First and foremost, this is a sales book. While it’s intended to be educational, it’s main goal is to advertise the EOS system, which means there are lots of fluffy stories of how so-and-so company made more money after implementing these strategies.

Secondly, most of these strategies are common sense strategies with fancy names like “L 10’s” (for a problem solving meeting) “scorecards” (measuring how the business is going) “people analyzer” (pretty much what it sounds like). Truthfully, I agree with many of the strategies this book recommends, but I feel the need to acknowledge that of many of these points are simple strategies many business likely used prior to this system existing, with buzzword names (which help with systems sales).

Finally, the strategies presented in this book feel mechanical and overly optimistic. Many strategies would be great in a perfect world and there is little account for human emotion and human error. For example, they recommend saying “tangent” or “rabbit” when a meeting is getting off track, but I feel that could be disrespectful and disregard the importance of what someone might be sharing. Or stating that using L 10’s will allow them to solve issues “once and for all” without mentioning that with human error, some issues might return before the best solution is found. The strategies are designed to make the business function like a machine, which can be beneficial for systematic problem solving and growth, but I wish there was more addressed on how to also kindly acknowledge the work of your human employees in the system and that even with this system, errors and imperfections will exist.

1.5 stars. I’m sure there are better business system books out there.