Seth Godin, one of the most prolific thinkerss in the marketing industry, has a new book out called Poke The Box. It's part of the Domino Project, a new publishing venture Seth has created. Earlier this year Seth and the Domino Project team put out a call for Street Team members for Poke the Box and I signed up as Seth's projects are always interesting and it's a great opportunity to try something new and learn. I was selected, along with about 60 others, to be on the inside. As a result, we've been given an early preview of the book (which comes out next month). Next week I'll share with you my thoughts on the book, but for now, let me tell you why I think you might hate this book:
1. You're a manager of some sort and one of the people who works for you is going to read this book.
You're a busy person, you've got forms to fill out, deadlines to meet, statuses that need quo-ing, committee get-togethers, papers that need pushing. It's a full time job. The last thing you need is somebody coming up to you with ideas and suggestions on how to really make change. Change for your company, for its customers, for the world. That's what's going to happen if someone who works for you reads this book. Or worse yet, they buy several copies and give it to their colleagues. You're going to have to start explaining why all these new ideas that you've never had the courage to try aren't going to work. Why being daring, taking risks and having courage is a bad idea. Man, this book is going to be a pain in your butt.
2. You're a smoothed down cog in the big corporate machine and one of your colleagues is going to read this book.
Punch in, punch out. Same desk, same job, same lunch. You've been doing it like this for years and now one of your colleagues is getting ideas. Maybe she's only been here for a few months, maybe she's been here longer than you, but all of a sudden she's doing things differently. Pretty soon she's going to be eating lunch with a different group of people at the company. People who make decisions. People who get bonuses and work on exciting projects. And it's not going to be long until she's your boss. And it's all because of that stupid book by Seth Godin.
3. Someone gave you the book and you were bored and figured, 'what the heck, I've got an evening to kill' and you read Poke The Box.
An hour or so later you're going to be pretty angry. You're going to be angry because deep down inside you know that Seth Godin just called you out. You'll be angry, not because you couldn't understand Seth's mind-bending concepts, but because in fact it's really quite straightforward. You'll spend several minutes trying to rationalize your current behaviour and make excuses for why you can't do the things Seth suggests. "Sure, it's easy for Seth, he's famous and rich and powerful," you'll say (even though you know that has nothing to do with it). You'll toss the book on the coffee table and go to bed. And you'll lie there, looking up at the ceiling knowing that the only thing standing between you and making a difference is you. And that night you'll hate Poke The Box.
The next morning when you stumble into the kitchen you'll see the book and you'll still hate it.
Or maybe, just maybe, you'll decide to try and do one thing different today. You'll stop waiting for someone to give you permission to start that sub-committe/cross dept. task force / time-waster and you'll just grab five colleagues, huddle around a table in the far corner of the lunch room and start making change happen.
More thoughts from other Street Team Members:
Mohit Pawar provides some background on the Domino Project.
Ivana Sendecka on the importance of shipping.
Rex Williams on spreading ideas.
Tom Fiffer on what's cool.
Paul Lancaster on the rise of the Information Jockeys.
Aaron Goldfarb on the broken publishing industry.
Daniel Decker on risk and change.