thimblesofplenty is a group of friends who also happen to be business people and avid readers. We wanted to keep up with the latest business books but found that time was a factor. So we divided out the work and each of us took a book and summarised it for the others. We though it might be a great idea to share these summaries with you. For a small price and a 3 minute time investment, our summary gives you some of the wisdom from the book, some food for thought and hopefully the impetus to make some time to read the whole book!

“Ever felt like you weren’t reaching your goals as fast as you would like? HARD GoalsK shows you how to change your thinking and get on the path to tremendous achievement!” --Marshall Goldsmith, world-renowned executive coach and author of the New York Times bestsellers MOJO and What Got You Here Won’t Get You There “Hard Goals is full of fascinating insights regarding how to get yourself to achieve things you never thought possible, and Murphy’s key ideas have strong research support. . . . If you want to achieve something great or important in your life, this is the book for you.” —Edwin A. Locke, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus, University of Maryland “If you want a mediocre life, set ho-hum goals. If you want a life filled with excellence and meaning, set HARD Goals. This book shows you how to set HARD Goals and love every minute of achieving them. The end result? Winning in life and unparalleled fulfillment.” Lyle Nelson, four-time Olympian and author of Spirit of Champions “Every company has goals these days. So why do most goals fall short? Why do leaders keep setting the same failed goals year after year? HARD Goals gives you the cutting-edge science to engage every employee in pursuing and achieving extraordinary goals. No more procrastination, foot-dragging, or giving up. With HARD Goals, your organization will achieve astonishing results. Every CEO, manager, and employee needs to read this book!” Kevin M. Andrews, President, SmartBen Want to increase sales? Get promoted? Change the world? There’s a goal for that . . . Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos, the school teacher next door who amassed a million-dollar fortune . . . Did these people succeed because they were more motivated or because they were more disciplined? The answer to both questions is yes—but not in the ways you might think. Anyone can achieve extraordinary things. The secret is setting goals that test the very limits of your abilities. In Hard Goals, Mark Murphy, the acclaimed author of Hundred Percenters, explains the science behind getting from where you are to where you want to be in your career, business, and life. Leadership IQ, Murphy’s top-rated leadership training consultancy, studied nearly 5,000 workers from virtually every field and found that extraordinary goals—the kind that got America to the moon and back, developed the iPod, created nanotechnology, and helped individuals overcome tremendous personal adversity—stimulate and engage the brain in ways that are profoundly different from the goals most people set. Research conducted for this book revealed that people who set Hard goals are up to 75 percent more fulfilled than people with easy goals. In these pages, Mark Murphy explains how success, and the satisfaction it brings, comes from knowing how to set goals that are: Heartfelt—have an emotional attachment, “scratch an existential itch.” Animated—motivated by a vision, that movie that plays over and over in your mind. Required—imbued with such a sense of urgency that you have no other choice but to start acting on them right here, right now. Difficult—the greatest achievements come from the toughest challenges—but they also leave you feeling stronger, smarter, and more fulfilled. People set goals all the time, but the majority end up unfulfilled or abandoned. With all the challenges facing us today, we could use a little more achievement. Hard Goals can help us get there by offering the hard science and practical techniques to conquer procrastination and unlock your brain’s potential for realizing your goals.

The #1 New York Times bestselling author of Never Eat Alone redefines collaboration with a radical new workplace operating system in which leadership no longer demands an office, an official title, or even a physical workplace. “An actionable methodology for any team to thrive during the decade of exponential change ahead.”—Peter H. Diamandis, founder of XPRIZE and Singularity University, bestselling co-author of Abundance, Bold, and The Future Is Faster Than You Think In times of stress, we have a choice: we can retreat further into our isolated silos, or we can commit to “going higher together.” When external pressures are mounting, and employees are working from far-flung locations across the globe, says bestselling author Keith Ferrazzi, we can no longer afford to waste time navigating the complex chains of command or bureaucratic bottlenecks present in most companies. But when we choose the bold new methodology of co-elevation as our operating model, we unlock the potential to boost productivity, deepen commitment and engagement, and create a level of trust, mutual accountability, and purpose that exceeds what could have been accomplished under the status quo. And you don’t need any formal authority to do it. You simply have to marshal a commitment to a shared mission and care about the success and development of others as much as you care about your own. Regardless of your title, position, or where or how you work, the ability to lead without authority is an essential workplace competency. Here, Ferrazzi draws on over a decade of research and over thirty years helping CEOs and senior leaders drive innovation and build high-performing teams to show how we can all turn our colleagues and partners into teammates and truly reboot the way we work together.

A powerful and personalized process to improve your life and advance your career Do you sometimes feel stuck, despite real efforts to gain momentum on goals you’ve set? Momentum means you’re doing more than simply getting things done. It’s that feeling of satisfaction, the belief that you can achieve big goals and complete important projects that fulfill you both personally and professionally. Get Momentum coaches you in the mindset, skill set, and toolkit required to make progress on the items you have on your life and work goals faster and easier, while living a less stressful, more meaningful life. The authors, Jodi Womack and her husband Jason Womack, provide valuable insights into the psychology of change and how to direct your focus to experience fulfillment at work and in life. The authors share what they know having built a successful executive coaching firm together, as well as facilitating leadership workshops in their home town and more than twenty countries around the world. Contrary to the promise of many self-help/business books, they believe there is no one-size-fits-all recipe for success.Get Momentum teaches you how to make proactive changes based on the solid foundation of your own “quality of life” criteria. Jodi and Jason offer clear, step-by-step guidance on how to define your personal criteria so that you can Get Momentum, improve your life and enhance your career. You will learn how to: Answer the Call (What to do when you say “Someone should do something about this!") Organize a Team and Gain the Perspective of People You Trust Measure Something (Just Not Everything At Once) Experiment Specifically and Practice Deliberately Build Momentum, Recognize Your Wins, and Pay It Forward With kindness, accountability and encouragement, Get Momentum will help you tap into your natural way of being to achieve professional goals and personal experiences that are on your bucket list, living a life you’re proud to share with others.

Push employees to their full potential with “tough love” leadership! “Provides the tools managers need to take ‘average’ employees and create a culture of accountable, fully engaged people. Managers will learn to recognize their leadership style and understand how they, too, can become Hundred Percenters.” Laura Christiansen, Vice President Human Resources, VTech Communications, Inc. "Heavily-researched and loaded with tools and examples, this book shows you how to challenge your employees to achieve the kind of extraordinary results and innovations that every CEO dreams about. Every leader needs to read this book!" Ned Fitch, CEO, Kalahari Tea "Murphy finds that most workplaces are brimming with untapped talent. Only it's suppressed by goal-setting that discourages big ideas and leaders who focus on happiness rather than greatness." Training Magazine We’ve all heard the saying that a happy employee is a motivated employee. But what if that’s not true? Leadership IQ CEO Mark Murphy says the “happy employee” philosophy doesn’t work. A study of more than 500,000 leaders and employees shows that despite the billions of dollars organizations spend to satisfy and engage workers, 72% of employees admit they’re still not giving their best effort at work. Rather, it’s leaders who focus on making their people great—not happy—who inspire Hundred Percenter performance. If you talk to the employees behind today’s great innovations, you’re unlikely to hear, “I was inspired by a boss who coddles me.” Instead you’d probably hear, “My boss challenges me and pushes me past my limits.” Most workplaces are brimming with untapped talent—only it’s suppressed by leaders who fail to connect with and challenge employees to unleash their true potential. Here are just a few of the big ideas in Hundred Percenters: The harder the goals you set, the better your employees will perform You should never use a Compliment Sandwich to deliver feedback Talented Terrors—people with great skills and a bad attitude—can destroy your company culture Before you can start motivating Hundred Percenters, you have to stop demotivating them You should never ask your employees if they’re “satisfied” This groundbreaking book debunks management fads that don’t apply to today’s workplace and provides the facts, theories, and direction you need to become a 100% Leader. Apply Murphy’s leadership lessons and you’ll see innovation, productivity, and profits soar, while employee turnover rates plummet. Hundred Percenters will bring out the best in your workforce.

In many jobs people work their way up through a hierarchy, an experience that prepares them for managing a team. In some professions, such as law, finance, accountancy, academia, engineering, education and healthcare, individuals may find themselves managing a team of equals. This book uses 50 simple lessons to show the reader in concise, pithy prose how to manage a team of equals with intelligence and diplomacy. Each lesson features a short introduction and example from the authors' experience, showing you how skills can be acquired. These are then followed by 6-10 action points to implement immediately. Core leadership skills are reevaluated for the leader of a smart team. The book teaches you core skills such as decision making and delegating, but also soft skills such as delivering good and bad news to team members and how to realise more general aims such as building trust and growing your team. The authors also offer advice on how to look after yourself as a team leader, how to build resilience in tough situations, but also how to develop creativity and extend your skill base so that you are constantly learning.

Bestselling author and world-renowned executive coach Marshall Goldsmith examines the environmental and psychological triggers that can derail us at work and in life. Do you ever find that you are not the patient, compassionate problem solver you believe yourself to be? Are you surprised at how irritated or flustered the normally unflappable you becomes in the presence of a specific colleague at work? Have you ever felt your temper accelerate from zero to sixty when another driver cuts you off in traffic? Our reactions don’t occur in a vacuum. They are usually the result of unappreciated triggers in our environment—the people and situations that lure us into behaving in a manner diametrically opposed to the colleague, partner, parent, or friend we imagine ourselves to be. These triggers are constant and relentless and omnipresent. So often the environment seems to be outside our control. Even if that is true, as Goldsmith points out, we have a choice in how we respond. In Triggers, his most powerful and insightful book yet, Goldsmith shows how we can overcome the trigger points in our lives, and enact meaningful and lasting change. Goldsmith offers a simple “magic bullet” solution in the form of daily self-monitoring, hinging around what he calls “active” questions. These are questions that measure our effort, not our results. There’s a difference between achieving and trying; we can’t always achieve a desired result, but anyone can try. In the course of Triggers, Goldsmith details the six “engaging questions” that can help us take responsibility for our efforts to improve and help us recognize when we fall short. Filled with revealing and illuminating stories from his work with some of the most successful chief executives and power brokers in the business world, Goldsmith offers a personal playbook on how to achieve change in our lives, make it stick, and become the person we want to be.

The must-read summary of Mark Murphy's book: "Hard Goals: The Secret of Getting from Where You Are to Where You Want To Be". This complete summary of the ideas from Mark Murphy's book "Hard Goals" asks a significant question: "Why is it that some people achieve so much while others seem to just spin their wheels and get nowhere?”. In his book, the author explains that when you analyse the science of achieving big things, you’ll find superachievers set themselves HARD (Heartfelt, Animated, Required and Difficult) goals and then go out and work towards achieving those goals with passion and intensity. It’s the setting and achieving of those HARD goals which drives their achievements. This summary will teach you exactly how to set HARD goals and why they are the key to achieving more. Added-value of this summary: • Save time • Understand key concepts • Expand your knowledge To learn more, read "Hard Goals" and discover the key to moving forward and achieving your goals.

Build a high-performance workforce by abandoning skills-based hiring practices and focusing on employee attitude Hiring for Attitude offers a groundbreaking approach to recruiting, assessing, and selecting people with both tremendous skills but, more importantly, an attitude that aligns with the organization’s culture. Murphy cites his own company’s research and examines recent scientific studies about the practical effects a person’s attitude has on the outcome of his or her job performance. Clear and practical lessons are illuminated by numerous case studies of organizations like Microchip, Southwest Airlines, and The Ritz-Carlton.

When was the last time you listened to someone, or someone really listened to you? "If you’re like most people, you don’t listen as often or as well as you’d like. There’s no one better qualified than a talented journalist to introduce you to the right mindset and skillset—and this book does it with science and humor." -Adam Grant, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Originals and Give and Take **Hand picked by Malcolm Gladwell, Adam Grant, Susan Cain, and Daniel Pink for Next Big Ideas Club** "An essential book for our times." -Lori Gottlieb, New York Times bestselling author of Maybe You Should Talk to Someone At work, we’re taught to lead the conversation. On social media, we shape our personal narratives. At parties, we talk over one another. So do our politicians. We’re not listening. And no one is listening to us. Despite living in a world where technology allows constant digital communication and opportunities to connect, it seems no one is really listening or even knows how. And it’s making us lonelier, more isolated, and less tolerant than ever before. A listener by trade, New York Times contributor Kate Murphy wanted to know how we got here. In this always illuminating and often humorous deep dive, Murphy explains why we’re not listening, what it’s doing to us, and how we can reverse the trend. She makes accessible the psychology, neuroscience, and sociology of listening while also introducing us to some of the best listeners out there (including a CIA agent, focus group moderator, bartender, radio producer, and top furniture salesman). Equal parts cultural observation, scientific exploration, and rousing call to action that's full of practical advice, You're Not Listening is to listening what Susan Cain's Quiet was to introversion. It’s time to stop talking and start listening.