Life Balance: How to Convert Professional Success into Personal Happiness (Ultimate Consultant

274 Pages·2003·0.8 MB·English

by  Alan Weiss

01Weiss7--FM 2/27/03 12:38 AM Page iii
LIFE BALANCE
How to Convert
Professional Success
into
Personal Happiness
Powerful Techniques
for the Successful Practitioner
ALAN WEISS, Ph.D.
Author, The Ultimate Consultant
The U L T I M A T E
C O N S U L T A N T
Series
01Weiss7--FM 2/27/03 12:38 AM Page i
01Weiss7--FM 2/27/03 12:38 AM Page i
LIFE BALANCE
How to Convert
Professional Success
into
Personal Happiness
01Weiss7--FM 2/27/03 12:38 AM Page ii
01Weiss7--FM 2/27/03 12:38 AM Page iii
LIFE BALANCE
How to Convert
Professional Success
into
Personal Happiness
Powerful Techniques
for the Successful Practitioner
ALAN WEISS, Ph.D.
Author, The Ultimate Consultant
The U L T I M A T E
C O N S U L T A N T
Series
01Weiss7--FM 2/27/03 12:38 AM Page iv
Published by Jossey-Bass/Pfeiffer
A Wiley Imprint
989 Market Street, San Francisco, CA 94103-1741 www.pfeiffer.com
ISBN: 0-7879-5509-4
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Weiss, Alan, (date)
Life balance : how to convert professional success into personal happiness / by Alan Weiss.
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN 0-7879-5509-4 (alk. paper)
1. Psychology, Industrial. 2. Self-actualization (Psychology) 3. Life skills. 4. Success in business.
I. Title: How to convert professional success into personal happiness. II. Title.
HF5548.8 .W4337 2003
158—dc21
2002154426
Copyright © 2003 by Alan Weiss
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any
form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise,
except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either
the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate
per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc., 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, 978-
750-8400, fax [phone], or on the web at www.copyright.com. Requests to the Publisher for per-
mission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River
Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, [phone], fax [phone], e-mail:
01Weiss7--FM 2/27/03 12:38 AM Page v
In fond memory to
Mrs. Grouthuesen, Mrs. Stephenour, Mrs. Fleming,
Miss Mandelkern, Mrs. O’Brien, Mrs. Bowman, Miss Barratini,
Mrs. Lipert, Mrs. Johnson, and Mr. Heitman—
my grammar school teachers.
I still remember every name and every personality.
I can’t say that about my high school, college, or graduate instructors.
That’s because I learned more from those I named than I ever suspected,
and to this day I continue to put it to good use.
01Weiss7--FM 2/27/03 12:38 AM Page vi
A l s o b y A L A N W E I S S
Books
The Ultimate Consultant Series:
Great Consulting Challenges and How to Surmount Them (2003)
Process Consulting (2002)
How to Acquire Clients (2002)
Value-Based Fees: How to Charge—and Get—What You’re Worth (2002)
How to Establish a Unique Brand in the Consulting Profession (2001)
The Ultimate Consultant (2001)
Organizational Consulting (2003)
How to Sell New Business and Expand Existing Business (2002)
Getting Started in Consulting (2000)
The Unofficial Guide to Power Management (2000)
How to Market, Establish a Brand, and Sell Professional Services (2000)
Good Enough Isn’t Enough (1999)
How to Write a Proposal That’s Accepted Every Time (1999)
Money Talks (1998)
Million Dollar Consulting (1992; rev. ed. 1998, 2002)
Our Emperors Have No Clothes (1995)
Best Laid Plans (1991)
Managing for Peak Performance (1990)
The Innovation Formula (with Mike Robert, 1988)
Booklets
How to Maximize Fees
Raising the Bar
Leadership Every Day
Doing Well by Doing Right
Rejoicing in Diversity
Audiocassettes
Peak Performance
The Consultant’s Treasury
®
The Odd Couple
Winning the Race to the Market
Videos
Stories I Could Never Tell: Alan Weiss Live and Uncensored
Alan Weiss on Marketing
Alan Weiss on Product Development
Newsletters
Balancing Act: Blending Life, Work, and Relationships (electronic)
The Consultant’s Craft
What’s Working in Consulting (editor)
01Weiss7--FM 2/27/03 12:38 AM Page vii
About the Author
lan Weiss began his own consulting firm, Summit
AConsulting Group, Inc., out of his home in 1985 after
being fired by a boss with whom he shared a mutual antipathy.
Today, he still works out of his home, having traveled to fifty-
one countries and forty-nine states, published twenty-one books
and over five hundred articles, and consulted with some of the
great organizations in the world, developing a seven-figure
practice in the process.
His clients have included Merck, Hewlett-Packard, Feder-
al Reserve Bank, State Street Corp., Fleet Bank, Coldwell Banker,
Merrill Lynch, American Press Institute, Chase, Mercedes-Benz,
GE, American Institute of Architects, British Standards Institute,
and over three hundred similar organizations. He delivers fifty
keynote speeches a year and is one of the stars of the lecture cir-
cuit. He appears frequently in the media to discuss issues per-
taining to productivity and performance and has been featured
in teleconferences, video conferences, and Internet conferences.
His Ph.D. is in organizational psychology, and he has
served as a visiting faculty member at Case Western Reserve,
St. John’s, Tufts, and half a dozen other major universities. He
currently holds an appointment as adjunct professor at the
Graduate School of Business at the University of Rhode
Island, where he teaches a highly popular course on advanced
vii
01Weiss7--FM 2/27/03 12:38 AM Page viii
consulting skills. His books have been translated into German, Italian, Span-
ish, and Chinese.
The New York Post has called him “one of the most highly respected inde-
pendent consultants in the country,” and Success Magazine, in an editorial devot-
ed to his work, cited him as “a worldwide expert in executive education.”
Dr. Weiss resides with his wife of thirty-four years, Maria, in East Green-
wich, RI.
viii About the Author