The Bigs, a story young professionals (& more) can learn from

The Bigs by Ben Carpenter is a hybrid book of sorts.  It’s the story of Carpenter’s career from college to CEO of an investment company.  But more than that it’s the story of the people that he met along the way, both good and bad that taught him things about life.

The aspect of him being CEO of an investment company didn’t interest me personally at first.   Personally, I’ve learned more from bad managers than the good one.  Part of that is because I’ve had very few good managers.  An overview of my two most memorable one:

•  I had a manager who skipped town with key company assets.  The next week, the owner of the company forwarded all of the mail to his address thousands of miles away.
• I had a manager whose hygiene was questionable, speech was poor, breath was bad, had no financial background and poor people skills; yet was in charge of an organization with a million dollar budget.

To be fair it wasn’t until a decade ago that I was a model employee.  However, even in those times when I wasn’t ideal, I was still better than most of my bosses.

What is great about The Bigs is that the story of Carpenter’s career in the financial world is engaging even if you aren’t interested in the stock market.  He keeps the story detailed enough so that you’re interested, but approachable enough to make it work for folks of any business acumen.

The cowboy, Ted, Marble and One Way are just a couple of the characters that we meet in his story.  Some of them teach us lessons for the right reasons and some because of their unintended consequences.   When you read the book you’ll find yourself nodding in agreement that you know a Ted too-and that they really are great.  The story about The Surfer is a great example of luck, perseverance and following your passion-as long as it’s done with nuggets of business sense and two brand names that you’ll certainly know.

The Bigs is billed as a book for students and young professionals and that is correct.  However, the book is a good read for anyone who is trying to figure out their way, become a stronger leader or simply be happy.  Oy, it’s not a happy kumbaya book is it?

It does touch on life, but that’s because of the author’s health scares and how it made him appreciate what was really important.  The Bigs is not laced with patchouli or hemp oil, but it does remind us that life is better when we’re happy.  It also tempers those elements with business sense and practical observations that young professionals can do to assist or guide them.

When I was younger this would’ve been helpful.  However as a mid grade career professional I still learned lots from the book and had some new takeaways.