Start With Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action

by Simon Sinek

We all sit at different places on this spectrum depending on the product or idea. Most of us are fiercely loyal to certain products and ideas at various times and demonstrate left-side-of-the-curve behavior. And for other products or ideas we exhibit right-side-of-the-curve behavior. When we sit on one side of the spectrum, we often have a hard time understanding those on the other side because their behavior doesn’t make sense to us. My sister is an early adopter when it comes to fashion trends, whereas I’m firmly in the late majority. It was only recently that I finally caved and bought a pair of overpriced designer blue jeans. I admit they look good, but I still think they aren’t worth the money and I can’t understand why my sister thinks they are. In contrast, I’m an early adopter for some technologies. I bought a Blu-ray DVD player before they had perfected the technology. I paid about four or five times more for it compared to a regular DVD player. My sister can’t understand why I waste my money on all that “useless stuff,” as she puts it. We will never see eye to eye on this stuff. Each of us assigns different values to different things and our behaviors follow accordingly. This is one of the major reasons why it is nearly impossible to “convince” someone of the value of your products or ideas based on rational arguments and tangible benefits. It’s the ol’ Ferrari and Honda Odyssey debate again. Designer jean companies (or my sister) can talk to me until they are bl...