Tim Sanders (1)

This is a combination business-psychology book or perhaps 'the inter-personal psychology of business'. It focuses more on relationships across firms than with employees and colleagues within the firm. The philosophy seems a mix of Buddhism meets Flowerchild meets Hipster meets Business 2.0. Business people who are old-school (not even Business 1.0) in a profit-focused, corporate world are not going to resonate with this book. Perhaps a subtitle could be: 'how to be super-positive, energetic, show more and loving fostering a mutual explosion in positive thoughts with other like-minded cheerful lovecats'. This is not to say the book has no merit. But the book is so full of excitement that at points it is syrupy. If everyone had such a compassionate perspective there would be so much less politics, arguing, tension, stress, and lawsuits it would be much more appealing and rewarding, I suspect, for many in business. On the other hand, if the author's suggestions around networking, for example, were widely adopted, then all businesspeople would spend all their time connecting with networked people connected by Lovecats, for no obvious business reason in many cases, and never get any work done.

Parts of the book are trivial and seemingly too basic to put in print (the recommendation, for example, to use a contact management system for recording business contacts); other parts of the book seem to be psychological: "Lovecats revel in the element of delight and surprise they can bring to the table." In my business experience, there are a lot of focused and successful business professionals whose list of what delights them include meeting objectives, closing a deal, enforcing accountability, beating competitors, and the like. As a result, the book is going to be more successful in networking-centric, enlightened?- unrealistic-communities such as bloggers or management consulting gurus who follow Seth Godin and Tom Peters. show less

The first half of this book was hard to get through. That part is trying to sell you on the idea of companies doing more than just making a profit. So if you're already convinced of the value of such a company, I'd say skip the first half.

I much preferred the second half because it got more practical. In particular, the chapter on how to influence change in your company was a great overview that I think I'll keep around for reference.

The second half also has a few chapters with ideas for show more changes you can make at your company. It's a little overwhelming unless you keep reminding yourself that every suggestion isn't going to work at every place. So I tried to focus on finding one good idea per chapter to take away as a starting point. show less

Tim Sanders is crazy smart. Anything the guy writes or says is worth noting. This book is about sales, negotiation, collaboration and doing what it takes to get a deal done. He teaches a seven-step system that will help you and your company increase sales and build relationships. Sanders claims that using these strategies has led to a 70% increase in sales for many of his clients. I’d be happy with half of that!

The first 3/4 were good, with some decent ideas but the last quarter was basically a scolding to the reader that dramatically altered my overall opinion of the book to its detriment.