Customer Reviews

The Good Person Guidebook: Transforming Your Personal Life

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Inspirational books often tend to wander, appealing to the imagination more than to the logical mind. Not so with Richard Bayer's The Good Person's Guidebook. On the first page, he makes it clear that the good person is "a person of moral excellence, but not in vacuum." Being good does not mean standing on a pedestal for passersby to admire. It means acting morally and responsibly in interactions with others.
The author describes his writing as inspired by religious principles and applicable to the business world. People not driven by religious beliefs or immersed in business will still find this book applicable to their daily lives.
Rather than simply musing about being good, Beyer presents an organized and well reasoned approach. His book is divided into three sections consisting of ways to consider living ethically, deciding what kind person to be and how to implement ethical choices in daily life.
His Seven Stories exercise helps make sense of your life so far. His Fifteen Year and Forty Year Visions offer a framework for charting your future.
I have found that readers looking for inspiration often do not want to sift through page after page of reflections in search of suggestions on ways to handle a particular life difficulty. They like brief concise treatments. Bayer provides these along with frequent suggestions for practical applications. His comprehensive table of contents and index make it easy for the reader to find a particular topic of interest.
In these days of reckless self indulgence, The Good Person Guidebook stands as a compass for readers looking to reorient their lives and live in a meaningful way.

Joseph G. Langen, Author of Commonsense Wisdom for Everyday Life.

When I received this book to review, I wasn't one hundred percent sure I was going to enjoy it. Typically "self-help" books are long on personal stories and short on advice. But The Good Person Guidebook was not what I was expecting; it was much more.

This book is divided into three main sections:
--A Perspective on Ethics
--Virtue: What type of person should I be
--Guidelines: what must we do

I learned how to make ethical decisions, respect human dignity and how to make long-standing goals. It clarifies good business practices versus bad business practices and helps to steer you in the direction of making the right business decisions.

Each new chapter begins with a famous quote, and because I love to collect quotes, this endeared me to the author. Also, at the end of each chapter you will find questions to consider and questions for group discussions. These are helpful if the book is being used in a business training session. I also enjoyed reading The Golden Rules from many different religions.

If you enjoy reading and learning about ethics and morality, especially with how they relate to business, then this is the book for you. Slightly larger than a trade paperback, it is easy to carry with you and read on the go.

First off I'd just like to thank Richard Bayer for writing this, it doesn't necessarily take a genius to understand these principles which most are embedded within us from birth...but hey I had to read the book to really get it sooo...

I'm not gonna bore you with some insightful review or anything just give you my experience.

I'm a 24 year old regular guy whom had a pretty mundane "going nowhere" kind of life. I've read other books but never finished them from authors like Dr. Laura or some other psychological guru. But Richard really puts it point blank right in your face, factually which I liked. The chapters were quick and easy to comprehend.

Before reading the book I had a 9-5 office job (which I'm just about to leave for something that really drives me), was hanging out the same old bars with the same old friends doing the same old thing day after day & weekend after weekend. Their didn't seem to be any sort of enjoyment or purpose in life. I couldn't maintain relationships, I had no hobbies, and my moral system was didn't make me feel like I had any worth.

Throughout reading this book I discovered I was starting to take on some of the positive moralistic principles not by a total conscious decision, most of the time they just started coming naturally.

So since finishing reading it which has been about 6 months ago I have an incredible life that is balanced in family, friends, hobbies, work, spiritual and emotional aspects. I feel for the first time in my life like I am doing what I always should be and love it!

I would recommend this book to anyone that just feels kind of lost or down in the dumps or even someone that feels like they don't get the respect they want or are always finding themselves stuck in a bad situation.

If you've ever wished that you could have your own personal career coach, this Five O'Clock Club book for you. Sized (5" x 7") to fit into a pocket or purse, this handy guide is especially good for business-oriented people. Each chapter is chock full of inspirational, thought-provoking quotes, tables, and group discussion questions. I can envision an entire office staff choosing this book to read and work through as a group for the betterment of all.

It's divided into three parts: 1. A Perspective on Ethics, 2. Virtue: What Type of Person Should I Be? and 3. What Must We Do (Ethical Principles for Action). There are thirty-three short chapters, written so as to easily be picked up and put down. The chapter that I feel could be most effective is How to Terminate Employees While Respecting Human Dignity. Actual words are given to help managers make this dreaded task doable. This is a worthwhile self-help book.

Let's face it... For all the talk of ethics and responsibility these days, there's never a day goes by without some new story of executive X or celebrity Y doing something that reeks of greed, selfishness, or a "me first" attitude. That doesn't even begin to cover all the lapses of non-headliners, the Joe Six-Packs, who find themselves in less-than-desirable situations due to choices they've compromised on along the way. The Good Person Guidebook: Transforming Your Personal Life By Dr. Richard Bayer is a series of relatively short essays on how to be an ethical person in today's workplace, but the lessons apply to both the marketplace and the personal home front.

Contents:
Part 1 - A Perspective on Ethics: Ethics in the Information Age - The Puritan Work Ethic and Beyond; Our Social Nature; Law vs. Ethics - The Limits of Law; How to Overcome Suffering - Especially in Your Career; Humility and Success; Compassion; Hope! What Is It? What Good Is It? Who Needs It?; Generosity in Deed - The Virtue of Thrift; The Search for Truth - or Not: The Problem with Secularism; Cheated by Writing a Blank Check! - To Science; What Is America All About? A Perspective from "America the Beautiful"; How to Make Ethical Decisions in Business; Good Ethics Is Serious Business - Objections and Answers

Part 2 - What Type of Person Should I Be?: Why Be Moral?; Virtue in Your Personal Life - The Meaning of Love; Raising Children Well (Not as Complex as It Seems); Raising Children with Prudence; On Gratitude; Violence; Virtue in Your Work Life - What Makes a Meaningful Work Life?; One Economy "Under God"?; Avoiding Shipwreck: Ethics and Entrepreneurship; Human Capital - The Key to Our Future; Five O'Clock Clubbers Talk about Their Good Habits; Maintaining Focus

Part 3 - Guidelines - What Must We Do (Ethical Principles for Action): Freedom, License, and a Way Out; Getting Where You Are Going - The Only Way to Go!; Targeting - The Truth Is Out There; Be on Track - and the Right Track - A Reminder from Islam; An Approach to New Year's Resolutions; Is My Potential Employer Ethical?; When to Blow the Whistle; How to Terminate Employees While Respecting Human Dignity

Appendixes: The Seven Stories Exercise; Analyzing Your Seven Stories; Your Fifteen-Year Vision and Your Forty-Year Vision; Your Fifteen and Forty-Year Vision Worksheet

Index; About the Author; Five O'Clock Club Books; About the Five O'Clock Club; Fruytagie Wall Canvas

Dr. Bayer runs a company called The Five O'Clock Club, the goal of which is to develop good, moral, and ethical people who can then apply those principles to their lives in the corporate world and with the larger community as a whole. His book starts out with defining what is meant by "ethics", and what it means to be a "good" person. Don't assume that's an easy answer. If it was so easy, would we be in the trouble we're in as a society right now? The second part of the book then works to apply those principles to your core person, into the main areas of your life. Finally, part 3 gets into application. Now that we know all this (and have hopefully internalized and incorporated it into our being), what do we do with it? What happens when the company you work for is making decisions that breach your ethical standards? Do you look the other way and claim everyone else was doing it or you had no choice? Or do you take a stand, refuse to compromise on your principles, knowing the potential short term loss and pain will be far outweighed by the gains and peace of mind that comes from knowing you did the right thing?

These are deep questions with no pat answers, but Dr. Bayer does a good job in bringing them down to earth in a more concrete sense. You obviously can't read these 300 pages in one sitting, and then go out into the world, an enlightened ethical person ready to do all this is right. It takes work... I'd recommend you take a chapter or two each morning or night, read it slowly, and contemplate the ramifications of what is being said. The first part won't necessarily have you going out with a list of "do A, B, and C today", as you need to build the foundation before you can add the walls and furnishings. But if you're dissatisfied as to what and where you're going with yourself, starting here would be a good path to follow...