Last year, I made a goal of reading 6 “business books.” Here is the list:
2. Rework
4. 7 Habits of Highly Successful People
I was vocal about my 2017 goal, so everyone around me would hold me accountable. Naturally, a few colleagues have asked about my reading goals for 2018. The short answer is that I don’t have a reading goal.
My primary goal was to read 6 business books. A secondary part of that was to write about these books as part of our Paradigm Learning blog. I was so focused on reading, highlighting, taking notes, having discussions, and writing blogs on these books that I ignored another part of my life.
During 2017, I stumbled into the world of real estate investing and became a landlord. (I had planned to buy one house and sell the other. I ended up buying a house and renting out the first one.) So, in 2018, I’m going to read an undefined number of real estate books. Yes, I realize I’m doing this backwards.
Imagine my surprise as I was reading, highlighting, and taking notes in The Book on Rental Property Investing by Brandon Turner when I came across this sentence, “Understanding how your business makes money is imperative in helping it make more.” And just like that, I realized my Paradigm Learning world and real estate world are not two separate worlds at all.
Whether it’s construction, real estate, oil & gas, media, transportation, medical manufacturing, or any other business, every employee should understand how their company generates revenue, how assets move through the organization, and how much money ends up in the bottom line, so they can drive results. And most don’t know these things, according to Inc. Magazine.
What can employees do to learn more?
• Attend company financial meetings
• Ask questions when you don’t understand something
• Read books and articles
• Participate in training
Get started by testing your financial literacy here.
