Book Report – Another Boring, Derivative, Piece of Crap Business Book

What is your favorite quote from the book?

“Capital isn’t so important in business. Experience isn’t so important. You can get both of these things. What is important is ideas. If you have ideas. you have the main asset you need, and there isn’t any limit to what you can do with your business and your life.” – Harvey Firestone

Seventy percent of all customers would switch suppliers today if they could just find one they perceived as being more fun.” – Tom Peters

When you follow the crowd, you’ll never draw a crowd. – Mike Veeck

When your idea looks safe, that’s when it can be most dangerous. There’s only one thing worse than being mistaken: being irrelevant. Instead of trying to come up with a smart idea and then figuring out what can go wrong, come up with a stupid idea and then figure out what can go right.- Mike Veeck & Allen Fahden

What were the key takeaways/lessons from the book?

1.) Be a Dumbass – Give up trying to do something smart, everyone else already thought of it. The better idea the deader the idea. The key is to smarted a bad idea by going to the right person.

85% of people want to kill an idea. Creators, because it’s not their idea. Refiners, because they can see too much wrong with it. Executors because it’s a threat to their system. The key is to understand what motivates people. Are they a creator, advancer, refiner, or executor.

2.) Win by doing something others won’t do. If you can’t think of a smart way to be different, explore the stupid ones.

3.) If you are the same you have no value. People buy commodities at the lowest possible price.

4.) Different way to be different – stop creating and start combining.

5.)Hit early adopters with ideas first.

6.) Don’t miss a brilliant idea because it has issues.

7.) Think about how much you hate the latest trend and attack it. – Disco Demolition Night Example

8.) Take your biggest disadvantage and make it an advantage. – Small Bank – promote it, like the midget Al Fahden used to promote the bank

9.) Use poor judgement. You can run with a bad idea just for the negative publicity.

10.) Stop covering your ass, cover your customers ass. If you risk alienating uptight people, you can spend your time with fun clients who appreciate your unique attitude.

11.) Never roll your eyes at someone’s idea. You can kill an idea with a look. Don’t fold your arms, open up and be excited.

12.) If you want the best customers, make the joke on you.

13.) If people are criticizing you, stop resisting. Go with it. Take the criticism you’re most afraid of and accept it. You can actually gain more group by making a mistake and then making up for it in a happy way. Try new things. You can only gain. Example – North stars played terrible previous season then hired six guys who never skated and had them skate around ice – saying “After last season, you are probably expecting this.”

14.) The Best teams are the most diverse. Seek out people who are just a little different for reason or another. They’ll either have big ideas for you because of how differently they see the world, or they can be a part of a big idea for you.

15.) Creators, Adopters, Refiners, Advancers. Go to early adopters first. Advancers can tell you which idea has the best chance of success and how to get it implemented. If you need more ideas go to creators. Early adopters hate rules. So you can break them when you approach them. When you have an idea – go to only the advancers and ask which idea is the best and why? Save the rest of the ideas for other times. What are the next steps? If you are a creator, think up ideas and solve problems. If you’re an advancer, set priorities (choose the best ideas) and make plans. If you’re a refiner, warn people about what can go wrong. If you’re an executor, dot the i’s, cross the t’s and keep the system well oiled. Creator – New Ideas. Advancer – Set Launch Plan. Refiner – shows what can go wrong, creator solves their objections. Executor does the details. Without advancers, great ideas die.

What is something you will implement from this book in the business or in your personal life?

DO a CARE Assessment for our team. Creators, Advancers, Refiners, Executors. Work together on assessment to help us push ideas forward! Laugh, Learn and Leap – Start with laughter, then share new ideas to learn and then help people leap. Use this with speaking, starting brainstorm sessions, ideapalooza’s, and meetings with people. Go After early adopters – iPhone – Thousands of people waiting in line. Steve Jobs “We didn’t do the iPhone to get a share of the phone market. We did it because it was the phone that we all wanted and it didn’t exist.” Create products that don’t exist, that are different and extraordinary. WORST IDEA SESSION – Prize for the dumbest idea of the group. The worse, the better. Have a frog file of all the ideas that sucked today.

How does something you learned from this book fit into the Fans First Way?

Be different but be the best version of yourself doing what you love. Sounds obvious but using Fahden’s CARE Model, I know I’m a creator and coming up with ideas is what I’m strongest at and I’m most passionate about the Bananas team. So ideas for this team is in my sweet spot. KNowing whether someone on our team is a Creator, Advancer, Refiner or Executor and putting them in the right role with the team doing something they are passionate about is key! They call this Peak Work Zone, does it energize you. OVERALL, it fits the Fans First Way most with being DIFFERENT. “When you’re different, people never forget it.” “When you’re different, no one else can compete.” If you are the same as your competitors, that makes you irrelevant. The Best teams are the most diverse. Win with people who are different than you – Creators, Advancers, Refiners and Executors.