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Jerry Porras, Stewart Emery and Mark Thompson
Success Built to Last
Creating a Life that Matters
Wharton School Publishing, 2006
What's inside?
For success that is engineered to last, figure out what matters the most to you...and pursue it.
Recommendation
From 1996 to 2006, Jerry Porras, Stewart Emery and Mark Thompson interviewed more than 200 "enduringly successful people," seeking their personal insights as a follow-up to Porras’ bestselling book Built to Last. The authors began each interview with an open-ended question designed to provoke an unstructured conversation about the meaning of success. The authors drew from these highly personalized revelations to extrapolate the qualities that high achievers share, particularly a driving desire to have meaningful impact. The authors vetted their perceptions by surveying business experts about their findings. While the book’s ideas aren’t new - follow your passion, be optimistic, build a great team - they are reliable, and the insight into business celebrities’ thoughts is instructive and valuable. If you share the drive to make a difference and lead a life of purpose, getAbstract recommends this book. It can help you pursue your goals with gusto.
Summary
About the Authors
Jerry Porras, Stewart Emery and Mark Thompson teach self-improvement and organizational development. Porras, professor emeritus of organizational behavior and change at Stanford, co-wrote Built to Last. Emery wrote Actualizations and The Owner’s Manual for Your Life. Thompson is a veteran entrepreneur and executive coach.
Comment on this summary
While I’m never completely convinced by the “follow your passion” argument, this goes a fair way towards articulating the idea successfully. And it has that essential dash of realism - which makes it more believable.
In short, there's nothing intrinsically new in this – but it’s very nicely put as a summary.