Ignore Everybody


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Hardcover
159 pages
ISBN 9781591842590 Published June 2009
Portfolio
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Ignore Everybody
And 39 Other Keys to Creativity
By Hugh MacLeod 

Related Blog Posts
Evil Plans
Posted Feb. 25, 2011 2:39 a.m. by jon
In - 800 CEO Read Blog

Creator of the hugely successful blog, Gaping Void, and author of the best-selling book Ignore Everybody, Hugh MacLeod has written a new book called Evil Plans: Having Fun on the Road to World Domination.

Like his blog and previous book, Evil Plans is filled with the author's curious illustrations that make observations on false perceptions, personal barriers, and other self-imposed limitations as a way to recognize and avoid them. Both humorous and serious, MacLeod's work is based on personal experience and theoretical quests to find success in work and life.

I recently sent Hugh a few questions about the new book, and what his own Evil Plan is:

How was writing the second book different from the first for you?

The first book was about getting in touch with your inner artist. The second book was about getting in touch with your inner entrepreneur. But apart from that, I tried to keep the format pretty much the same. Lots of cartoons, lots of personal anecdotes. Writing a second book has its challenges, however. You no longer have "beginner's luck" to fall back on. Like the old saying goes, a musician spends his whole life writing his first album, and a year writing his second. There's a lot to live up to.

As popularity for Gaping Void continues to grow, how do you focus, and balance all the things you need to do?

With great difficulty. There's so much to do... probably too much. Eventually you just have to say to yourself, "Well, I did choose this", and then get on with it.

Everybody might need an evil plan, but what's difficult about making one?

Well, besides the usual financial sacrifices and the insecurity, the thing most holding us back is out own capacity for self-doubt and our own fear of failure. But you learn to ride with that after a while. Eventually it seems normal.

How do you make the plan last?

Tenacity.

What's next for you and Gaping Void?

Having built my own business and my own "gapingvoid" brand over the last decade, the onus is now on helping others find their own Evil Plan. Helping others to become successful is far more interesting (and harder) than becoming successful yourself. But I like helping others- it gives me something to think about, besides my own little world. The best teachers are the ones who can learn the most from their students. I still have a lot more to learn, than I ever will have to teach. I like that.



Friday Links
Posted Feb. 18, 2011 4:58 p.m. by dylan
In - 800 CEO Read Blog

➻ It's been a big week in book-selling, what with Border's filing bankruptcy and and announcing that it will be closing 200 locations (including all Milwaukee locations), so maybe you missed Barnes & Noble's open letter to Amazon affiliates:

We understand that Amazon.com has threatened to terminate its affiliate program in certain states that may enact e-fairness legislation that requires Amazon to collect sales tax due on purchases by residents in those states.

Barnes & Noble is disappointed to hear that Amazon would threaten small businesses’ livelihood rather than comply with state law. Here at Barnes & Noble, we value the 13,000+ members of our affiliate program worldwide. They are an important part of our overall business success and strategy. Barnes & Noble collects and remits sales tax due from its sales, including from BN.com, our e-commerce business.

We would like you to buy all of your books from us, so we obviously don't have a dog in this fight (there has to be a better way to say that) but I do agree that Amazon's threat seems a little bullying. Also, with the condition of state budgets across the country, maybe this isn't the time for Amazon to bring attention to the fact that it doesn't collect state taxes?

➻ And as Andy Kessler noted in the Wall Street Journal piece yesterday, "Amazon is displacing thousands of retail workers." He did not pose that as a negative, however, but as the progression of how "Technology is eating jobs." In an article that asks Is Your Job an Endangered Species?, he writes about how layoffs trim nonessential jobs and make room for new ones.

Forget blue-collar and white- collar. There are two types of workers in our economy: creators and servers. Creators are the ones driving productivity—writing code, designing chips, creating drugs, running search engines. Servers, on the other hand, service these creators (and other servers) by building homes, providing food, offering legal advice, and working at the Department of Motor Vehicles. Many servers will be replaced by machines, by computers and by changes in how business operates. It's no coincidence that Google announced it plans to hire 6,000 workers in 2011.

In a week that that saw the IBM computer "Watson" win on Jeopardy, the argument is most certainly not trivial. Kessler's book, Eat People: And Other Unapologetic Rules for Game-Changing Entrepreneurs, was released earlier this month by Portfolio.

➻ As David Brooks points out, there are some important things a computer can't do, like imagine it was manufactured on a star:

For several months when he was four, Harold insisted that he was a tiger who had been born on the sun. His parents tried to get him to concede that he was a little boy born in a hospital, but he would become grave and refuse. This formulation, “I’m a tiger,” may seem like an easy thing, but no computer could blend the complicated concept “I” with the complicated concept “tiger” into a single entity. As Harold grew, he was able to use his imagination to blend disparate ideas, in the same sort of way that Picasso, at the height of his creative powers, could combine the concept “Western portraiture” with the concept “African masks.”

Brooks has a new book, The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement, coming out in March with Random House. And if you just can't wait for a taste, The New Yorker has your back. In their "Annals of Psychology," they ran an excerpt about from the book about How the new sciences of human nature can help make sense of a life. The quote above is from that excerpt. The one below will tell you what in the world he's actually talking about:

We are living in the middle of a revolution in consciousness. Over the past few decades, geneticists, neuroscientists, psychologists, sociologists, economists, and others have made great strides in understanding the inner working of the human mind. Far from being dryly materialistic, their work illuminates the rich underwater world where character is formed and wisdom grows. They are giving us a better grasp of emotions, intuitions, biases, longings, predispositions, character traits, and social bonding, precisely those things about which our culture has least to say. Brain science helps fill the hole left by the atrophy of theology and philosophy.

A core finding of this work is that we are not primarily the products of our conscious thinking. The conscious mind gives us one way of making sense of our environment. But the unconscious mind gives us other, more supple ways. The cognitive revolution of the past thirty years provides a different perspective on our lives, one that emphasizes the relative importance of emotion over pure reason, social connections over individual choice, moral intuition over abstract logic, perceptiveness over I.Q. It allows us to tell a different sort of success story, an inner story to go along with the conventional surface one.

He discussed some of this, among other topics, last September with Charlie Rose (who recently did his own 12-part Brain Series that's well worth checking out).

➻ Hugh MacLeod's new book Evil Plans went on sale this week, and he has some heavies in his corner talking about it. Running excerpts, Dan Pink asked Are you ready for world domination?, while Jonathan Fields stated that Success Is More Complex Than Failure. Pam Slim calls it required reading for doing good, and had this to say in her review:

When I read the series How to be Creative (which later turned into Hugh’s first bestselling book, Ignore Everybody), I felt my heart leap. I was no longer alone—there were people out there who also felt fierce joy in the creative process, and self-righteous indignation against “The System.” And who had every faith that talented, opinionated, quirky freaks could and should change the world.

I was in love.

Before going any further, I would suggest checking out the Evil Plans slide show at Fast Company. (Hat tip to the Portfolio Javelin for the links.)

➻ And, finally, speaking of evil plans, Parag Khanna was on PBS's Need to Know discussing How to Run the World and why he says We’re living in a modern version of the Middle Ages. (And just to be clear, Khanna's book is actually really good, not evil.)

➻ Quicksilver girl ... and she's free



What can you make?
Posted Feb. 10, 2010 4:40 a.m. by jon
In - 800 CEO Read Blog

I just posted this question on Twitter and LinkedIn and got a lot of interesting responses. From paper snowflakes, to muffins, to cookies, to photos, to records; these are the things that first came to people's minds when considering the question. These things are what they like to make. These are the things they like thinking about making.

After reading books like Pam Slim's Escape From Cubicle Nation, you start to realize that there's something to these seemingly mundane activities. Gary Vaynerchuck's Crush It comes to mind too, as well as Hugh MacLeod's Ignore Everybody. Making paper snowflakes becomes a craft blog with thousands of readers sharing their passion. Taking photos becomes a successful wedding photography business with landscape photos on the side for fun. Writing songs becomes a stepladder to licensing music for commercials. And on, and on.

Business is a part of our lives, and it's interesting to watch how it gets played out. What's sad is to watch the opportunities where it could blossom, but gets pushed aside, because of fear, self-doubt, and the false assumptions of what reality is.

So, what can you make? And more importantly, what are you doing about it?



The 800-CEO-READ Business Book Awards of 2009
Posted Dec. 15, 2009 3:00 a.m. by dylan
In - 800 CEO Read Blog

The 800-CEO-READ Business Book of the Year

Too Big to Fail: The Inside Story of How Wall Street and Washington Fought to Save the Financial System—And Themselves by Andrew Ross Sorkin, Viking Books, 624 pages, $32.95

Even though Too Big to Fail was written during the same year the financial collapse occurred, Andrew Ross Sorkin has written what we predict will be the definitive book on the subject. Sorkin not only tells a gripping “perfect storm” story—reporting the gory details as our 401k’s disappeared and our financial system became nationalized—but he humanizes the players as well, resulting in an imminently readable, albeit lengthy, book.

It’s a sobering reflection and a critical reminder of what transpired in recent financial history. But it is the great stories and detailed, insider information—the sense one gets of being in the room while history is being made—that will place this book among the greats.

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Leadership

best in category ➻ Maestro: A Surprising Story About Leading By Listening by Roger Nierenberg, Portfolio, 128 pages, $19.95 | Leadership is something that can be learned. However, the most respected leaders are not textbook cases, but those who wield the necessary traits and knowledge with a very personal sense of purpose. A parable, which Maestro is, is an ideal way to create a scenario for that sense of purpose to develop, as ideas are presented in ways that are interpreted personally by those who read them, rather than listed as bullet points or chapter summaries. By using the metaphor of a conductor and his orchestra, important details are revealed, from interpersonal communication skills, individual effort to benefit the group, group dynamic to celebrate the individual, and the role that listening (both physically and intuitively throughout all experience) plays in creating the most successful results.

best of the rest:

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Management

best in category ➻ The Four Conversations: Daily Communication That Gets Results by Jeffery Ford & Laurie Ford, Berrett-Koehler, 238 pages, $19.95 | At the core of management is the practiced skill of communication. The Fords present four kinds of the conversations and the best situations to use each of them. More performance conversations (asking for promises) and less understanding conversations (are you OK with all of this?) are needed, they say.

best of the rest:

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Marketing & Advertising

best in category ➻ Trust Agents: Using the Web to Build Influence, Improve Reputation, and Earn Trust by Chris Brogan & Julien Smith, John Wiley & Sons, 271 pages, $24.95 | Social Media took off in big ways this year, and while technology has become an important tool for communication, marketing, and advertising, Trust Agents reels the tech-excitement back in by advocating a not-so-new element that is essential: trust. If the people who put out the messages aren’t people we’d like to work with and buy from, their messages, no matter how easy to broadcast, won’t hold their weight. It’s not about how to master technology, but about being the kind of person, the kind of company, that people like to do business with. This book is filled with prime examples, great stories, and hard facts that convince us not to be blinded by innovation as we communicate with our audiences.

best of the rest

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Sales

best in category ➻ A Seat at the Table: How Top Salespeople Connect and Drive Decisions at the Executive Level by Marc Miller, Greenleaf Publishing Group, 174 pages, $19.95 | In A Seat at the Table, Marc Miller shows that selling is based on the simple concept that the only thing a customer desires is value. The value this book will have for salespeople is that in the discussions of the customers need for value, Miller guides the reader step by step how to provide strategic help for their customers and deliver new and different forms of value.

best of the rest

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Finance & Economics

best in category ➻ False Economy: A Surprising Economic History of the World by Alan Beattie, Riverhead Books, 321 pages, $26.95 | Alan Beattie not only provides engrossing snapshots of mankind’s economic history; he demonstrates how naturally fragile economies are—and continue to be—and how they are guided by the choices we make, not by some invisible hand. It’s a great lesson in these uncertain times that we are—or at least can be—in control of our own economic future.

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Entrepreneurship & Small Business





best in category ➻ Escape from Cubicle Nation: From Corporate Prisoner to Thriving Entrepreneur by Pamela Slim, Portfolio, 340 pages, $25.95 | “Should I go solo?” The collapse of companies and careers over the last year has many asking themselves exactly that question. It’s the avalanche of concerns that follow like “What would I do?” to “Do I have enough money?” that stop most. The power of Escape from Cubicle Nation is that it removes all the roadblocks to saying “Yes.”

best of the rest

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Biographies & Narratives

best in category ➻ The Match King: Ivar Kreuger, the Financial Genius Behind a Century of Wall Street Scandals by Frank Partnoy, PublicAffairs, 272 pages, $26.95 | In The Match King, Frank Partnoy brings Ivar Krueger, the match king, and exciting (though terrifying) time to life. We learn how he cornered the market on matches in his native Sweden and using “creative” accounting was able to ride that success to riches beyond belief until the market collapsed and so did his house of cards. So brilliant is Partnoy’s portrayal that I wanted to keep reading the book even as I walked to my car from the office at night. A great story, told well—there is nothing better.

best of the rest

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Current Interest

best in category ➻ Too Big to Fail: The Inside Story of How Wall Street and Washington Fought to Save the Financial System—And Themselves by Andrew Ross Sorkin, Viking Books, 624 pages, $32.95 | How could we not pick a book on the financial crisis to lead the Current Interest category this year? And if we are going to pick a book on it, how could it not be this one? Too Big To Fail is the definitive book on the events leading up to, as well as on the characters involved in, the financial meltdown. In his reporting, Andrew Ross Sorkin has managed to weave together an entertaining narrative and recreate a nearly unbelievable sequence of events on Wall Street and in Washington—one that will likely be referenced as long as the topic is studied.

best of the rest

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Personal Development

best in category ➻ Power of 2: How to Make the Most of Your Partnerships at Work and in Life by Rodd Wagner & Gale Muller, Ph.D., Gallup Press, 243 pages, $24.95 | Wagner and Muller contend that it is a myth, or a rarity at least, that the best work happens when one heroic person who is somehow more superiorly gifted than average wrestles an insurmountable task and wins. Instead, Power of 2 proposes that a great partnership can more reliably produce transcendent work by capitalizing on the strengths of both persons engaged in the venture. It’s not a surprise then that Power of 2 was published by Gallup Press, the experts on strengths theory, and it is a pleasure to read a book that encourages collaboration based on strong research and communicated through enjoyable stories, particularly at time when many people are more often encouraged to “look out for #1.”

best of the rest

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Innovation & Creativity

best in category ➻ The Design of Business: Why Design Thinking Is the Next Competitive Advantage by Roger L. Martin, Harvard Business Press, 191 pages, $26.95 | Design thinking is a popular trend in innovation thought this year and a number of good books submitted to this category offer various and useful treatments. The Design of Business by Roger Martin lays out the most applicable system to integrating design thinking into an organization or applying it to a singular problem. Martin also shows just how design thinking can reside harmoniously with more analytical or quantitative approach to strategy. Using memorable metaphors, Martin brings his professorial experience to the topic teaching the uninitiated and the theorist alike this new way of problem solving.

best of the rest

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Big Ideas

best in category ➻ What Would Google Do? by Jeff Jarvis, HarperBusiness, 257 pages, $26.99 | Don’t be confused. This book is not about Google. Jarvis is delivering the virtues of clickable, linkable, searchable, and transparent using the Internet powerhouse as the metaphor. The thought experiments in the final third of the book (Google Cola, Google Capital, and The United States of Google to name a few) make concrete the ways in which the web is quickly changing what we expect from those who serve us.

best of the rest

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