Love Is Just Damn Good Business with Steve Farber

“I’ve been in the business of leadership development for 30 years, and it became increasingly evident to me that love is the foundation of great leadership,” says Steve Farber. He isn’t talking a touchy-feely notion of love, but the competitive advantage you can have when you love what you do in the service of people who love what you do. This book is about dispelling the myth that love and business are mutually exclusive. Farber isn’t talking about love as a sentiment, but as a discipline: love of the cause, values, people, customers, products, and services.

The best way to put this philosophy into action is to ask yourself what you would do differently if you really loved your employees and your customers. That starts the conversation and leads to questions about policies for employees and customers. For example, does your customer service policy really make it easy for customers to do business with you? Does the way you handle customer returns say you love that customer? Or not? Think about what you should be doing differently. It all comes down to actions, not words. Farber guarantees that if you ask the right questions, you’ll unleash the combined expertise of your people and help them be inspired to implement necessary changes.

Farber discusses how to lay the groundwork for a thriving, competitive enterprise. When love is part of your organization’s framework and operationalized in its culture, employees and customers feel genuinely valued. Employees who are passionate about the work that they do are more loyal, innovative, creative, and inspired—and that translates to great customer experience. They don’t serve others out of obligation, but because of a genuine desire to improve.

Farber’s challenge is for “everyone to bring the word love into the forefront. If we consciously put love out there as the objective, then it changes everything we are trying to do. We’ve used words like passion and engagement, but if you call it love, aspirations are raised to a new level and new ways of doing things are identified.”

For more information about Steve Farber, visit www.SteveFarber.com