The Big Moo: Stop Trying to be Perfect and Start Being Remarkable [Hardcover]

Godin: This is a book about how and why to grow. It's not a book of facts or logical reasoning. Instead of lecturing you about how important and wonderful it is to do scary, brave, and remarkable things, [this book] paints a very different picture for you. My colleagues and I are intent on slipping some subversive ideas into your subconscious...ideas that will help you dream bigger dreams (though they might cost you some sleep as well). We believe one way to get past [what we call] the growth paradox is to avoid addressing it head-on. Instead of warning you about the dangers of stagnation, or promising you benefits of growth, we've decided to tell you some exemplary stories instead. Stories that are easy to read, memorable, and, most important, useful parables for putting growth to work in your own organization.

Q: What's the "growth paradox"?

Godin: Most organizations are paralyzed, stuck in a rut, staring at the growth paradox. On one hand, they understand all the good things that will come with growth. On the other, they're afraid, petrified that growth means change, change means risk, and risk could mean death. Nobody wants to screw up and ruin a good thing, so the organization just sits there, motionless.

Q: Individual contributions by your 33 colleagues aren't credited. Pretty unusual, perhaps even remarkable. You identify them. Why not credit them?

Godin: We did it because it makes it easier to read the book as a whole, to avoid being interrupted by the noise your brain makes as it shifts gears from one voice to another. That and it lets you guess who wrote what.

Those who have read any of Godin's earlier works already know that his thinking is highly unconventional as he relentlessly asks conventional questions such as Why? Why not? Are you sure? How do you know? What if? Have you thought about...? He delights to churning up waves atop gray matter. Heaven knows, he has opinions of his own. Also opinions about those opinions. However, to me, his greatest value as a thinker is his role as what I call a "provocateur of the intellect." That is to say, most of his best ideas focus on how to help others to formulate their own best ideas.

What we have in this volume is a synthesis but NOT a homogenization of what 33 business thinkers have to say in response to two questions:

1. If being remarkable is the only way to grow, how to become remarkable?

2. If the only barrier to being remarkable is one's ability to persuade associates to make it happen, how to do that?

It would be inaccurate to say that the responses are "all over the map" because, in fact, there is no "map." Within the responses, however, are what can correctly be viewed as time capsules of intellectual stimulation. Their impact will vary from one reader to the next. For me, some had significant impact; others none whatsoever.

When we first see a purple cow, it is remarkable. But after seeing hundreds....

What is remarkable this morning is merely familiar tomorrow (or this afternoon) and ho-hum thereafter. According to Godin, "A big moo is an extreme purple cow, the remarkable innovation that completely changes the game....Yes, a purple cow is what you need, but the big moo goes a step further. In order to grow [whatever] at the pace the markets demand, you and your colleagues must find the big moo, the insight that is so astounding that people can't help but remark on it." I agree, while presuming to suggest that the process of "remarkability" proceeds at a high rate of speed. To repeat, what is remarkable this morning is merely familiar tomorrow (or this afternoon) and ho-hum thereafter.

Ultimately and inevitably, the value of what Godin and his colleagues offer in this book will be determined entirely by the value of the ideas which they generate in the conscious and, more importantly, the unconscious mind of each reader.