The Measure of a Man: A Spiritual Autobiography (Oprah's Book Club)

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****LOVED IT****
MEASURE OF A MAN does not measure up
SPIRITUAL "Of, Relating to, Consisting of, or Affecting the Spirit" MERRIAM-WEBSTER
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Never cared for the man, but his book is great.

The Measure of a Man: A Spiritual Autobiography (Oprah's Book Club)
Sidney Poitier
Manufacturer: HarperSanFrancisco
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0061357901
Release Date: 2007-01-26

"I have no wish to play the pontificating fool, pretending that I've suddenly come up with the answers to all life's questions. Quite that contrary, I began this book as an exploration, an exercise in self-questing. In other words, I wanted to find out, as I looked back at a long and complicated life, with many twists and turns, how well I've done at measuring up to the values I myself have set."
—Sidney Poitier

In this luminous memoir, a true American icon looks back on his celebrated life and career. His body of work is arguably the most morally significant in cinematic history, and the power and influence of that work are indicative of the character of the man behind the many storied roles. Sidney Poitier here explores these elements of character and personal values to take his own measure—as a man, as a husband and a father, and as an actor.

Poitier credits his parents and his childhood on tiny Cat Island in the Bahamas for equipping him with the unflinching sense of right and wrong and of self-worth that he has never surrendered and that have dramatically shaped his world. "In the kind of place where I grew up," recalls Poitier, "what's coming at you is the sound of the sea and the smell of the wind and momma's voice and the voice of your dad and the craziness of your brothers and sisters...and that's it." Without television, radio, and material distractions to obscure what matters most, he could enjoy the simple things, endure the long commitments, and find true meaning in his life.

Poitier was uncompromising as he pursued a personal and public life that would honor his upbringing and the invaluable legacy of his parents. Just a few years after his introduction to indoor plumbing and the automobile, Poitier broke racial barrier after racial barrier to launch a pioneering acting career. Committed to the notion that what one does for a living articulates to who one is, Poitier played only forceful and affecting characters who said something positive, useful, and lasting about the human condition.

Here is Poitier's own introspective look at what has informed his performances and his life. Poitier explores the nature of sacrifice and commitment, price and humility, rage and forgiveness, and paying the price for artistic integrity. What emerges is a picture of a man in the face of limits—his own and the world's. A triumph of the spirit, The Measure of a Man captures the essential Poitier.

SPIRITUAL "Of, Relating to, Consisting of, or Affecting the Spirit" MERRIAM-WEBSTER.......2007-08-30

At the center of her novel is Kay Lansing, who has grown up in Englewood, New Jersey, daughter of the landscaper to the wealthy and powerful Carrington family. Their mansion -- a historic seventeenth-century manor house transported stone by stone from Wales in 1848 -- has a hidden chapel. One day, accompanying her father to work, six-year-old Kay succumbs to curiosity and sneaks into the chapel. There, she overhears a quarrel between a man and a woman who is demanding money from him. When she says that this will be the last time, his caustic response is: "I heard that song before."

That same evening, the Carringtons hold a formal dinner dance after which Peter Carrington, a student at Princeton, drives home Susan Althorp, the eighteen-year-old daughter of neighbors. While her parents hear her come in, she is not in her room the next morning and is never seen or heard from again.

Throughout the years, a cloud of suspicion hangs over Peter Carrington. At age forty-two, head of the family business empire, he is still "a person of interest" in the eyes of the police, not only for Susan Althorp's disappearance but also for the subsequent drowning death of his own pregnant wife in their swimming pool.

Kay Lansing, now living in New York and working as a librarian in Englewood, goes to see Peter Carrington to ask for permission to hold a cocktail party on his estate to benefit a literacy program, which he later grants. Kay comes to see Peter as maligned and misunderstood, and when he begins to court her after the cocktail party, she falls in love with him. Over the objections of her beloved grandmother Margaret O'Neil, who raised her after her parents' early deaths, she marries him. To her dismay, she soon finds that he is a sleepwalker whose nocturnal wanderings draw him to the spot at the pool where his wife met her end.

Susan Althorp's mother, Gladys, has always been convinced that Peter Carrington is responsible for her daughter's disappearance, a belief shared by many in the community. Disregarding her husband's protests about reopening the case, Gladys, now terminally ill, has hired a retired New York City detective to try to find out what happened to her daughter. Gladys wants to know before she dies.

Kay, too, has developed gnawing doubts about her husband. She believes that the key to the truth about his guilt or innocence lies in the scene she witnessed as a child in the chapel and knows she must learn the identity of the man and woman who quarreled there that day. Yet, she plunges into this pursuit realizing that "that knowledge may not be enough to save my husband's life, if indeed it deserves to be saved." What Kay does not even remotely suspect is that uncovering what lies behind these memories may cost her her own life.

I Heard That Song Before once again dramatically reconfirms Mary Higgins Clark's worldwide reputation as a master storyteller.

Before you can adopt the seven habits, you'll need to accomplish what Covey calls a "paradigm shift"--a change in perception and interpretation of how the world works. Covey takes you through this change, which affects how you perceive and act regarding productivity, time management, positive thinking, developing your "proactive muscles" (acting with initiative rather than reacting), and much more.

This isn't a quick-tips-start-tomorrow kind of book. The concepts are sometimes intricate, and you'll want to study this book, not skim it. When you finish, you'll probably have Post-it notes or hand-written annotations in every chapter, and you'll feel like you've taken a powerful seminar by Covey. --Joan Price

The tape opens to the silky-smooth, overtrained voice of the female narrator, who's responsible for tying together audio clips from actual Covey seminars. Leaving aside the occasional attempts at promoting Covey and his institute, her script does a first-rate job of making sense of Covey's own intense, analogy-rich style of explaining his habits. There's nothing simple about his approach to becoming an effective person. The first three habits alone--which have to do with personal responsibility, leadership, and self-management--could take years to master. Yet the last four are unattainable, the narrator insists, if you can't acquire the personal security--the "inner core," says Covey--that presumably comes from a mastery of the foundation.

Throughout our lessons, Covey's presence is both learned and thoroughly appealing. He drops references to the likes of Socrates, T.S. Eliot, and Robert Frost with the aplomb of an English professor. And his knack for mixing everyday stories with abstract concepts manages to clarify difficult issues while respecting our intelligence. You could argue that the cassette is nothing more than a clever marketing tool for selling another few million copies of the book. But, even at that, it's worth the investment in time and concentration: in the end, we're moved to learn more about integrating all seven habits in our struggle to become better and, yes, more effective people. (Running time: 1.5 hours, one cassette) --Ann Senechal

In The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, author Stephen R. Covey presents a holistic, integrated, principle-centered approach for solving personal and professional problems. With penetrating insights and pointed anecdotes, Covey reveals a step-by-step pathway for living with fairness, integrity, service, and human dignity -- principles that give us the security to adapt to change and the wisdom and power to take advantage of the opportunities that change creates.

For more than sixty years the rock-solid, time-tested advice in this book has carried thousands of now famous people up the ladder of success in their business and personal lives.

Now this previously revised and updated bestseller is available in trade paperback for the first time to help you achieve your maximum potential throughout the next century! Learn:

This reader-friendly marketing book conveys timely and relevant material in a dynamic presentation of how marketing concepts are implemented, and what they mean in the marketplace. It introduces marketing from the perspective of real people making real marketing decisions at leading companies every day. Learners will come to understand that marketing is about creating value–for customers, for companies, and for society as a whole-and they will see how that is accomplished in the real world. A five-part organization covers making marketing value decisions , identifying markets and understanding customers' needs for value, creating the value proposition, communicating the value proposition, and delivering the value proposition. For individuals interested in a career in marketing.

The book was easy to read and all important points are highlighted and defined in the page margins.

The study guide which comes with the text helps students remember the key points of each chapters by providing a brief summary of the chapter followed by a number questions of all different types.

For business leaders and public figures in any arena, The Speed of Trust offers an unprecedented and eminently practical look at exactly how trust functions in our every transaction and relationship—from the most personal to the broadest, most indirect interaction—and how to establish trust immediately so that you and your organization can forego the time-killing, bureaucratic check-and-balance processes so often deployed in lieu of actual trust.

Author Lost My Trust Immediately, So Why Would I Listen To Anything He Has To Say?.......2007-08-01

The corporate world is filled with executives, men and women who have worked hard for years to reach the upper levels of management. They're intelligent, skilled, and even charismatic. But only a handful of them will ever reach the pinnacle -- and as executive coach Marshall Goldsmith shows in this book, subtle nuances make all the difference. These are small "transactional flaws" performed by one person against another (as simple as not saying thank you enough), which lead to negative perceptions that can hold any executive back. Using Goldsmith's straightforward, jargonfree advice, it's amazingly easy behavior to change.

Executives who hire Goldsmith for one-on-one coaching pay $250,000 for the privilege. With this book, his help is available for 1/10,000th of the price.

Q&A with Ram Charan

Q: You identify 8 know-hows. Can you take us through one of them?
A: In this time of continual change, money making or business models are becoming obsolete more frequently than ever before. It wasn't that long ago when AOL was king of the hill. That leadership was taken over by Yahoo. Now Yahoo is at a crossroads and the leadership has been taken over by Google. So far Google is ahead. It has the central recipe to increase its revenues via advertising because it knows how to measure advertising effectiveness better than anybody else. Leaders at both AOL and Yahoo must be scratching their heads trying to figure out how to reposition the company to make money in the new context. Repositioning is a know-how. It's hard work, and it requires imagination. We will have an opportunity to see about the decision made by Time Warner top brass to summarily replace Jim Miller with Randy Falco of NBC Universal. Randy has a distinguished record. He will have to demonstrate one of the most crucial know-hows in this book: Can he reposition AOL for the new game, and in time? Cost cutting is not the answer.

Q: How can you build your know-how, or help others develop theirs?
A: No talented athlete ever became a champion without consistent regular practice in the right way, along with feedback and hard work. There are no short cuts.That's why you should start practicing early in your career by taking assignments that will help you cultivate the know-hows and seeking out bosses you can learn from.

Q: Many people think of leaders as having innate traits that set them apart from the rest of us. Are you saying we should be looking at skills instead of personality?
A: At the time somebody enters the work force, a great deal of his or her personality has been formed. Most people who talk about leadership today talk about personality, personality, personality. Personality traits, presence, charisma--they will experience attrition if you don't practice them in the context of know-hows. Personality traits and know-hows reinforce each other. In the 21st century, the transparency of results is immediate. Failure is detected very early. Dependence on personality traits without the mastery of the know-hows is a recipe for disaster.

Q: What do you think about the future?
A: The future is very bright. The global economy will continue to expand. There will be more demand for leaders than ever before. Master the know-hows. Hone your personality traits while you're mastering the know-hows. Don't forget that your success must come in the context of global competition. Take the opportunity to win.

Read the First Chapter of Know-How

The Substance of Successful Leaders

Know-how is what separates leaders who perform--who deliver results--from those who don't. It is the hallmark of people who know what they are doing, those who build longterm intrinsic value and hit short-term targets. What gets in the way of finding people who can perform is the appearance of leadership. All too often I see people being chosen for leadership jobs on the basis of superficial personal traits and characteristics, such as:

• The seduction of raw intelligence: "He's extremely bright, incisive, and very analytical. I just feel in my gut he can do the job."

• A commanding presence and great communication skills: "That presentation was awesome. How she ever boiled down all that data onto the PowerPoints is beyond me. Shecertainly had the committee in the palm of her hand. Mark my words, she's going to the top."

• The power of a bold vision: "What a picture he painted of where we are going, moving forward."

• The notion of a born leader: "The people in the unit love her. Such a morale builder and motivator!"

Certainly intelligence, self-confidence, presence, the ability to communicate, and having a vision are important. But being highly intelligent doesn't mean that a person has the knack for making good business judgments. How many times have you seen people confidently making decisions that turn out to be disastrous? How often have you heard a vision that turned out to be nothing more than rhetoric and hot air? Read more from Chapter 1...

Book Description

The new grand theory of leadership by Ram Charan . . . The breakthrough book that links know-how—the skills of people who know what they are doing— with the personal and psychological traits of the successful leader.

How often have you heard someone with a commanding presence deliver a bold vision that turned out to be nothing more than rhetoric and hot air? All too often we mistake the appearance of leadership for the real deal. Without a doubt, intelligence, vision, and the ability to communicate are important. But something big is missing: the know-how of running a business—the capacity to take it in the right direction, do the right things, make the right decisions, deliver results, and leave the people and the business better off than they were before.

For well over four decades, Ram Charan has been learning in the most visceral way the underlying reasons why leaders succeed and fail. As one of the most influential advisers to top management teams of leading companies around the world, he has had a front-row seat to observe the cause and effect of leadership practices and behaviors.

Ram Charan’s insight into the real content of leadership provides you with the eight fundamental skills needed for success in the twenty-first century:

• Positioning (and, when necessary, repositioning) your business by zeroing in on the central idea that meets customer needs and makes money
• Connecting the dots by pinpointing patterns of external change ahead of others
• Shaping the way people work together by leading the social system of your business
• Judging people by getting to the truth of a person
• Molding high-energy, high-powered, high-ego people into a working team of leaders in which they equal more than the sum of their parts
• Knowing the destination where you want to take your business by developing goals that balance what the business can become with what it can realistically achieve
• Setting laser-sharp priorities that become the road map for meeting your goals
• Dealing creatively and positively with societal pressures that go beyond the economic value creation activities of your business

Know-How is the missing link of leadership. By showing how the eight know-hows link to, interact with, and reinforce personal and psychological traits, Ram Charan provides a holistic and innovative portrait of successful leaders of the twenty-first century.

Customer Reviews:

Some Good Insights.......2007-09-05

This book has some strong insights into identifying the skill set of performers and non-performers. It is also in some ways though too concise in terms of what Charan identifies.

For instance where he defines Tenacity - the drive to search, persist and follow through, but not too long.

I think Tenacity in leadership is terribly important and not something that has a point of stoppage.

I recently read Bob Prosen's "Kiss Theory Good Bye" and found its identification in terms of Crippling Habits that leaders/companies must overcome to be another inspiring book on how leaders and managers can truly empower long-term change in accountability and in terms of a company's bottom line.

Kiss Theory Good Bye: Five Proven Ways to Get Extraordinary Results in Any Company

Eight priorities for success as a CEO.......2007-08-30

Forty-five years of observing businesses and business leaders as a trusted business-advisor lead Ram Charan to conclude that eight areas of know-how are essential to success: Positioning the Business; Pinpointing External Change; Leading the Social System of your Business; Judging People; Molding a Team; Developing goals; Setting Laser-sharp Priorities; Dealing with Societal Pressures. Using relatable examples Charan explains what he means by these areas of know-how and then ends each chapter's discussion with some guidance on how to gather this know-how.

An easy read that may leave you thinking, "He speaks common sense."
This book is recommended for business leaders who want to consider if they are giving the right priorities to their time and energies. Dennis DeWilde, Author of The Performance Connection

Common sense leadership advice.......2007-08-28

This book covers eight leadership principles in a generic way. The author uses the trick of using success cases that sustains his ideas, but neglects the countless other cases that do not fit his theory. Anyhow, it's an easy and worth read.

Use this to clarify thinking.......2007-08-26

The essence of the book is in the way the thoughts are organized and clarified - and the confirmation that many of our thoughts about running a company and who should be in the company are not just intuition.

It is good value for money and provides a good checklist. I think the first chapter sums it sum nicely; the financial essence of running a profitable company are the same, whether a shoe-shop, a pizza place or a consulting company. What makes the difference is the deep know how needed to succeed in the marketplace - and his value is in giving a framework around which a reader can do substantial self-assessment and put in place a good plan for self improvement.

I also think this is really a good read before making critical hires in particular - it allows one to step back a bit from the hurried pace of today's hiring and take a deep look at what is really needed.

If this book can also help prevent entrepreneurs going off into areas where they lack know-how, this alone would be a great outcome.

Good and Specific Ideas.......2007-08-24

"Know-How" provides a number of credible and helpful ideas on building and sustaining a successful organization. I particularly liked his brief comments on why G.M.'s year 2000 onwards push to regain market had failed, and would greatly have valued more material on strategic thinking. The bad news is, like many books, "Know-How" runs out of gas in its latter half - too many vague aspects relying very heavily on difficult-to-evaluate judgement.

Ram begins by asserting that personal attributes (eg. raw intelligence, commanding presence and great communication skills) are just one small slice of the leadership pie, and that their value is greatly diminished without know-how. ("Know-How" also points out that even management genius Jack Welch originally overemphasized personal attributes.) Some key know-how strengths include the ability to creatively and positively respond to societal pressures with significant impact (eg. global warming, fuel economy), and setting laser-sharp priorities aligning resources and actions to accomplish the goals.

Important personal traits include ambition (with integrity and knowledge regarding where to move), drive and tenacity (stick to the plan, but also realize when it is not working), self-confidence (not driven by a desire to be liked and thereby tolerate non-performers), psychological openness, and an appetite for learning.

Positioning is the central idea of one's business, and most will require at change within each decade. Declining revenues/market share are warning signs. Basic positioning question is "Why is what we offer better than the other options available?" Another is "Where can we win?"

New technology often creates a need to reposition - eg. Google's impact on newspaper advertising. This need may be obscured by conflicting signals - eg. a rise in one region's sales. Another example is Blockbuster vs. Internet movie downloads, or IPod vs. music stores. Down the road thinking is essential in these situations, taking competitors' likely actions into account. The political process now has greater impact than ever before, representing another key area for review - eg. societal positions on global warming, fuel economy.

Immelt of G.E. uses "Dream sessions" to assess trends. Invites customer CEOs (and 1-2 associates) in for a 1-2 day session to hear what the participants visualize for up to ten years. External trends, root causes, views from their customers and regulators are considered. Immelt is also likely to ask those CEOs where they think G.E. should put its R&D priorities.

Promoting cooperation among top leaders is another important concern for a CEO. A new CEO observed that Sherwin-Williams' division presentations degenerated into 7-hour general discussions constantly interrupted by questions from other heads. He decided to limit the presentations to one hour, without interruption, and require the audience to submit three questions - of which he would choose the best. Finally, he asked the division heads whether the meeting had benefited them. Considerable improvement resulted.

Ram suggests multiple people participate in the evaluation of leaders. The intent is more probing, balanced judgement. (However, my experience in an organization needing substantial transformation is that the prior culture's leaders are not likely to focus on the right strengths - eg. overvalue "teamwork" vs. results.)

Hiring criteria for new people should focus on 3-4 top issues; using a broad checklist results in selecting so-so performers with broader experience than most. At least some of the new leaders should come from areas expecting new growth - eg. Brazil, China, India (for an international organization), store managers for Home Depot.

As for the G.M. vignette, when Wagoner took over in 2000 its N.A. market share had been slipping for years, particularly due to Toyota and Honda. Cash generation and margins were shrinking and factories were far below capacity. Wagoner decided to regain market share (probably the politically most popular choice, though my review of others is that it is rarely accomplished), and focused on rebates to accomplish this. Market share did go up, but cash and margins fell; its bonds were downgraded to junk status. Reality was that Toyota and Honda have major competitive advantages - shorter cycle times for new models, and fewer models requiring redesign investment. Also, neither were saddled with G.M.'s health care costs, and the operational excellence added an additional boost to margins. Ram suggests that G.M. should instead have killed off unsustainable product lines - eg. Hummer, Saab, and focused on improving results of those remaining.

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