The 15 Professional and Individual Growth Laws by John C. Maxwell
“The 15 Invaluable Laws of Growth: Live Them and Reach Your Potential” by John C. Maxwell offers some really good principles for business professionals. This book might be one of his best books so far.
What is this book about?
In this book John C. Maxwell offers 15 ways to think about growth and plan your growth and development. The book offers 15 pretty simple, actionable and straightforward advices and ways to act now and start working on your growth in personal live and in business.
The single most important advice you can pick up from this book is that growth does not happen by accident but there are 15 well-defined and elaborated ways on how you can take action now and start working on developing yourself and your business or career.
Here is a short summary of the first 15 laws of growth:
1. Law of Intentionality
Growth will never happen on its own. Growth requires intention from you – building a strong intention will open the path for your development.
2. Law of Awareness
In order to grow successfully you need to be honest with yourself and know yourself. Being aware of where you are and where you can go is a prerequisite for sustainable growth.
3. Law of the Mirror
Based on the law of the mirror you need to evaluate yourself and identify the potential value in yourself and start building it by adding more value to your current self
4. Law of Reflection
The law of reflection states that at some point you need to pause so the growth can catch up with you. These are times when you need to pause and step back and evaluate your current situation before moving forward.
5. Law of Consistency
Consistency is one of the top drivers for successful and sustainable growth. Having a good plan and vision is important but being consistent is what will keep moving you in the right direction. As the book states the motivation gets you going but the discipline keeps you growing.
In addition to the 5 laws of growth described above the book also introduces the next 10 principles:
6. Law of Environment – Growth thrives in conducive surroundings
7. Law of Design – Developing your strategy to reach the full growth potential
8. Law of Pain – Managing and handling bad experience in a good way can lead to growth
9. Law of Ladder – The growth of your personal character will determine the potential of your personal growth
10. Law of the Rubber Band – Your growth will stop once you lose the focus of where you currently are and where you should be
11. Law of Tradeoffs – The reality is that you need to give up something at some point in order to keep growing
12. Law of Curiosity – Being curious, discovering, learning and asking why stimulates your growth
13. Law of Modeling – You need to have your role models and mentors to motivate and drive your growth
14. Law of Expansion – Your growth will always increase your capacity further
15. Law of Contribution – The ability to grow yourself gives you the ability and opportunity to grow others