The book Be obsessed or be Average by Grant Cardone is actually the first book that I am reviewing. One of the main reasons for this review is the fact that I highly recommend this book to pretty much anyone! However, I recommend this book especially to entrepreneurs, people who want to grow and develop, people who need a mentor and some guidance and also people that need motivation to achieve their goals. What I love about this book and about Grant is his no bullshit attitude. If he thinks some society accepted “truth” is stupid, he will just say so without much circumlocution and brake the myth. If you need a personal mentor (and I think all of us do!) and you don’t have anyone in your surroundings, then this book and probably some other contributions from Grant are an excellent place to start.
After this short intro I will cover briefly all the chapters of this book and extract the most important messages from the chapters. Afterwards I will excerpt some quotes that I find very inspiring and useful. In the end I will finish with the short conclusion. Although reading this review is a good starting point I still highly recommend reading the book as it’s full of great life and business advice, and useful tips.
The book can be found on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Be-Obsessed-Average-Grant-Cardone/dp/1101981059
In Chapter 1 Grant speaks about his troublesome young years, about doing drugs and about being obsessed with the wrong things in life. He also described that when he acknowledged his addictive personality and redirected it to something positive that everything started to rapidly change for the better.
In Chapter 2 Grant talks more about obsession being your only option. If you want to inspire others, make a difference on this planet you should ask yourself “why not me” and of course be obsessed. He also tells that success is not only having one thing (like money) or about sacrificing anything, it’s about having it all: health, family, love, recreation, spirituality, community and time to enjoy it! He also talks about the epidemics of average and that people by telling you to slow down and be happy what you have, they are actually trying to make sense of their decision to settle (for him settle = quit) in their own lives. The important thing to address from this chapter is about people spending so much time consuming useless content (TV, news, Facebook etc.) and by having these constant distractions it’s hard to really stay focused and brake from the average cycle and succeed.
In Chapter 3 Grant focuses on the purpose i.e. the reason for doing something and fueling your obsession. He also tells more about goals which all of us need to stay focused, rebooted and motivated. The goals are not TO DO list, they are much more. You should eat and breathe your goals, write them daily and not just write them somewhere and forget. He also adds that you don’t need to like something to commit and be good at that, and that you will probably like it once you master it!
In Chapter 4 Grant focuses on feeding the beast i.e. feeding your goals. He tells us that what you pay attention to is what you get so it’s crucial to focus on the positive things that work for you! He emphasizes that you must always learn, and try to find a mentor and also the one that is very successful himself. You should maximize learning by turning your travel/leisure time into learning time.
Grant also says that the culture of not talking about money or talking about money as a bad thing comes from our poor/middle class upbringing and that it’s totally ok i.e. we should talk about money and to talk about wanting more money. He also says that 95% of the time of the entrepreneur should be focused on getting more money and only 5% on controlling expenses.
In chapter 5 Grant discusses doubt which you need to starve and exclude from your life. He has an interesting thought that there is no such thing as burnout, it’s only when you loose track of your purpose but still work too much, when you have burnout. He also shared interesting information about the myth of vacation and claims that time off will not renew you, only getting re-obsessed with your purpose will. Many successful people do not see work as work!
This chapter is full of braking myths as Grant speaks about the myth of balance where people think that due to your obsession you must sacrifice anything which is not true. He also talks about free time as a big threat to the obsessed. In the end of the chapter Grant discusses naysayers and haters and he makes big difference between the two since naysayers typically care about you and want to protect you and haters don’t’ like you and have bad intensions. He combats naysayers by just hitting the outlined goals and he is just ignoring haters as he sees them as his best promotors (they are promoting him freely at the expense of their own energy and time).
Chapter 6 talks about all the areas that you need to dominate to ultimately win. First one is to dominate time by writing down goals and then make time, not excuses for delivering. Second one is about dominating money, to plan and to talk about your financial success, not to think about money as evil. Third is your area of expertise where you should market yourself as being the best in the game. Fourth is to dominate your brand.
Chapter 7 is about staying dangerous and he is having some tips about this to: move once you settle, constantly connect with new people, accept to be unpopular and finally to take risks with your investments. He also talks about loving the fear as fear is indication of what should be done and about converting fear to creativity, inspiration and strength. You should accept danger and discomfort since you will discover your greatest self far outside your comfort zone and in moments when you fear something but you still do it!
He talks also about the myth of diversification as he says that you actually should put your all egg into one basket but then care about that basket very closely. He also talks about business development and not to watch for the margin but instead to watch for the growth and he also talks about being early adopter regarding technology and to network as much as possible. He talks about playing the role until it’s real i.e. fake it till you make it mentality as these always come true in the end.
Chapter 8 is about sales which he rightly calls the god of any business as sales makes the money come to any company. Ha talks about the need for you and your people to be engaged and passionate about your products. He has sales meeting every day and he finds accountability very important. He always rewards those who achieve and punish those who don’t. He always has statistics of how much someone contributed since numbers don’t lie, only people do.
Chapter 9 talks about overpromising and over delivering since committing small will typically won’t win the business in the first place. He is never conservative when marketing and selling. He also thinks that not blowing in your own horn is another myth and that you should do it as much possible. He emphasizes that since you are an ethical person committing big means also that you will deliver. He also talks people don’t buy the products or price i.e. people are buying the solution, people and company. He always makes sure that customer gets bigger value then the price he pays since then the customer is the winner.
Chapter 10 is a very good chapter about teams and people. He talks about the mistakes people/entrepreneurs make trying to do it all alone. It’s hard to find good people, but still you should give your best. You shouldn’t look at people salary as cost since more people will give you more money and more growth. If new people don’t bring more profits, then either the employee is not good or you’re not using the employee good. Grant also talks that you should always recruit because in business it’s normal to grow and to loose existing people. However, to be able to recruit great talent you need to have good reputation which is only possible if you have great products, great sales/marketing strategy and great networking of you and your company. In a smaller company always do the hiring by yourself, Grant has bad experience with hiring agencies.
Grant is also talking about the myth of low turnover. You shouldn’t brag with it because it takes courage to get rid of people who no longer belong, contribute or are radiating contagious bad energy. However, it’s always a problem if more people quit than get fired. Additionally, he never gives bonuses for people being organized, team players, knowing much etc. as he expects that already, he gives a bonus only when he receives a bonus from the outer world. Apart from hiring he also emphasizes creating the company culture that anyone should align with. His culture is in-short: order, hard work, fast work, invest in oneself/educate and dress sharp.
Chapter 11 is called be a control freak. In this chapter Grant talks about another myth that says that control and micromanagement is a bad thing. He says that the ones that don’t have any control gave control a bad reputation. He gives control to his managers only when they prove to him that the system performs better. He also says that control is good since it gives the employees a safe environment. In the end he pretty much equalizes control and leadership.
Chapter 12 talks about persistence which is very important and the major difference between those who quit and the those who succeed. It is probably the single most important characteristics of any entrepreneur. Another word for it is also the grit.
Chapter 13 is a closing chapter with lots of useful tips. Grant talks about time which is only nonrenewable resource that we have and to always take care about the time. He also talks about meting and hanging with successful people and the people that are better than us. He also says that everyone should find the mentor, pay for his guidance and not save money when paying the mentor. He also talks about setting unrealistic goals (in his experience he met these as well) which helps him keep the motivation and focused. He once again talks about education to constantly learn about his domain of expertise as he spends 10% of his time and money on education. He also says that one should take care about his own body i.e. being in shape and eating healthy. Finally, he says that charity is important and that charity isn’t giving but investing! You can and you should give not only money but also your time, energy, intelligence and inspiration to others.
People are encouraged to be happy and they spend their lives trying to buy happiness with borrowed money from credit cards that must pay off with money earned from a job they hate.
Those how tell you settle for less are doing it because they are trying to make sense of the decision to settle in their own lives. Actually they didn’t settle, they quit.
You should eat, sleep and breathe your goals.
What you pay attention to is what you get.
If you are the most successful person in the room, you are in the wrong room.
If you want to meet the devil have white spaces on your calendar.
People gave up on their dreams and now spend their lives trying to get others to give up as well.
Play the role until it’s real (fake it until you make it).
Everything you ever accomplished started with the first time.
People don’t buy price, they buy solution, people and company.
In business two most important things are greeting someone and shaking his hand.
People have an opportunity to take the reins in their hands since if they don’t someone else will.
The difference between success and failure is staying in the game when others throw the towel
Persist and you will make perfect. Then persist some more and you will find that what you thought was perfect was a joke.
After writing so many details about this book it’s hard to write some more. There is a small thought that I would like to add, probably because of us Europeans tend to car more about the work/life balance. I honestly think that it’s very hard to be totally obsessed with developing business and also have quality time with your family specially being a father of two kids. I would say…obsessed yes, but spending quality time with family, taking care about your child upbringing shouldn’t be neglected in any way! Still I would suggest this book to anyone since it’s not very long and it’s packed with useful information.
P.S. When I read interesting and useful books I always take notes either via Google Keep or via The Kindle that I use. This is one of those books that I recommend reading on Kindle or in paper, but maybe you are more of an audio book type so that is also a good option. I believe that this book would help anyone to become a better version of oneself, it would also help entrepreneurs and IoT enthusiasts as well.