The best books I've read so far this year that were published in 2024 or 2025 are 99% Perspiration Thomas Edison's quip, "Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration" continues to shape thinking about work in America. Journalist Adam Chandler unpacks why it is that hard work alone is hardly enough for American workers to succeed in today's economy. Additionally, he provides helpful historical data alongside interviews with a wide variety of workers to Read More …
Seth Godin
8 Meaningful Quotes (#2105)
For nearly a decade I've engaged in the spiritual practice of tweeting meaningful messages from the new books I'm reading (for example, Tweets Worth Thinking About) in the form of short quotations. I invite you to read through the seven tweets below, which I shared on X (formerly known as Twitter) over the last two months. (All but one of these quotes comes from a book published in 2023 or 2024. The Seth Godin quote was from a blog post he published in 2024.) So Read More …
Great New Books – August 2023 (#2072)
The best new books I’ve read in the last 30 days are listed below. Only Work Sundays Pastoring local congregations is rewarding yet challenging work. In recent years there has been considerable reporting on pastor burnout and the unreasonable expectations placed on many clergy as COVID-19 transitions from pandemic to endemic. Liz Miller, a Millennial United Church of Christ pastor who recently concluded seven years of service as the pastor of Edgewood United Church, shares her Read More …
Ministry: More or Better? (#1474)
Seth Godin is the author of seventeen books that have been bestsellers around the world and changed the way people think about marketing, change, and work. In this five minute video, he suggests that our cultural preference for more being better is unwise and often simply not true. So What? In most congregations, plans are now well underway for constructing ministry and mission for 2015. What should be done (including and often especially how much more than the prior year) is Read More …
Key Marketing Question (#1342)
Seth Godin, a one of a kind marketing genius who was inducted into the Direct Marketing Hall of Fame in 2013, recently shared the most important question any person or entity marketing a product or service to a potential new customer must address: "Do they trust me enough to believe my promises?" So What? When churches engage in marketing they must not ignore this question. Think about how your congregation markets itself to potential newcomers as well as how individual ministries Read More …
Learn Together (#1173)
Seth Godin is the author of twelve books that have been bestsellers around the world and changed the way people think about marketing, change, and work. He is also the master of saying a great deal using relatively few words on his blog. Recently he wrote about the power of togetherness in learning. Godin affirms that mere access to educational opportunities is not adequate. Completion rates from MOOCs are among the strongest recent data backing up this argument. Given this Read More …
Hurry Up & Be Generous (#0933)
Seth Godin is the author of twelve books that have been bestsellers around the world and changed the way people think about marketing, change, and work. He is also the master of saying a great deal using relatively few words on his blog. Recently he shared that while people are in a hurry to do many things, generosity isn't usually on that list. Godin then asked a powerful question: What happens when we adopt the posture of being in a hurry to be generous? So What? As we Read More …
The Power of Why (#0727)
Seth Godin is the author of twelve books that have been bestsellers around the world and changed the way people think about marketing, change, and work. He is also the master of saying a great deal using relatively few words on his blog. Recently he shared this wisdom about the power of why: "Why?" is the most important question, not asked nearly enough. So What? The life of faith and the ministry of a given local community of faith both benefit tremendously from why questions. Read More …
Time in A Web-Based World (#0600)
Seth Godin is the author of twelve books that have been bestsellers around the world and changed the way people think about marketing, change, and work. He is also the master of saying a great deal using relatively few words on his blog. As we start the year most call 2012, he wrote a 204 word post about the artificiality of time that included this sentence: "The decision to work at a different rate than others can be a significant competitive advantage." So What? Time isn't what it was Read More …
Consider a Workflow Audit (#0431)
Seth Godin is the author of twelve books that have been bestsellers around the world and changed the way people think about marketing, change, and work. He recently blogged: Go find a geek. Someone who understands gmail, Outlook, Excel and other basic tools. Pay her to sit next to you for an hour and watch you work. Then say, "tell me five ways I can save an hour a day." Whatever you need to pay for this service, it will pay for itself in a week. So What? Almost everyone wants to work Read More …