Muscle for Life with Mike Matthews - Book Club: My Top 5 Takeaways from Good to Great by Jim Collins

Episode Date: November 12, 2018

Simply put, if you’re in business either for yourself or working for someone else and want to become a better entrepreneur, businessperson, worker, boss, or even, I would argue, a better person, you want you read this book. In short, it provides a compelling and comprehensive answer to the question of why some companies excel and others don’t, and it’s the result of a tremendous amount of in-the-field research and scientific analysis, not a single author’s experiences or opinions. One of the reasons I recommend Good to Great so highly is it deals with the strategic level of business and work, where decisions carry far more weight and influence than those made in the trenches. In fact, sound strategic thinking is probably the ultimate success “hack” there is because no amount of hard work can transform a lousy strategy into a screaming success, and nothing succeeds like a brilliant strategy executed competently. I believe that applies not just to business, but to all areas of life. Assuming you can do the types of things most people don’t want to do, the more bright ideas you can generate and implement, the more your life is going to be filled with hope, excitement, and reward. And this book can help by showing you how to make more good strategic decisions than bad ones. As you’ll see in my takeaways, Good to Great has heavily influenced my own decision making particularly in my businesses, and to great effect. As a matter of fact, I’d ascribe much of my success as an author and entrepreneur to the “hedgehog” and “flywheel” concepts alone, which have informed much of the direction of my work and companies for a number of years now. Want to get my best advice on how to gain muscle and strength and lose fat faster? Sign up for my free newsletter! Click here: https://www.muscleforlife.com/signup/

If you are going to be great, you must find what you can be the best in the world at. Not just good at, the best in the world at. And then you have to do as much of that and as little of everything else as you possibly can. Hey, this is Mike from Muscle for Life, and I'm often asked about books. People ask me for book recommendations on various topics. They ask me what book I am currently reading and what books I have recently read and what my favorite books are and so forth. And as an avid reader, I am always happy to oblige and get some book recommendations in return as well. I also just like to encourage people to read as much as possible because I think that knowledge benefits you much like compound interest benefits your bank account.

In that the more you learn, the more you know, and the more you know, the more you can do, and the more you can do, the more opportunities you have to succeed. And on the flip side, I also believe that there is little hope for people who aren't perpetual learners. I know that might sound a little bit pessimistic or cynical to you, but let's face it, life is overwhelmingly complex and chaotic. And if we look around, we can find plenty of evidence that it simply suffocates and devours the lazy and ignorant. So if you are a bookworm and you're on the lookout for good reads, or if you'd like to just get into the habit of reading more, then this book club is for you. The idea is very simple. Every week I'm going to share a book that I've particularly liked. And I'm going to tell you why I liked it and give you several of my key takeaways from it. I'm also going to keep these episodes short and sweet so you can quickly

decide whether or not a book is likely to be up your alley or not. This is where I would normally plug a sponsor to pay the bills, but I'm not big on promoting stuff that I don't personally use and believe in. So instead, I'm just going to quickly tell you about something of mine, specifically my newest book, The Little Black Book of Workout Motivation. Now, this book was fun to write because it really is my personal and 100% practical and hands-on blueprint for transformation, both inside and outside of the gym. And I promise you that it will provide you with new and valuable knowledge and skills that you will use for the rest of your life. In short, I wrote this book to help you fix the things that are most holding you back from doing and achieving the things you care most about.

So if you want to learn how to overcome the mental blocks that are making you unmotivated, unhappy, and unhealthy, then the little black book of workout motivation is for you. And you can find it on all major online retailers like Audible, Amazon, iTunes, Kobo, and Google Play. retailers like Audible, Amazon, iTunes, Kobo, and Google Play. And I should also mention that you can get the audiobook 100% free when you sign up for an Audible account, which I highly recommend that you do if you're not currently listening to audiobooks. I love them myself because they let me make the time that I spend commuting, prepping food, walking my dog, and so forth, more valuable and productive. So if you want to take Audible up on this offer and get my audiobook for free, simply go to www.workoutmotivationbook.com slash audiobook, click the sign up today and save button,

create your account, and voila, you get to listen to my little black book for free. All righty, that is enough shameless plugging for now at least. Let's get to the show. Okay, so let's get to the featured book, and it is Good to Great by Jim Collins. So simply put, if you are in business either for yourself or working for someone else, and you want to become a better entrepreneur, business person, worker, boss, or even, I would argue, in some ways, a better person, you want to read this book. In short, Good to Great provides a compelling and comprehensive answer to the question of why some companies, and I would say some people, excel and others don't. And it's the result of a tremendous amount of in-the-field

research and scientific analysis. It is not some single author's experiences or opinions. Now, one of the reasons I recommend this book so highly is it deals with the strategic level of business and work where decisions carry far more weight and influence than the decisions made in the trenches on the tactical level. than the decisions made in the trenches on the tactical level. In fact, I believe that sound strategic thinking is probably the ultimate success hack out there because no amount of hard work can transform a lousy strategy into a screaming success and nothing succeeds like a brilliant strategy executed competently. I also believe that applies not just to business, but to all areas of life. Assuming that you can do work and you can do the hard work, you know, the things that most people don't want to do, the more bright

ideas you can generate and then implement, the better you are at generating bright ideas and the better you are at executing them, the better your life is going to be. The more your life is going to be filled with hope, excitement, and reward. And I think that this book can help because it shows you how to make more good strategic decisions than bad ones. And that's the key. No one's ever perfect. We're all going to make mistakes. We're all going to make more good strategic decisions than bad ones. And that's the key. No one's ever perfect. We're all going to make mistakes. We're all going to make bad decisions. We just have to make more good decisions than bad decisions. And as you will see in my takeaways that we are going

to get to in a minute, this book has heavily influenced my own decision-making and particularly in my businesses and to great effect. As a matter of fact, I describe much of my success as an author and entrepreneur to a couple of the concepts that we are going to discuss, the hedgehog concept and the flywheel concept specifically, because those two ideas have informed much of the direction of my work and my companies for a number of years now. I read this book years and years ago early on in my adventures in the health and fitness space. Okay, so let's get to those takeaways. Okay, so here's takeaway number one, quote, for no matter what we achieve, if we don't spend the vast majority of our time with people we love and

respect, we cannot possibly have a great life. But if we spend the vast majority of our time with people we love and respect, people we really enjoy being on the bus with and who will never disappoint us, then we will almost certainly have a great life no matter where the bus goes. The people we interviewed from the good to great companies clearly loved what they did largely because they loved who they did it with. And my note here is that wouldn't have really resonated with me years ago, but it really rings my bell now because I have experienced very acutely what it is like to spend too much time with people who are perpetual disappointments. As Collins says elsewhere in the book, every minute devoted to putting the proper person in the proper slot is worth weeks of time later. And now I know that is so very true. Do not hire and appoint lightly. Having the right people in the right jobs is

one of the great secrets to building a great company. And as a corollary, I would say that having the right people in your personal inner circle is a major secret to living a great life, regardless of where you end up going and what you end up doing. Who you are traveling with is going to greatly impact how much enjoyment and satisfaction you get out of the journey. Hey, quickly, before we carry on, if you are liking my podcast, would you please help spread the word about it? Because no amount of marketing or advertising gimmicks can match the power of

word of mouth. So if you are enjoying this episode and you think of someone else who might enjoy it as well, please do tell them about it. It really helps me. And if you are going to post about it on social media, definitely tag me so I can say, thank you. You can find me on Instagram at muscle for life fitness, Twitter at muscle for life and Facebook at MuscleForLifeFitness. Okay, takeaway number two, quote, much of the answer to the question of good to great lies in the discipline to do whatever it takes to become the best within carefully selected arenas and then to seek continual improvement from there. So my note here is that this is a central tenet of the book. If you are going to be great, you must find what you

can be the best in the world at, not just good at, the best in the world at. And then you have to do as much of that and as little of everything else as you possibly can, because that's what it takes to become the best in the world. That takes a tremendous amount of work and time. something that Collins coined to describe an essential strategic framework present in all of the top performing companies that he and his team analyzed. And I'm just going to quote from the book here to explain what it is. So quote, a hedgehog concept is a simple crystalline concept that flows from a deep understanding about the intersection of the following three circles. One, what you can be the best in the world at, and equally important, what you cannot be the best in the world at. This discerning standard goes far beyond core competence. Just because you possess a core competence doesn't necessarily mean you can be the best in the world at it. Conversely, what you can be the best at might not even be

something in which you are currently engaged. Two, this is the second circle of the three, what drives your economic engine? All the good to great companies attained piercing insight into how to most effectively generate sustained and robust cash flow and profitability. In particular, sustained and robust cash flow and profitability. In particular, they discovered the single denominator, profit per X, that had the greatest impact on their economics. It would be cash flow per X in the social sector. And three, third circle, what you are deeply passionate about. The good to great companies focused on those activities that ignited their passion. The idea here is not to stimulate passion, but to discover what makes you passionate. A hedgehog concept is not a goal to be the best, a strategy to be the best, an intention to be the best, a plan to be the best. It is an

understanding of what you can be the best at. The distinction is absolutely crucial. Now, I took that advice to heart early on in my fitness career, and I owe a lot of my success to it. When I began in 2013, that's when I officially began. That's when I started working on fitness stuff full-time. Previously, I had published a couple books in 2012, but that was a nights and weekends project. And the success that I saw there is what encouraged me to just jump into it full-time, which was 2013. So when I began, I saw that there were a number of potentially winning strategies for winning in the space, including entertainment, celebrity, for winning in the space, including entertainment, celebrity advertising, and education. Now,

I chose the latter, education, as my primary focus for a few reasons. One, I wasn't interested in becoming a social media personality or celebrity or influencer, so I didn't have the passion there. In fact, not only am I not passionate about any of those things, I actually dislike those things. I have no interest in attaining celebrity at all. So the second reason why I chose education is that I knew that I could never dominate. I can never be the best in the world at an advertising war with the large publishing and supplement companies who specialize in it and who have very large budgets for it. And reason number three is I am personally passionate about reading, researching, and writing. And I believed that I could excel at those things and I could produce content far better than most everything else that was being

published in the space at the time. I also knew that outstanding content marketing can be very profitable. It can make for good business. And so I decided to focus on that content marketing and I have not looked back. However, I did make a few missteps along the way, which we will get to in a minute. So let's go on to the third takeaway now. Quote, Herring understood that the way to get people lined up behind a bold new vision is to turn the flywheel consistent with that vision from two turns to four, then four to eight, then eight to 16, and then to say, see what we're doing and how well it's working? Extrapolate from that, and that's where we're going. The good to great companies tended not to publicly proclaim big goals at the outset. Rather, they began to spin

the flywheel, understanding to action, step after step, turn after turn. After the flywheel built up momentum, they'd look up and say, hey, if we just keep pushing on this thing, there's no reason we can't accomplish X. So my note here is this. In other words, what Collins is saying is big talk is like caffeine. It's a cheap stimulant that becomes less and less effective the more it's used. I don't think there's anything wrong with having and communicating big goals. But in the end, nobody cares about what we say we want to do or even what we actually are spending our time doing. In the end, they only care about what comes of it. They only care about the results. And ironically, the people and groups and companies who are most

solidly on the path to greatness can and often do care the least about reminding everyone where they're going. It's self-evident by the results they are currently getting. Next, takeaway number four, quote, if you have the right executives on the bus, they will do everything within their power to build a great company, not because of what they will get for it, but because they simply cannot imagine settling for anything less. Their moral code requires building excellence for its own sake, and you are no more likely to change that with a compensation package than you are likely to affect whether they breathe. The good to great companies understood a simple truth. The right

people will do the right things and deliver the best results they're capable of, regardless of the incentive system. Now, my note here is this ties into my first takeaway and my notes on the first takeaway, and its importance really can't be overstated if you want to build a remarkable business, team, or group. So here's what I've learned. One, some people just have what it takes to win, that combination of intelligence, grit, drive, integrity, and so forth. And some people simply do not. They just don't have it.

And that isn't a moral judgment. It's just an observation. Two, if people are going to change at all, it usually takes a very long time. And trying to facilitate it is probably a waste of time. Trying to make them into who you want them to be is most definitely a waste of time. Three, money is a horrible motivator and a powerful catalyst of character. If you want to know who someone really is, give them a bunch of money and then see how they choose to live and behave. Okay, fifth and final takeaway. Quote, those who built the good to great companies, however,

made as much use of stop doing lists as to-do lists. They displayed a remarkable discipline to unplug all sorts of extraneous junk. So my note here is this is so true, and especially as you become more successful. You see, in the beginning, the opportunity cost of most work is negligible. It just costs a bit of your time. So you simply want to say yes to basically everything because the goal in the beginning is just to gain momentum, to get moving, to get going. Now, as things improve, the opportunity costs rise, and you have to get better and better at saying no to opportunities that would pull you away from your hedgehog concept. So to quote Collins again, quote, the more an organization has the discipline to stay within its three circles, the more it will have attractive opportunities for growth.

Indeed, a great company is much more likely to die of indigestion from too much opportunity than starvation from too little. The challenge becomes not opportunity creation, but opportunity selection. Now, I have tasted a bit of this in my businesses in a couple ways. One, I let nearly two years go by without publishing a new book or new edition of an existing book. This was a mistake because my book writing is really what launched my entire career, and it has been my absolute best source of long term followers and customers. I should have never abandoned what I am now getting back to, committing to an aggressive publishing schedule and fitting everything else around it. That's

why I recently published the little black book of workout motivation, and then immediately went into rewriting Bigger, Leaner, Stronger and Thinner, Leaner, Stronger. And we'll be publishing those new third editions in the next couple of months. The digitals will be going live, should be going live this month in November. So eBooks and audio books should be going live this month. And then paperbacks are probably going to be January-ish because not only do they need to be printed, but then the current second editions need to sell out so I can flip over to the thirds. And then from there, I'm doing a number of books next year. I'm doing a fitness journal. I'm going to be considering doing like a meal planning nutrition journal. I'm going to be doing a second edition, brand new of Beyond Bigger, Leaner, Stronger, the sequel to Bigger, Leaner, Stronger. And I'm going to be doing another little book, I think on meal planning. That's the current plan at least. And then from there, I have more projects lined up for 2020 and even stretching into 2021. Oh, I also forgot.

I should be able to next year also get another cookbook out. So I've already lined up the people and the project, and we are going to get rolling in January. I think we will get it done next year. So it's going to be a one pot kind of fast and slow, quick and easy concept. And it's going to fall under the Shredded Chef name. That's going to kind of be the umbrella, the brand. to fall under the Shredded Chef name. That's going to kind of be the umbrella, the brand. So I have the Shredded Chef. This is going to be the Shredded Chef one pot edition, I guess you could say. Okay, back to the point. So here's the second thing that I've learned as relates to this takeaway. A few years ago, I thought it would

be neat to have an app. And so I just kind of jumped into it without doing my due diligence. to have an app. And so I just kind of jumped into it without doing my due diligence. And it has cost me a lot of time and a lot of money. And the app has done relatively well, but it is also completely unnecessary. I didn't really weigh the opportunity cost properly when I got into it. And looking back, I can say that the time and the money that went into that app, which is called Stacked, by the way, if you want to check it out, getstackedapp.com. Honestly, I could have spent that time and money on many different things that probably would have been far more beneficial to my businesses, like writing books, for example. But that said, now I do have this app and many people do use it and many people do like it. So I actually am in the middle now of completely overhauling it. So we are, it's not just me,

my brother-in-law is really heading up the project actually, and he's doing a great job. And so we are completely revamping the look and the feel and how some of the features work, and we're going to be adding stuff. And the reason why I'm okay with it now is it doesn't require very much of my time, which is really the most important and most valuable resource that I need to guard my time more than anything else. I'm more concerned about where my time goes than money currently. And I also really do believe that this 2.0, this stacked 2.0 is going to kick ass. It's going to be really, really nice. I would say one of the best strength training, resistance training apps out there. And we are going to just make it 100% free. Currently, it's free to download and then you pay a few dollars to upgrade one time if you like it.

I'm just going to remove that. I don't even care to make those few dollars. I'm just going to make it completely free. And I think that people are going to really appreciate that. That's going to help it generate even more word of mouth and more popularity, which ultimately will result in money. Some people will come in via the app, really like it and be like, oh, what else does this guy have? Oh, he has books.

Cool. I'll check that out. Or he has a coaching service or he has meal plans or training plans or supplements or whatever. All right. Well, that's it for this episode. If you want to let me know what you thought, or if you have read Good to Great and you want to share your ideas, let me know.

Shoot me an email. Mike at Muscleforlife.com. quick review of it on iTunes or wherever you're listening from. This not only convinces people that they should check the show out, it also increases its search visibility and thus helps more people find their way to me and learn how to build their best bodies ever too. And of course, if you want to be notified when the next episode goes live, then just subscribe to the podcast and you won't miss out on any of the new goodies. Lastly, if you didn't like something about the show, then definitely shoot me an email at mike at muscleforlife.com and share your thoughts on how you think it could be better. I read everything myself and I'm always looking for constructive feedback, so please do reach out. All right, that's it. Thanks again for

listening to this episode and I hope to hear from you soon. Oh, and if you liked this episode, then you are going to love my newest book, The Little Black Book of Workout Motivation. You should definitely check it out because this book is my personal and 100% practical and hands-on blueprint for transformation, both inside and outside of the gym. I promise that this book will provide you with new and valuable knowledge and skills that you will use for the rest of your life. In short, I wrote this book to help you fix the things that are most holding you back from doing and achieving the things that you care the most about. So if you want to learn how to better overcome the mental blocks that are making you unmotivated, unhappy, and unhealthy, then the little black book of workout motivation is for you. And you can find it on all major online retailers like Audible, Amazon, iTunes, Kobo, and Google Play. Now,

I should also mention that there's an audio book as well, one that I recorded myself. So if you like listening to me talk about this kind of stuff on the podcast, then you'll definitely like listening to the audiobook. And you can actually get that audiobook 100% free when you go to www.workoutmotivationbook.com slash audiobook and sign up for an Audible account. Now, I myself love audiobooks and highly recommend them to everyone because they let you take downtime that you spend commuting, prepping food, walking dogs, stuff like that into something more valuable and productive. So if you want to take Audible up on this offer and get my audiobook for free, simply go to www.workoutmotivationbook.com slash audio book, click on the little sign up today and save button, create your audible account and voila, you get to listen to my little black book for free.