In the early days of their business journey, Brian and Mary Jo Sullivan were not avid readers. However, in their mid-twenties, they discovered the joys of reading for both fun and personal development. Over time, this passion grew into a commitment to read personal and professional development books, which they found to be incredibly impactful. Inspired by the benefits they gained, they decided to share this experience with their team by creating a recommended reading list in the office.

Recommended Reading List

“I wasn’t an avid reader until my mid-twenties when I learned the joys of reading for fun, which eventually led to reading personal and professional development books. The impact that the books I read had on me was incredibly valuable, so we decided to have a recommended reading list in the office. To further support the list and emphasize the value of reading, we made all books on the list free to our team members. They could take any book they wanted, whenever they wanted, as long as they committed to reading it. We also asked for suggestions for the recommended reading list so that we could continue to grow the list. As a result, the initial list of around 20 books grew to over 100. Appendix D, at the back of this book, has three of our recommended reading lists: one for books on business, one for books on families, and one for faith.

The presence of this list and the conversations that resulted were insightful in so many ways. We included a question on our performance reviews to determine how many books people read each year and how many of those were from the list. It was not surprising at all that the people who read the most books from the list were also the ones growing the most personally and professionally. It was similarly curious to me how people would wonder why they weren’t advancing as professionals, yet they weren’t doing something as simple as reading books provided for free. We had some people on our team who would read two fiction books per month but wouldn’t read a single development book in a year. We also had team members who wanted to be paid for the time spent reading, and another shared that he didn’t read books on our list but found others similar to them and read those instead. It rarely surprised me to see an employee who didn’t put in minimal effort to read the free books leave the company. Perhaps one day, those people will see the value we provided with those free personal development books.”

By providing free resources for personal development, you can help foster an environment of continuous growth, but it’s up to the individual to take advantage of those resources. Whether it’s reading a book, applying new knowledge, or growing professionally, the choice to invest in oneself ultimately leads to greater opportunities.

For more insights and practical advice on how to grow your business and invest in yourself, be sure to order Entrepreneurial Trinity.