Customer Reviews

Who's Got Your Back: The Breakthrough Program to Build Deep, Trusting Relationships That Create Success--and Won't Let You Fail

5 star:		(82)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book was o.k. and all in all worth reading. However to me, the good concept could have probably been conveyed fully in twenty pages or so. The concept is to form a personal board of directors/advisors, not necessarily family or friends but people you can trust to give you good and honest advice and direction, and that this group can change over time. Not an exactly new concept but a good one. The previous book, Never Eat Alone, had a similarly basic concept--the value of networking--but for me, the elaboration, illustrations and anecdotes in that book were more valuable.

I usually hate this kind of book. By page 20, the blinding insight is delivered and then the next 200 pages just repeat it. Not here. Keith draws you in quickly but then keeps deepening his points. By page 205, I was more absorbed than I was at page 20. (The profiles of various types of people whose personal glass ceilings get in their way (section 3) was priceless. I re-read it three times, then tried fitting everyone I know into one or more of them.)

Keith uses an interesting device to keep the reader engaged: he makes you complicit in his own mentoring or "lifeline" process, as he calls it. Far from lecturing, he is often, and very appealingly, an imperfect student of his own insights. Severals times I found myself saying "Keith, you are doing it again...". Just as his treasured lifeline people must do. This quirk really makes his point and lets the reader immediately relate to the value of what he suggests.

I read this book at an interesting time: finding myself at a personal plateau with no obvious mentors and, as well, being asked to mentor someone whom I had no clue how to help. This book was very provocative for me on both fronts.

Why you should read this book:

1) The Four Mindsets: Intimacy, Generosity, Vulnerability, Candor
This follows up on the mindsets Ferrazzi explored in his first book, Never Eat Alone. Building relationships, and repairing relationships, using these mindsets will greatly enhance and fuel all types of relationships, and increase your chances of maintaining strong, successful alliances. These four mindsets are core to building trust.

2) Building a Dream Team: We all have dreams, and we need strong relationships to help us realize those dreams. Once we've accepted that conducting our relationships through the lens of the four mindsets contributes to our success, building a dream team to help us fuel our success is the next logical step. Ferrazzi outlines nine steps to building a dream team. Not sure if the steps work or not, since Ferrazzi doesn't present hardcore evidence that actual, real live individuals have used these steps successfully, but Ferrazzi's nine steps includes many practical and tactical ideas that logically should work, and seem worth trying.

3) Holding Each Member Accountable: Without accountability in the group and among individuals, teams become lazy, complacent, loose focus, and derail. Ferrazzi does a nice job of explaining safe ways to implement accountability measures into your organizational, or dream, teams.

What I Didn't Like About This Book:

As was the standard in Never Eat Alone, Ferrazzi does lots of name dropping. In Who's Got Your Back, my eyes again glassed over with all the name-dropping. Ferrazzi's message would have been much stronger and clearer without all the lip service.

The concepts of team, accountability and having the powerful wind of strong relationships behind your back are definitely essential. Why I gave this a three was all of the name dropping, which makes Ferrazzi come off as insecure in his own skin. It's as though he's constantly trying to prove his self worth which for me takes away from his credibility on this particular subject. Also I would like to see some unique research that backs up these concepts to give them more potency rather than just being based on the author's own ideas. Nonetheless it's good common sense if you can get over the constant "aren't I important" name dropping --- it goes against many themes presented in the book.

Following on the heels of the spectacularly successful and useful "Never Eat Alone," Keith Ferrazzi has put out what he has called during his tour "the book I should have written first."

Maybe it is, maybe it isn't, but the editorial finesse of Tal Raz is missing, and, frankly, if I hear one more story about his other-side-of-the-tracks working class background in Latrobe I think I just might scream. Get over yourself, Keith. You've made it. Move on and let's get some business done.

The concept, however, is good, and well executed, even if in too many words. Some of the fundamental approaches to assembling a 'personal board of directors' have been discussed elsewhere and better, but Ferrazzi does pull together several of these varying approaches.

The additional workbooks available on Ferrazzi's web site make the ideas come alive, and the properly motivated reader can get right to work implementing the ideas.

But the middle third of the book is dreadfully slow and tedious, and it is nowhere near the breezy read "Never Eat Alone" is.

Keith may have some useful things to share,however one has to take the hype with a pinch of salt.There are people who are being 'incentivized' by Keith's marketing machinery,to post an amazon review.

I think the book launch is a little overdone. There are many authors with gem of insights in their books,without going through the tremendous hype machine. Also there are many authors who have nothing insightful to say but focus mostly on hype machine.

I guess Keith falls in the middle.He may have some interesting things to share but the book does not merit the artificial launch hype.

I like Keith for many things.But this marketing hype is unnecessary.It can create a favorable bias about a book,which may or maynot be true.
Best is,if the book emerges favorable on its own.

There are plenty of marketing authors in America doing this.
I wish they can reduce it and start respecting the real and unbiased readers discretion.

In "who's got your back" Keith Ferrazzi hits a nerve- even the most successful people in business have to admit - we have friends and family who love us but they don't understand our business - and we have business relationships that we often keep at arm's length. Keith provides an alternative - opening up and creating "instant intimacy." You may first recoil at the notion, but read on. He makes a powerful point - that when we open up, and ask people we trust and respect for candor and clarity, we win. If we don't we'll miss out on the opportunity to grow and achieve a far greater level of success. As an executive coach I will recommend this to clients and friends. A compelling read. Suzanne Bates [...]

In his latest work Kieth builds on the concepts of Never Eat Alone and provides guidance on nurturing authenticity into intimacy. Leveraging concepts Napoleon Hill's Mastermind Group, Ferrazzi goes several steps further to provide methods for creating deep relationships in an increasingly shallow society. Who's Got Your Back is an excellent read for any entrepreneur looking to work with and through others for mutual success.

I read the predecessor to this book, "Never Eat Alone", in my first years of college. It caused a complete paradigm shift that affected every future part of my life. I'm happy to say that "Who's Got Your Back" is a worthy follow-up from the same author. I love how, like in his first book, Ferrazi outlines specific action items that have worked for him and how you can implement them in your own life.

While not every action he recommends is suitable for every person, most are, and as in his first book I get the sense that it is a real, warm, caring friend who is writing this and not your typical motivational guru.

In "Who's Got Your Back", Ferrazi lays out a much more systematic approach to building a specific type of relationship, which can be described as close friends who both love you and hold you accountable. Ferrazi refers to them as 'lifeline relationships' or your 'dream team'. In short, "Who's Got Your Back" is a more focused, more systematic book than "Never Eat Alone".

Personally, I am not a big fan of the new 'formula-based' approach. I believe in having a collection of anecdotes and tips that speak to the reader, but don't try to force him into a single way of thinking.

"Never Eat Alone" will always occupy a space in my heart because I had read it first and "Who's Got Your Back" will not replace it. Still, to Ferrazi's credit, there is enough new, useful and inspiring content in his new book that I can recommend it to people who have never read "Never Eat Alone".

An especially interesting read from a viewpoint of evolution from Keith Ferrazzi's last book ("Never Eat Alone") in which he makes a strong case for building and actively maintaining relationships as a driver of success in your professional and personal lives. Whereas the first book focused on "building out your network", the author now finds himself arguing for deeper and more engaged relationships: "the inner circle". The four themes of intimacy, generosity, vulnerability and candor are continued from "Never Eat Alone", but the emphasis is placed on accountability and the mechanics of maintain the "inner circle".

As with the last book, I did not agree with the author on every point, but still very much enjoyed the read. The book strikes a nice balance between the motivation and the tactical details on how to get started. I've put several of authors' suggestions into practice and I am already enjoying their results.

Great book.