For those of you who have met Claire Collis, and been on our Zoom calls, you will know that she is a prolific reader. If there is a business or personal development book worth reading, you can bet that Claire has read it. So she was the obvious choice to choose the first book for our new Tribe Online Book Club. So I will pass you over to Claire to find out more about our first book.
The doors to The Tribe Online reopening has been the perfect excuse to expand what we are offering to our community. So, this seems like the perfect opportunity to talk about books (in my opinion there is never a bad time to talk about books), specifically books that help us, as female business owners, to learn, develop and grow. Yep, you’ve guessed it, we are launching a Business Book Club for members.
We will be starting off slow, with just one book and a couple of months to read through it at a leisurely pace before we have a virtual chat about it. And we will be taking requests for books and/or topics for future book club choices from our members. Once you sign up let us know what you’d like to read next.
Not a fan of books? Don’t worry, the Business Book Club is only one small part of what The Tribe Online has to offer and, as with everything here at The Tribe Online, you only join in the parts that you think will benefit you. If books aren’t your thing, just give Book Club a miss. If books are your thing, then read on…
I’ve selected “Finish – Give Yourself The Gift of Done” by Jon Acuff as our first book because I really like it! Kidding! Well, not completely kidding. It is not your typical productivity in business book, which is what I assumed it was when I first picked it up. The book frames the struggles of having big ideas, a huge to-do list and an entrepreneurial brain in the context of real life. It offers some practical ideas and solutions to get your next big project finished. And, most importantly, it’s pretty funny, why bother reading something if you aren’t going to enjoy it, right?
I don’t want to give too much away here but the key challenge that Jon Acuff outlines early in the book is that perfectionism gets in the way of us completing our big projects. I’m sold already at this point (anything to avoid finishing any of my big projects). Some of the big projects that he refers to include; writing a book, dieting, exercising, starting a business but the approach and advice he lays out could apply to most things where we tend to get in our own way.
He then goes on to show how perfectionism is the underlying cause of some other specific problems, to which he proposes some fairly smart solutions. You’ll have to read the book, or join us for Book Club, to find out exactly what those solutions are and how they might work for you but here is my favourite takeaway from the book:
The idea of the “day after perfect” being the really tough part of seeing anything through.
This was something I hadn’t really considered before reading Finish, but in my mind, it is gold all by itself. How many times have you started a nice new healthy habit only to see it derailed after one bad day? 10 straight days of no coffee – 1 day with coffee – “Oh well, might as well just drink coffee again now” I can’t count the number of times I’ve had this conversation in my head, usually about exercise.
And Jon Acuff’s proposed solution? We should focus on “moving forward imperfectly” and “trying again…today, tomorrow, or next week”. Simply put we should prepare to not always be perfect and let ourselves carry on with our imperfect actions.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on this, as well as any book recommendations for our Business Book Club. Hopefully, see you in The Tribe Online community soon.
Claire Collis is a digital education specialist and ghostwriter who works with entrepreneurs and small business owners, supporting them to create books and online courses as strategic pillars of their growing businesses. Through her mentoring and consultancy work she helps clients to share their stories, knowledge and expertise in ways that support their goals, their businesses and, in turn, those of their clients.
[…] perfectionism is something that many entrepreneurs struggle with. For our Tribe Online Business Book Club earlier this month, we read Finish by Jon Acuff. Claire selected this book for us to read because […]