“You should have written the book.”
We were three margaritas in, and my brother Chad was giving me a hard time for not leveraging my 30 steps to success into something more. My truth is they were never intended for leverage. I used them. So did Chad. However, Chad believed in the broader application and eventually started using them to develop salespeople, influence culture and drive performance.
I told him it was flat-out ruthless to take my ideas without the appropriate attribution. We laughed, ordered another round and actually considered that, perhaps, we should write that book. Together.
We raised our glasses and mutually agreed to proceed, albeit with one guiding principle: The project had to be fun. To put it another way: We didn’t have to write this book — we wanted to.
The 30 steps offered a foundation that was part of our story and shared professional experience. We also recognized that those steps were only the beginning. We wanted to expand the content and offer insight from our shared experiences leading high-performing teams in a constantly changing world. We wanted to ask — and answer — these critical leadership questions:
- What does it take to be an effective leader today?
- What are the essential skills and tactics that positively influence culture, fuel performance and drive growth?
- What do people want from the work experience today, and how can we as leaders help them achieve their potential at work and fulfillment in life?
The outcome of that effort is our new book: “Prepare for Impact: Driving Growth and Serving Others Through the Principles of Human-Centered Leadership.” The book will be published on Jan. 16, 2024, and you can pre-order it now. In the meantime, you can also download a free chapter.
I’m proud of this book, and it was a privilege to write it with Chad. He is the executive vice president of business operations for the Dallas Cowboys and EVP with Legends Hospitality. He is also one of the most human-centered leaders I know.
“Prepare for Impact” can help sellers, leaders and professionals in all walks of life improve their performance and impact on others. The book is intended to be actionable and offers questions, prompts and exercises to consider at the conclusion of each chapter.
I’m especially excited to introduce our ideas to support:
- Early-career professionals: People looking for insight to navigate the first stage of their careers. Chad and I talk about our early struggles, how we course-corrected, and why guidance and support are so important in your early working years. This is the book we both wish we would have had to guide us through that critical phase one.
- Sales professionals: The book will help you apply the 30 steps in actionable ways. Each chapter offers a series of questions to guide your journey and improve your seller skills and competency.
- Human-centered leaders: “Prepare for Impact” offers our best thinking on what it takes to influence culture and build high-performing teams in today’s forever-changed world of work. We share nine tactics you can use to make work a better place.
I also hope the ideas reinforce a deeply held, shared belief: The quality and fulfillment we experience in life is directly related to the quality of our relationships. Life is people. Being a human-centered leader means prioritizing people — their values, ideas, expressions and experiences — as most important to long-term success.
That was the most important part of this project and my entire writing journey over the last decade.
I hope in some small way the ideas have helped. I also hope you enjoy the book. I know you’ll enjoy getting to know Chad better. If our relationship and writing this book has helped me better understand anything, it’s simply that work is most worthwhile when you are doing work that matters with people you love.
Thank you for your support. You make an impact.
