Start With Why, Simon Sinek – Book Review
If you have read a few of my recent blog posts – you will have noticed that I have been reading the book – “Start With Why” by Simon Sinek. You will also know that I have made a few references to how it has helped me with a few things – so, the bottom line is, I like this book.
There is one caveat – it is way too long. I found myself getting a little bored in sections, so I would skip over them. This is the only thing that I didn’t like about it mind you, and it was easy enough to skip the sections that I didn’t connect with.
Rating
It’s a definite read that is for sure, and it should be on your book list. If you have a few speed reading skills, it will help you through various sections – but don’t let that stop you from buying it.
What the book is about
Sinek spends a lot of the book looking at the above diagram – the Golden Circle.
WHAT: Every single company and organization on the planet knows WHAT they do.
HOW: Some companies and people know HOW they do WHAT they do. Whether you call them a “differentiating value proposition,” “proprietary process” or “unique selling proposition,” HOWs are often given to explain how something is different or better.
WHY: Very few people or companies can clearly articulate WHY they do WHAT they do. When I say WHY, I don’t mean to make money—that’s a result. By WHY I mean what is your purpose, cause or belief? WHY does your company exist? WHY do you get out of bed every morning? And WHY should anyone care?
If you watch this video that Sinek did at TED recently – you’ll get a good overview. This video as actually the reason that I purchased the book.
What I learned
I find that when I read books like this – I often enjoy them and, at that moment in time, have a moment of revelation and learning. The problem is – I often don’t do anything after that. There can be little action.
I have started to combat this by making notes on each book that I read (easy to do with the Kindle, as long as you don’t mark too much). On this book, I have three sides of typed notes, but I also have some actions from it.
So here are the key points:
- We have a good purpose (or WHY) with our company. I just need to make sure that we keep focusing on putting that message across.
- This book, along with a few others, caused me to think a lot about how we do marketing as a company. If you haven’t read my musings, have a look at the following post: a new definition of marketing.
- I want to look at our company values based on the following statements from the book:
Making it even more difficult for ourselves, we remind ourselves of our values by writing them on the wall . . . as nouns. Integrity. Honesty. Innovation. Communication, for example. But nouns are not actionable.
It’s nearly impossible to hold people accountable to nouns.
For values or guiding principles to be truly effective they have to be verbs. It’s not “integrity,” it’s “always do the right thing.” It’s not “innovation,” it’s “look at the problem from a different angle.” Articulating our values as verbs gives us a clear idea . . . we have a clear idea of how to act in any situation. We can hold each other accountable to them measure them or even build incentives around them.
- The simplicity of understanding WHY and making sure your HOW and WHAT connect with that has really helped me with communication in all the various ventures that I am involved in. I am asking the question “WHY” a lot. For example, I do some coaching with some community leaders in the church – and we started to look at a slightly adapted model of this – it was a great session that should hopefully make things clear.
- People have to connect with your “WHY”. A lot of companies have a purpose (WHY) that has come from the leader, which is how it should be – but, and this is a big but, people have to connect to that WHY. If your WHY is to build a large, profitable and successful company – people won’t connect with that. People aren’t interested in helping you to build a company and become more successful. WHY has to connect with their heart.
- Sinek validated my views on authentic selling! I love it when I am on the right path. According to Sinek, authenticity is proven in WHAT you do – which is something that I totally agree with. This causes you to examine what you do through the lens of authenticity.
- My views on competition have changed due to one of the last paragraphs in the book.
Now think about how we do business. We’re always competing against someone else. We’re always trying to be better than someone else. Better quality. More features. Better service. We’re always comparing ourselves to others. And no one wants to help us. What if we showed up to work every day simply to be better than ourselves? What if the goal was to do better work this week than we did the week before? To make this month better than last month? For no other reason than because we want to leave the organization in a better state than we found it?
Have you read the book – what did you think?
” is a great biography – very honest (and funny!) and almost inspiring (not something that I thought I’d say about Chris Evans in the early days). The 
is brilliant as Chris himself tells you his story. It is incredibly captivating (so glad he didn’t get someone else to read it!)
for my key ring (I have a normal sized one like a leatherman, but that is bulky to carry every where). Comes with Pliers, knife blade, tweezers and screwdrivers. It also came with a powerful torch. Very cool indeed.
by Verne Harnish. He has a great website too and seems to be connected to some interesting people. I’m a third of the way through the book – and it is a great read, full of practical and helpful stuff for running a business. Got some interesting ideas (and confirmation that I am on the right track with some that we are doing now).
(Thomas Nelson) and Seth Godin’s free eBook: 
is 20 years old and introduces a concept called Theory of Constraints (TOC). The story is about Alex Rogo, a plant manager given 3 months to turn his plant around or it closes. He meets his “business coach” (a physics professor) accidentally and the story unfolds the interactions between the two as well as Alex and his team (and wife).
is also a good read and deals more with TOC for sales and marketing.