Saturday, July 23, 2005

Tom Peters. An honor from the top shelf

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Great stuff unexpectedly drops in over the transom sometimes.

I've wanted to write about enterprise and innovation for a long while. Our current start up has been soaking up its share of waking hours, but this past April I got around to opening up this site for posting some ideas that had been stacking up.

I'm an avid reader of biz related books and mags. Like life, the content quality of what's published is all over the board. Some great, some awful. However, even in the bad ones, I find there is usually one or two small things that are valuable and that can be put to good use.

Tom Peters is another story. When Tom wrote In Search Of Excellence, the business of enterprise changed forever. There are now over 10 million copies in print, in a zillion languages. Tom has written, or had a hand in, a dozen or so other books, nearly all best sellers, and untold articles about business, life, innovation and enterprise.

Every single time I come in contact with Tom Peter's work I come away better. When Tom writes, there aren't one or two good things in each piece. There are one or two good things per page. Typically there's one or two good things per paragraph. Book after book, article after article. Decade after decade. Tom is the best of the best.

Fortune magazine calls Tom Peters the Ur-guru of management and compares him to Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Walt Whitman and H.L. Mencken. CBS MarketWatch said "Tom Peters is the most provocative and engaging (as well as annoying and threatening) management guru running loose in America today."

Tom Peters web site is the only permanent outside link I've ever included on this site. It was there from the first day I put the site up.

I just received an unexpected, "over the transom" gift from Tom and friends. We were asked if they could include SustainableWork on their blog roll, their list of recommended reading sites.

My goodness. Thank you!

The subject of start ups, innovation and self enterprise is an area of life that's typically full of the worst kind of hype and hucksterism found anywhere. I've been trying to talk about these subjects with a minimum of noise and as much straight talk as I can muster. That approach usually doesn't stand out amid the tidal forces of popular culture.

The fact that Tom and friends think enough of this approach and this content to include it in their recommended reading is among the coolest gifts I've ever received.

Fortune magazine summed up Tom's impact this way: "We live in a Tom Peters world."

I know I do and I'm very grateful.

Many thanks Tom and friends!
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