I have a confession. I’m having a great time dipping into Tom Peters’ new book, The Little BIG Things: 163 Ways to Pursue Excellence. Neat concept. A book built, more or less, out of Tom’s blog posts (edited and re-organized). But the EXCITABLE punctuation (which includes randomly bolded words, HEADLINES in the middle of paragraphs and EXCLAMATION POINTS galore!!) is DIS-CON-CERT-ING. It makes me feel, well, jumpy. Like I can’t settle down and concentrate. Then again, I’ve never been able to read Wired Magazine because the layout and fonts make me dizzy.
I wonder if in fact this is what Tom intends. It’s a trademark of his other recent books too. If you know anything about him, you know that, first and foremost, he is a PROVOCATEUR. Along with Peter Drucker, he is the most influential thinker about modern business management, he is the author of In Search of Excellence, published in 1982, and he has influenced hundreds of so-called marketing gurus (I am, er, one of them) who think they’ve invented ideas like personal branding. For the record, WE DIDN’T. He has also profoundly influenced some really smart people, including Seth Godin. He is a hurricane of passion and big thinking and wisdom and encylopedic details. (Follow him on Twitter if you want to be entertained.) I am lucky enough to have met him in person. I interviewed him about blogging [VIDEO]. “Blogging changed my life,” he told me.
Tom Peters is one of the speakers at the very cool re-Set Business authors event in New York on April 20, 2010. Along with Seth Godin, Gary Vaynerchuk, Michael Eisner and Anna Bernasek. I will be there and am really looking forward to it. Register with this 10 percent off code: re-setfriend.
So… whew. Let me catch my breath here. I think the proper response to the Department of Punctuation is, bug out. Who cares. We don’t need you. Suck it up, Debbie. Put your reading glasses on… or TAKE THEM OFF. And plunge ahead. That’s what I’m doing and I recommend you do the same.The book is a truly dizzying compendium of little tips that turn out to be BIG THINGS. A few of my favorites:
- It’s 11 AM – Have You Called a Customer Today?
- “Thank You.”
- “Suck Down For Success”
- “I’m Sorry.”
- What We Have Here Is a Failure to Overcommunicate
And more and more and MORE… 158 more to be exact. A treasure trove of both counterintuitive and commensense tips for doing business the right way. In other words, in a way that respects both employees and customers and, ultimately, impacts the bottom line. Bravo, Tom! Now go BUY THE BOOK.