Shortform Books

Patrick Lencioni’s Fable About The Ideal Team Player

What are the three virtues of Patrick Lencioni’s ideal team player? How does cultivating these qualities in your employees help you level up their performance? In his book The Ideal Team Player, Patrick Lencioni explains how to spot, hire, and coach a model team player—someone who is humble, hungry, and smart. Through the fictional story of a man who takes over his uncle’s troubled construction company, he explains how these three simple qualities combined can transform any organization. Here goes the fable of Patrick Lencioni’s ideal team player model.

Advantages of Laughing, Singing, and Dancing

What are the advantages of laughing, singing, and dancing? Can engaging in these playful activities actually impact your mental and physical health? Brené Brown’s last step for living Wholeheartedly is to engage in laughter, singing, and dancing—and for a good reason. Studies show that there are many health benefits of engaging in this behavior including strengthening your immune system, reducing depression, increasing fitness, and more. Keep reading to learn about the various advantages of laughing, singing, and dancing and how to overcome the problem of self-consciousness.

Practical Value in Marketing: Useful Products Sell

What is practical value in marketing? How can you effectively provide value for your customers? A key aspect of contagious products and ideas is that they are useful to the customer. You can add practical value to your product or idea by creating an amazing discount, or by providing useful information for your customers once they’ve brought your product. Keep reading for more about practical value in marketing.

The Factors That Cause Salary Inequality

Why do some people earn more than others? What factors determine a person’s pay? Labor—people’s time, energy, knowledge, and skills—is a scarce resource. Just like any other resource, pricing labor allocates scarce resources that have alternative uses. For example, paying engineers higher salaries than artists shifts people’s time toward engineering, where their output to society may be larger. In this article, we’ll discuss what determines a person’s pay and why salary inequality is the case.

How to Implement Change in an Organization

How can you successfully implement change in an organization? What is the key to enacting change that sticks? In their book Switch, Chip and Dan Heath dive into the inner workings of change, offering actionable advice for creating changes that not only succeed but stick. They share four ways to implement change in an organization, while also providing keys to change in general. In this article, we’ll take a look at four practical ways to implement change in an organization: insider advice, emotional appeals, progress acknowledgement, and praise.

Why Fad Diets Don’t Work and What to Do Instead

What’s all the backlash against fad diets? Why do most people gain the weight back after losing it on a fad diet? If you tried a fad diet and lost weight but you either gained it back or found it too hard to maintain, you’re not alone. Fad diets don’t work in the long term for these four reasons: they rely on the user losing water weight, you get bored of eating the same foods, your food choices are too limited, or you don’t feel satisfied with the foods you’re eating. Here is why fad diets don’t work and what

How to Reach Your Goals by Doing One Thing at a Time

Do you know how to reach your goals strategically and effectively? What steps should you take? You won’t reach your goals unless you line up the dominoes to connect the present to the future. Strategic thinking, or breaking down the process for achieving a big goal into steps, is critical for getting where you want to go. Just as dominoes fall one at a time, your focus should be on doing one thing at a time. Keep reading to learn how to reach your goals with this winning strategy.

Having Low Energy? Your Mind May Be the Problem

Do you feel low on energy for no apparent reason? Do you constantly feel tired, struggling to summon enough energy to enjoy life and do what needs to be done? According to Norman Vincent Peale, the author of The Power of Positive Thinking, having low energy is often the result of what’s going on in your mind—your thoughts affect how you feel physically. When your thoughts tell you you’re tired, the body accepts this and feels tired. But when your mind and thoughts are engaged and interested in what you’re doing, you have the energy to keep going indefinitely. Here

Memory Distortions: Reconstructing the Past

Is memory an accurate record of the past? Can you think of a memory that you remember in vivid detail? Do you believe those details are accurate? Memories are mere representations of events—not accurate recordings—and thus they easily become distorted. There’s no way you can remember every detail of an experience. Instead, you remember certain aspects, and when you call up the memory, you unconsciously fill in the details. This lends itself to memory distortions. Here is how memories become distorted and how they affect your learning process.

Finding Your Values in Life: Where to Even Start?

What are your values in life? Are there any values you’d like to change? Why is it important to define and live by one’s personal values? In his book The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, Mark Manson talks about finding your values. Your personal values are the basis for everything you do. That’s why it’s important to discover what you value, what values may be harming you, and how to fix your negative values. Continue below for everything you need to know about finding, understanding, and changing your personal values.