“Many receive advice, only the wise profit from it.” – Publilius Syrus If I could choose a life coach for this stage of my life, it would be Guy Kawasaki. In his latest book Reality Check, Guy has done an awesome job of covering all the bases.
Cover of Guy Kawasaki's book Reality Check.
Having spent a few years there myself, I found his portrayal of Silicon Valley both hilarious and accurate. If I had a nickel for every company suffering from extreme amounts of wasteful spending or delusions of grandeur — well, I never would have banked on those stock options.
My favorite thing about the book though has to be the way he presents the various personalities at play in startups and business. He presents some of these roles in a list that would make David Letterman proud. For example, from The Top Seventeen Lies of CEOs:
“Working together, we’ve established our goals.” In other words, these are the goals that the CEO decided will make him look good. Few managers believe that these goals are doable, and yet they are the ones who are going to have to accomplish them. But that’ what “working together” means: The CEO decides and the workers do.
(similar sections on lies told by VC, Entrepreneurs, Engineers, Lawyers and Partners)
Other sage wisdom in this book includes advice on effective communication techniques, especially emailing, demoing, and presenting.
There’s a hilarious chapter on handling the competition where he cites some pretty clever little tactics. For example the new pizza store that offered customer discounts if they brought in the torn-out Yellow Pages of the competitors restaurants. Or the hardware store owner that responded to a competing national chain opening up right next door by hanging a sign over his door that read “MAIN ENTRANCE”.
Mr. Kawasaki left me with a “just go get it done” attitude after reading this book. This is definitely one of my favorite books on business, startups and tech culture and it definitely deserves a place on your bookshelf.
Tags: book reports, books, business, guy kawasaki, reality check