job of taking researched ideas how to make the change to the positive and then pairs them with great examples of leaders who have effectively put the ideas into practice.