The Power of Nice

"The Power of Nice" by Linda Kaplan Thaler and Robin Koval was the first in my recent spree of business topic books. I originally picked it up because I had been reading some pretty heavy books and I needed a light (quick) book to read - to cleans the pallet - before diving into other heavier books on my "I want to read" list. This book was sitting on my wife's nightstand and the cover alone - a bright yellow cover with a big smile on it resembling a happy face - made me think this would be the the quick, light read I needed.

While reading this book I found it to be in tune with the current culture of business. Coined as a book about "How to Conquer the Business World with Kindness.", it goes against the grain of thinking that business is a heartless cut-throat environment where decisions are based purely on the bottom line. Merit and integrity are now, more than ever, getting their fair shake in the business world. This book outlines the values of kindness and dives into case studies that supported the idea that kindness will get you further in the business world.

That being said, I feel many of the values of kindness shouldn't need to be written in a book. Personally, a book that tells you how to be nice is much like a book that tells you, "The sky is blue" and "fire is hot" it goes without saying. The reason it goes without saying is because it is a fundamental of life (a.k.a common sense).

When I finished reading I told her exactly that, I felt the book was about common sense. She looked at me as if I should know better and sarcastically said, "Yes, but how often do common sense and business work together?" She was being sarcastic, but it is a legitimate argument.

The principles outlined in the "Power of Nice" are not new, nor ground breaking; they are fundamentals. As a child, how often did your parents tell you to be nice, play fair, be gentle with the family pet? I don't know about you, but it was at least a hundred times... per day. Thanks to my parents I've been learning how to be nice since I was learning how to walk. Being nice is a cornerstone of my foundation because my parents realized that it is a fundamental of life.

As an adult how much experience do you have at your career? 5, 10, 20 years? Now, how long have you been being nice to people? I'm guessing at least 18 years longer than your career experience. That is a lot of experience at being nice! Wouldn't that be an incredible skill set to bring into your current job?

For those who are willing to embrace this way of thinking about business it is empowering. Empowering not only in the business world, but in all areas of life because if you practice being nice at work, you are in essence practicing a fundamental of life for at least eight hours a day. This does have it's rewards.

As Randy Pausch wrote in The Last Lecture, "You've got to get the fundamentals down, because otherwise the fancy stuff is not going to work."

In the case of work, the "fancy stuff" could be the innovation, engineering, or promotions waiting to happen. In the case of personal life, the "fancy stuff" could be a thriving relationship, quality time with your kids, or whatever you want to accomplish. In any case, this book helped remind me of my own definitions of the "Power of Nice" and by relying on my fundamental value of kindness, I'm able to succeed at both work and life.

What I've Been Reading... (Catch Up Post)

I've been on a bit of a reading spree lately and I haven't taken the time to catalog what I've been reading in my blog. The latest topic of interest has been business. Like it or not I've reached a point in my career where I need these books to open my mind to new ways of thinking. What I'm trying to say is that I'm reading books that will teach me new tricks before this dog is too old (or stubborn) to learn new tricks.

Rather than trying to create a big blog post that encompasses all the books I've read; I'll have a post for each of them. That way, if I get bored or tired, I can stop and pick it up later and not have any unfinished projects left on my plate.

In my following posts I'll be writing about:
The Power of Nice
The One Minute Manager
The One Minute Manager Meets the Monkey
The Leadership Pipeline

Climate Confusion

I'll be honest with you, I not sure what I think about global warming. When I first saw An Inconvenient Truth about a year ago I was ready to go plant a tree the moment the movie ended. Honestly, since then I've been nervous to run my lawn mower out of fear that it will cause the temperature to raise a quarter of a degree, which will in turn cause an ice shelf to break off, causing the ocean to rise, and then bye-bye coastal city.

That is a lot of guilt to live with.

What I needed to alleviate the guilt was a new perspective. It isn't fair to any subject to base an opinion on only one point of view. For this reason, I've started reading a book called Climate Confusion by Roy W. Spencer. A book about, "How global warming hysteria leads to bad science, pandering politicians and misguided policies that hurt the poor."

Unlike Al Gore's fear tactics, Roy Spencer uses humor in his writing to connect the reader with the subject. He connected with me the moment he made the following quote, "Warmer winters? Evidence of global warming. Colder winters? Also evidence of global warming. The theory of man made global warming has been elevated to physical law, proven beyond any doubt, and it supposedly now gives us a unified way to explain any change we see in nature."

In all honestly I believe that having watched Al Gore, and reading Roy Spencer I'm seeing both the head and the tail of the global warming coin. I don't think it will make my stand on the global warming issue any more concrete, but it doesn't hurt to try to understand both sides of the argument.

The Bicycle Wheel by Jobst Brandt

I've been wrenching on bikes as long as I've been riding and the only part that I never touched was the bicycle wheel.

The bicycle wheel is a truly magnificent piece of equipment that happens to be a black hole of mystery for me and many others cyclists. This mystery seems to be getting more and more mysterious as the trend is to buy pre-built wheels, which are strong and often times cheaper. The down side is you are confined to the trends of the market with pre-built wheels and don't get the satisfaction, pride, and personalization that building your own wheels give you.

Determined to shed light on the black hole of wheel building mystery I decided to learn how to build my own wheel, even if it cost me twice as much as a pre-built wheel. To do this I turned to the web to find a good (highly recommended) book. All reviews pointed me to a book called The Bicycle Wheel by Jobst Brandt.

I spent a week reading this book before starting my quest for parts. Just reading this book shed a ton of light on the subject. It is amazing how misunderstood the bicycle wheel really is. In his book, Jobst Brandt, does a great job of debunking a lot of the bicycle wheel lore. He does this by clearly explaining the Theory of the Spoked Wheel with words and picture diagrams. After explaining the wheel he then goes into detail on how to build and repair bicycle wheels, which was clear enough to actually guide me through building my first wheel. Later in the book he gives examples of equations to prove his wheel theory.

I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in building their first wheel. This is becoming a big interest of mine and you can expect a lot of posts about this in the future.

What I'm Reading Now... "The Call Of The Wild" by Jack London

As I write this I am forced to multi-task. My new found call of the wild has struck my heart and I'm currently packing so I can hitchhike my way to Alaska where I will walk into the wild.

OK, that is a bit of a stretch. No, make that a lot of a stretch. Besides, I shouldn't poke fun at the story of Chris McCandless, who did just that. His story was written in Into The Wild by Jon Krakauer, which happens to be the reason I started reading Jack London's, The Call Of The Wild.

The story is written from the perspective of Buck, a St. Bernard/Scotch Shepherd dog who is the pet of a judge. Lazy and trusting of humans he is kidnapped by the gardner's assistant and sold as a work dog where he is forced to learn the laws of man by way of club and fist. Buck, An intelligent dog who learns how to play the system by avoiding conflict with man, creates conflict with other sled dogs as he works his way to the front of the dog sled team. The dog team is transferred among several owners before Buck is rescued by a kind man who truly cares for him. While Buck enjoys his new life with his new owner he can't help but feel a call of the wild. A call that he embraces when a pack of Indians kill his owner.

I must admit I loved this book. It was a short read (80 pages) with a fresh perspective and powerful storytelling. As soon as I finished this book I started Jack London's, White Fang. However, White Fang didn't grip me in the same manner as The Call Of The Wild and I've since put that book down in favor of a different book called Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer.

What I'm Reading Now... "Into The Wild" by Jon Krakauer

Several weeks ago I started reading a book called Into The Wild by Jon Krakauer that will interest most people that pride themselves on their outdoor experience.


Based on truth, this book's central character is Christopher McCandless (a.k.a Alexander Supertramp) who for no apparent reason depletes his saving account by giving $25,000 to charity and hitchhikes his way to the Alaska wilderness, where he walked into the wilderness with nothing but a gun, a few books, and a ten pound bag of rice. Four months later he was found dead.


Chris's story was first told in an article in Outdoor Magazine, written by Jon Krakauer. This story got a record number of responses. Readers comments ranged from people who tried to defend Chris's action to others that thought he was no more than an inexperienced crack-pot who not only met his fate, but a fate he deserved.


The book traces the journey by McCandless, introduces you to the people he met along the way, and speculates on what his final months were like by piecing together events written in a journal kept by Chris. At times this book seemed to be a defense of Chris; trying to explain to readers that he was not a crack-pot, nor deserving of the fate he met. However, Chris's story was only one of several in the book.


Into The Wild included stories about the Alaska wilderness and those who have fallen victim to it. Plus, the author parallels his life to the life of Chris, which gets any reader that enjoys the outdoors to do the same.

It is suspected that one of the authors that influenced Chris's walk into the Alaska wilderness was by his favorite author, Jack London. Jack London wrote The Call Of The Wild, which was one of the books Chris took into the wilderness with him.

I must admit, while reading this book I had not yet read The Call Of The Wild , but from what I read in this book I can assume that I do not have the call to the wild that Chris obviously felt from deep within. Although I pride myself on my outdoor activity; I have no illusions that I am fit enough to depend solely on myself for survival.


Reading this book has made me curious about the ideals that were written by Jack London. My next read will be The Call Of The Wild. Hopefully, I will have a better understating of Chris's actions after reading it. However, I do not feel the understanding is necessary in order to enjoy this book and would recommend it to anyone.

What I'm Reading Now... "Care of the Soul" by Thomas Moore

About a month ago I had a stomach bug that left me immobile for several days. During that down time I started reading "Powder Burn" by Daniel Glick. I've since finished that book.

For me, finishing one book a year is about average. However, for some reason I've since decided to double my average and started reading a new book called "Care of the Soul" by Thomas Moore.

I started reading the book shortly after a trip to see my grandmother. My grandmother is progressing in years and to pass time she reads a lot of books. I wanted to surprise her by bringing her several new books by her favorite author, but it was difficult getting a title that she hadn't already read. Instead, I opted to take her to a bookstore so she could browse and choose several books she wanted to read.

While my grandmother browsed; so did I.

I came across a book that was called "Care of the Soul" by Thomas Moore. I didn't know anything about it, but for some reason I was drawn to the book and wanted to read it.

As I read about the author I realized that I may be biting off a bit more than a guy with a one book a year track record should. Thomas Moore is a psychotherapist with a lot of education; including a BA, two master degrees, and a Ph.D. Add twelve years of being a Catholic monk and you got yourself a guy that is going to write using big words...

Hell bent I dove head strong into the book. I'm currently a third of the way through the book and my assessment of the author using big words was 100% correct. I would be two thirds of the way through the book, but I find my self reading the same paragraph multiple times to fully understand what he writes. Like any other challenge I find myself compelled to finish even though it may not be a simple passage.

For me the concept of one's soul encompasses a vast scope and to try and understand it can be intimidating. I'm not certain that this book will enlighten me and make the scope any less vast, but I think by reading this book I'm making a conscious effort to to think about it. And truly, that is a baby step in what I feel to be the right direction.

What I'm Reading Now... "Powder Burn" by Daniel Glick

This last week, I have been plagued with a stomach bug that has left me without energy and housebound. I figured there would be no better time than the present to crack open a book and start reading, to my wife's surprise.

My wife, who was an English major, reads books as quickly as I watch sitcoms. I on the other hand only get the urge to read about once a year, which coincidentally happens to be around the same time I get really sick and have to stay immobile. So...

This year's book is called Powder Burn by Daniel Glick. I burned through the first quarter of the book yesterday (pardon the pun) and so far it has done a fantastic job of keeping my interest. Daniel Glick, who is a journalist that writes for Newsweek, does a fantastic job of packing a lot of information into a small amount of writing.

I'm lousy at summaries, but here is what I've read so far...

Vail Associates, a company that is loaded and well hated by locals is about to make an expansion to its already large ski area during the fall of 1998. This expansion will encroach on wildlife, including the elks breeding grounds and the much needed space of the endangered lynx.

On October 19th, 1998 a series of fires destroy 12 million dollars of chair lifts and ridge top buildings. The number of structures on fire at the same time could only be the result of one thing, arson.

The question currently isn't what caused the fires, but who had the motive to start the fires. Vail Associate VPs have a long list of enemies, from disgruntled workers, pissed of locals, and extreme environmentalists.

Which leaves the question of whodunit???

Personally, I'm interested in finding out, so I'm heading to my reading spot now for a nice lazy day on the couch with my book.

Tongue Twisted? Dr Seuss Can Cure That!

I've never been an out spoken individual and as a result, my tongue has gotten a bit lazy. With a lazy tongue I feel a bit self-conscious about my speaking, so I don't speak as much, which then causes my tongue to get lazier. Get the picture? It's a vicious circle.

Recently, I started reading a book to my son that my wife bought for him called, "Oh say can you say?" A Dr. Seuss book that is 48 pages of tongue twisters. As I read the book out loud to my son, I started tripping over every other word. It was frustrating, but it became a fun challenge for my lazy tongue!

I've been reading the book - out loud - for about a week. In that week I've noticed an incredible difference. My tongue is starting to listening to my head and say exactly what I want it to. This makes the story more enjoyable for my son and is allowing me to break that vicious circle.

I know the book is geared towards young children, but it also acts as a great reminder to me as an adult. As an adult I cannot expect to move forward until I have learned the basics. In my case, I can not work towards being a well spoken individual at work or in meetings until I revisit, and in some cases relearn, the basics. As I become fore comfortable and confident in my speaking, I will reflect that comfort and confidence in the work space around me.

Baby Steps...