Last week, Scott Martineau, and I spent a couple days in the Bay Area and then we flew out to Cleveland for a day of consulting with Dan Kennedy.  The Bay Area was great, as always.  I love the entrepreneurial vibe that oozes out of San Jose.

Sidebar—a couple funny stories.  First, our car got towed from metered parking when we were seriously no more than 120 seconds overdue.  Those dang tow trucks in downtown San Francisco are Johnny on the Spot.  Our car was towed to an impound yard called “Auto Recall—We Care!”  Whatever.  Second funny story had to do with the dinner Scott ordered at the Village Pub.  Let’s just say that “soft-shelled crab” is nothing like Alaskan crab legs.  When the waiter brought Scott his plate, all he could say was, “Wow!  There’s a mamma crab and a papa crab,” and they were staring right at Scott, waiting for him to dig in.  I don’t think Scott’s recommending soft-shelled crab these days.

Anyway, back to my point.  The long flights to and from Cleveland gave me a chance to read a couple of books: one by Dan Kennedy called Ruthless Management of People and Profits; the other by Michael Gerber called Awakening the Entrepreneur Within.  Dan’s book is a pragmatic, realistic, no-holds-barred approach to managing people to build a profitable venture.  Michael’s book is an idealistic, optimistic, dream-the-impossible approach to building an enduring, world-class organization. 

Both books have so much good in them.  I recommend them both.  But it’s the blending of the two philosophies that I think provides the real power to think big and swing for the fences.  I consider both Dan and Michael to be world-class entrepreneurs.  Both have had a profound influence on me and our company.  And I recommend all entrepreneurs study both of their works.