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The Flywheel of Life and Leadership
This book is for those who want a comprehensive approach to both life and leadership. It highlights key principles and practices to deal with the hectic, interconnected, and demanding world we live in. The first principle is seeking balance. Pursuit of a professional career at the expense of everything and everyone else, can lead to a shallow victory. Fighting for this balance requires a plan, introducing efficiencies, and becoming a corporate athlete. Next, your ability to overcome all the filters that exist between you and the truth is dependent upon building relationships at all levels of the organization and demonstrating you really do care about your people. Finally, you need an operating model that has a clear definition of winning and focuses the organization on the few things that will make the biggest difference. Underlying these principles is leading your organization with a heightened level of discipline leading to habits allowing you to both lead and inspire others. The authors share examples on how these practices apply at all times and across various situations including in times of adversity. The time to start preparing for the eventual curveball of life is not when it is leaving the pitcher's hand; it begins with how you live and lead each and every day.
132 pages, Paperback
Published August 22, 2022
7 people are currently reading
27 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
April 19, 2024
A 5 star review from me! I got this book from my professor and got the chance to meet the author over Zoom for a book discussion as well. If you like self-help books, I would definitely recommend this one. The author went to Mizzou, went on to work at Caterpillar for 37 years, and left just as he was being considered as a CEO candidate due to being diagnosed with ALS. In my opinion, he has lived every "era" of his life to the fullest. Ed has done it all: had a very successful/meaningful career that he was incredibly passionate about, travelled the world, has made family a priority, is now doing meaningful work to find a cure for ALS, practices gratitude, sleeps/eats well, and is just truly happy.
I personally loved the book so much because the life he described is the way I want to live and lead. I agreed with every point made in the book and really want to follow through with the advice given.
Because I want to follow through on the lessons learned in this book, I made a list of what I want to remember/implement and I thought I would share that in this review too:
1. Our generation is going to have a harder battle trying to find work-life balance. That just means we have to fight harder to make it happen and plan our personal lives with as much rigor as our professional lives. There shouldn't be guilt spending time with family/"not being productive" if it really is a priority. If you really want this balance, then you are "being productive" by spending time with them and working to better that balance/that goal you have. Outsource what you don't love doing so you have more time for this balance.
2. Any team you are a part of or any work you do, have in writing narrowed down what the focus/why of your work is. Clarity means you won't get distracted by all the noise. You can't lead until you know on a detailed level what your business does, what the purpose is, what focus the team should have.
3. If you don't have meaningful relationships/community, you will have a shallow life. You have to work on making this happen. Work will be much more meaningful if you build relationships/have community.
4. At some point in time everyone has adversity, you are measured by how you respond. Ed never once has gone to a dark place from finding out his diagnosis, he said "I have no fear in where I am going but I fight to stay because I love where I am at so much" --even in the midst of dealing with this diagnosis. He said refuse to accept a victim's mentality.
5. At the end of your life you'll be way more proud of what was difficult that you contributed to changing rather than when things were easy and going good. Take those opportunities to make contributions.
6. Put in writing who you want to be to become that. Put in writing how you would ideally spend your day and spend it that way to have the life you want. It takes discipline to form the habits (30-45 days) that you want to be doing but make a real plan to do it. If you have clarity, your thoughts, words, actions, habits, character, and destiny can all align and make what you want actually happen.
7. Sleep is so important and it can't be used as the variable, build it into your daily prescription to get your 8-9 hours in. It is part of being a corporate athlete in your personal life to have the energy to devote to work: planning out your physical, emotional, and mental health with the same rigor as everything else.
8. Be the neighbor that helps their neighbor, be the friend/spouse/parent who shows up to all the events/remembers the birthdays --they all matter.
9. If you do not plan or write down what you want your life to be like you will be going with the flow and in reactive mode. Reap the benefits of clarity. Choose your definition of winning.
10. Spend your meals with others (dinner every night with family no matter what). Talk about highs and lows/have quality talk and keep phones away. This improves your relationships. The two ways to improve any relationship are: catching up on their life and experiencing new things together.
11. People who have hobbies that are not their phone are much happier/healthier
12. Practice gratitude. He keeps it on his calendar every day. He answers how are you doing with: everyday is a terrific day.
13. You can use affirmations to have what you want in writing. I want to make a list of my own like he did on Pg. 114
There were more lessons but overall I am inspired by the way Ed approaches life and want to live my life similarly. I know that takes a lot of planning and putting those goals/plans in writing to make it happen so I think I am going to try to do just that!
I personally loved the book so much because the life he described is the way I want to live and lead. I agreed with every point made in the book and really want to follow through with the advice given.
Because I want to follow through on the lessons learned in this book, I made a list of what I want to remember/implement and I thought I would share that in this review too:
1. Our generation is going to have a harder battle trying to find work-life balance. That just means we have to fight harder to make it happen and plan our personal lives with as much rigor as our professional lives. There shouldn't be guilt spending time with family/"not being productive" if it really is a priority. If you really want this balance, then you are "being productive" by spending time with them and working to better that balance/that goal you have. Outsource what you don't love doing so you have more time for this balance.
2. Any team you are a part of or any work you do, have in writing narrowed down what the focus/why of your work is. Clarity means you won't get distracted by all the noise. You can't lead until you know on a detailed level what your business does, what the purpose is, what focus the team should have.
3. If you don't have meaningful relationships/community, you will have a shallow life. You have to work on making this happen. Work will be much more meaningful if you build relationships/have community.
4. At some point in time everyone has adversity, you are measured by how you respond. Ed never once has gone to a dark place from finding out his diagnosis, he said "I have no fear in where I am going but I fight to stay because I love where I am at so much" --even in the midst of dealing with this diagnosis. He said refuse to accept a victim's mentality.
5. At the end of your life you'll be way more proud of what was difficult that you contributed to changing rather than when things were easy and going good. Take those opportunities to make contributions.
6. Put in writing who you want to be to become that. Put in writing how you would ideally spend your day and spend it that way to have the life you want. It takes discipline to form the habits (30-45 days) that you want to be doing but make a real plan to do it. If you have clarity, your thoughts, words, actions, habits, character, and destiny can all align and make what you want actually happen.
7. Sleep is so important and it can't be used as the variable, build it into your daily prescription to get your 8-9 hours in. It is part of being a corporate athlete in your personal life to have the energy to devote to work: planning out your physical, emotional, and mental health with the same rigor as everything else.
8. Be the neighbor that helps their neighbor, be the friend/spouse/parent who shows up to all the events/remembers the birthdays --they all matter.
9. If you do not plan or write down what you want your life to be like you will be going with the flow and in reactive mode. Reap the benefits of clarity. Choose your definition of winning.
10. Spend your meals with others (dinner every night with family no matter what). Talk about highs and lows/have quality talk and keep phones away. This improves your relationships. The two ways to improve any relationship are: catching up on their life and experiencing new things together.
11. People who have hobbies that are not their phone are much happier/healthier
12. Practice gratitude. He keeps it on his calendar every day. He answers how are you doing with: everyday is a terrific day.
13. You can use affirmations to have what you want in writing. I want to make a list of my own like he did on Pg. 114
There were more lessons but overall I am inspired by the way Ed approaches life and want to live my life similarly. I know that takes a lot of planning and putting those goals/plans in writing to make it happen so I think I am going to try to do just that!
February 27, 2023
Read this for work book club. It is very caterpillar centric, and many examples would not be relevant to people outside of industry. However, Ed is a very wise leader and has good nuggets and life lessons to share that can be applied to your personal life and volunteer work as well.
April 16, 2024
I enjoyed the simple and straightforward structure of this. Many leadership books end in a sob story that led the author to their routine but Rapp was very objective and included the use of affirmations.
August 19, 2024
I felt good after reading this book ~ it was positive and proactive and rooted in discipline. There were great holistic tips to articulate your values as a foundation and then create a combined personal and professional statement. Ed Rapp's commitment to his health and holding himself accountable is admirable. I particularly liked the advice about exercising in the morning rather than the evening because the only excuse is that you are too lazy to get up. The book is very Caterpillar centric but that was valuable to me. 4-1/2 stars.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews