Seth Godin

• Business
• Management

It expands on the differences between leaders and managers and the fact that in today’s modern world we are all potential leaders.

The old feudal leadership model was propagated around a leader (or King) surrounded by “YES” men. Today we are surrounded by people who like to make up their own minds.

To become leaders of the new tribes we need to be heretics. Modern day heretics are people who are willing to change the status quo and have realised that safe can no longer be classed as secure.

The thing that stops most people form becoming leaders is fear, people just don’t like change. They will work in a business and even though it may be going bankrupt they refuse to leave because they wish to maintain the status quo.

We are told that businesses such as the record industry are going to fail if they refuse to adopt new methods (Believing they can maintain the status quo of their old distribution models).

He coins the term sheepwalking, “the concept of hiring people who have been raised to be obedient, giving them brain dead jobs and enough fear in an effort to keep them in line”. Leaders of the new tribes have a responsibility to break out of the sheepwalking mode!

The tribe is defined as “a group of people connected to a leader and connected to an idea”.

The size of the tribe can vary but a small tribe is not necessarily a bad thing.  The people we exclude from our group can add as much to its strength as the people we include as a small tribe can provide exclusivity.

“If you want to sell just one product you may get away with an overnight success but if you wish customers to return you need to provide value”.  The tribe theme is very much about niches and catering for our specific segment of the market.

We are told that it is not just our right but our obligation to become leaders of a tribe.

Senator Bill Bradley’s definition of a movement is having three elements: “1. A Narrative, 2. A connection, 3. Something to Do”.  The book tells us that too often organizations concentrate only on the third.

YES

• Hard Back
• Paper Back
• Audio book
• Audio Download

• Business
• Marketing

The meatball in the title is the previous mass marketing of everyday products to people. The sundae (with its various options for additions) is just like the new marketing opportunities (blogs etc).

Old style marketers think they can just bolt on the new marketing to the old products, hence the disjointed image of a meatball with a sundae on top.

He is not advocating against selling average products to average people he is just indicating that this will not provide enough growth.

Previous marketing was about suppliers capitalizing on the products they already had, this is not enough now and synchronizing the product with the marketing (and our client’s requirements) is the way ahead.

He uses the comparison of a book publisher (who is always seeking new readers for new writers) and a magazine editor (who is seeking new articles for his existing readers) to bring home one of the differences between old and new marketing.

The main body of the book is split into 14 current trends (trends that we must monitor if we wish to continue to grow as an organization).

YES

• Hard Back 
• Paper Back
• Audio book
• Audio Download