No One Cares

Social media posts on LinkedIn at the end of each year are filled with people talking about how many books they’ve read over the last year or lamenting that they didn’t make their goal.  Posts in January are filled with resolutions about how many books a person plans to read.  Many of these posts include the hashtag #LeadersAreReaders.

I hate to break it to you, but no one cares about how many books you’ve read.  People care far more about who you are as a person and what you do. 

Leaders do read but that isn’t what makes them better.  Simply consuming information isn’t enough.

When I was a major, I had the privilege to attend the Air Force’s most prestigious academic program, the School of Advanced Air and Space Studies.  Those familiar with this graduate school experience sometimes refer to it as the “book-a-day club” because the students average about four books a week.  After reading a book the day prior, students meet in small seminar groups facilitated by an instructor for a couple hours at a time to discuss and debate a book and about once a week we had to write a paper.  We also had to write a thesis and pass a verbal examination administered by a panel of our professors.  It’s a grueling program wherein some people struggled, and some people thrived.

In interacting with my peers, it became clear that those who struggled (i.e., exhausted, not faring well in debates or graded events) tended to stay up most of the night just to finish the book.  Those who were thriving (i.e., better rested, more content, and doing better in debates and on graded events) tended to skim the books for the major themes and spent most of their time thinking about the strengths, limitations, and applicability of the material.

Work smarter, not harder.  Make the most of your hard-won knowledge gained through experience, books, and other venues.  Think about what you can take from those sources to make yourself better.  You won’t have to post about how many books you’ve read because people will see it in your actions.  People will ask you how you handled something so well or solved a problem that befuddled others.

Leaders are thinkers; they observe, reflect, learn, and apply. Sometimes we learn from reflecting on our experiences and other times we have the opportunity to learn from others through books and other media.  In the words of noted philosopher and educator, John Dewey, “We do not learn from experience…we learn from reflecting on our experience.”  Reflection is what unlocks the value of knowledge because it is the thought and consideration that allows us to understand the utility of what we have learned.  Put another way, if you have an experience, read a book, or view a lesson in the Accelerate Leadership Academy and you do not use that new knowledge to change something about your life, you are wasting your time.

Don’t settle for spinning your wheels.  Choose instead to accelerate your leadership.

Authored By: Jason Lamb, Managing Director