Business Book Review: Life's Great Question

Here we are at another edition of Business Book Reviews on The Indiepreneur! I read (probably too much) and I love sharing the information that I learn, and I hope at least someone benefits other than me! Because, as we’re talking about in this week’s book, Life’s Great Question by Tom Rath, it’s how we help others that ultimately matters.

High Level Summary of Life’s Great Question

Worth a Read for Indiepreneurs: Absolutely, even if it is mostly a test

What It Does Well: Emphasizes that we are so wrong about the inward focus of our life

What It Doesn’t Do: Everyone is different, so it can’t tell you exactly how to answer Life’s Great Question. It can only help you start on the path.

Overall Thoughts

Last week, I talked about Strengthsfinder 2.0 by Gallup, which is a potentially great business tool to help people figure out where they should focus their time at work based on what they’re good at doing.

As I noted then, I’ve really appreciated Tom Rath’s work and his data driven perspective in the business world. So when he released Life’s Great Question right before the Pandemic locked everyone down, I jumped at the purchase.

To be honest, I was a little disappointed when I first opened the book. Like Strengthsfinder, it’s only about 50 pages of general information, with the rest of the book being explaining your test results from a partnering website Contribify. But those first 50 pages are powerful.

For whatever reason, we have become an inward facing society. This book was published right before COVID-19 started locking things down, but the amount that people have turned inward since then has only accelerated.

The result has not been good. Even without looking at the tragic and extreme cases, people have legitimately become more mean.

That’s the wrong way to go. Tom Rath quotes Dr. Marin Luther King, Jr. “Life’s most persistent and urgent question is: What are you doing for others?”

Why do we hate what we do? Why are we so miserable at our jobs, leaving the workplace less healthy than when we arrived?

Because we’re not answering Life’s Great Question: How does what we do help others?

First World Problems

We joke all the time about First World Problems. This is one of them, but unlike your local 24 hour supermarket being out of your favorite soda at 1 in the morning, it is a serious problem. We have become disconnected from how our work helps others. And it’s killing us. Slowly, for sure, and perhaps laying us in gilded casket, but no less dead.

Efficiency has made us such a wealthy nation, but it has also disconnected us from the world.

Rath urges us to figure out how our work helps others. And it does, otherwise people wouldn’t purchase it. Until we figure out and focus on this connection, though, we won’t find joy in our work. Even, potentially, if we are following our dreams and working where our passions lie.

My Test Results

Like all these tests, Contribify lumps the taker into a handful of categories. In my case, it says I should focus on Teaching, Scaling, and Perceiving. Which, after reading the description, lines up pretty well with what I found on Strengthsfinder and what I enjoy doing in life.

It also made something even more painfully clear: I couldn’t simultaneously stay in my position and focus on the areas where I would enjoy contributing. Unlike my previous position, where I was overworked but mostly fulfilled with the work I was doing, in this position I literally felt like a cog, not feeling like I was helping anyone with my 8 to 5 puttering.

I’m still figuring out life after leaving. But in the work I’m doing, I’m better able to figure out how what I’m doing will help others, and it really does leave me energized.

Key Takeaways from Life’s Great Question

Alright, so what are you going to find in this book? For the text itself, it’s only 50 quick pages, so you probably should just read it. But let me put my favorite parts here.

You Are How You Help

Right off the bat, Tom Rath grounds the conversation by pointed out everyone’s mortality. We are going to die. Now what are you going to do with the time you have?

When looking at that time, we’ll often look at what we do as our contribution to the world. Rath turns that around, and says that we need to instead frame the statement as “you are how you help.”

The problem is that we, “fail to connect our daily work with the positive influence it has on something bigger than ourselves.” Whatever work we do, it is helping somebody. If that wasn’t the case, nobody would pay to have it done. But it’s easy to get disconnected from who we’re helping and just focus on ourselves.

He gives an example of people preparing food. When the chef sees the customer, customer satisfaction goes up 10%. If the customer can also see the chef, meal quality goes up 17% and service is 13% faster. Just by putting a face to the food (not in a Krusty the Clown way).

Wired to Contribute

We, as humans, were not designed to be solitary creatures. COVID has certainly shown that. But being together is just part of it. We need to help each other.

To quote Rath, “real growth is the product of following your contributions more than your passions.”

We hear all the time to follow your dreams. If your dreams don’t help others, even your dreams will be disappointments.

That’s also an important thing to figure out before you try to start a business or freelance career because you’re tired of the 9-to-5: if you don’t know who it’ll help, then you’ll likely struggle to enjoy this new position, too.

Purpose Beyond a Paycheck

Yes, it’s great to find purpose outside of work, something that Rath acknowledges in Life’s Great Purpose. But in addition to that, we need to find purpose in our jobs.

Unfortunately, as of right now that is mostly on us. As he notes, the “current relationship between people and organizations is flat-out broken.” He does say that we need this to change, but this is a societal issue that’s going to take awhile. In the meantime, us, as individuals, need to take action.

Yes, You Can Change

There’s this popular refrain that people don’t change. But they do. Over their lifetime, they can potentially change a lot. Rath references studies that show that intervention designed to change personality traits could make those new traits stick in about five to six months.

So you can change. Or, as he quotes Scott Berry Kauffman, “It’s good to accept and love who you are, but it’s also good to know that you can change for the better.”