I am a magazine kind of person. I will thumb through and read business and hobby magazines more readily than I do books. It is how I am made. That’s not to say I don’t enjoy a good book or novel, they just don’t end up on my reading list for various reasons.
Now, before you suggest that I read this book with rose colored glasses on let me provide you a quick background of how Steve and I know each other.
One of the books I just finished, a few hours ago, is written by a good friend Steve McKee. It is called When Growth Stalls.
Professionally, we met when I was a television news reporter for Albuquerque’s ABC affiliate. We’d meet occasionally at a local Pizza Hut and share our views on the world. After a series of mutual job transitions, we both started our respective advertising and public relation firms at the same time. I later sold my PR firm to one of Steve’s competitors. As I worked out a non-compete and later rebuilding the company, Steve continued to move forward.
Personally, our wives, long before either of us were on their respective radar, grew up next door to each other. Not that they remained close friends, more familiar friends. We had a chance to all connect socially and spiritually though our worship at a local fellowship. I’d like to think that our conversations are always transparent, and reflecting on a few of them… they are!
Taking into account of what I know of Steve personally and professionally, his book When Growth Stalls leaves everything on the table. He brings his “A” game. Parts of the book conversation sound like personal conversations we’d have over coffee or during an occasional telephone call. What I am telling you, this book is genuine.
As I read through it, I was thinking of how my clients could benefit from his insight. But then it hit me, in a “shoemakers children have no shoes” kind of way, I need this, my firm needs this. To me, When Growth Stalls is an extended conversation with my friend Steve about what works and what doesn’t work.
Successful CEOs and leaders will “get” this book. Those who miss its many applications will soon wander aimlessly to their next job.