A few weeks ago, Joe and I met with a co-founder and a producer of an innovative company that produces web videos and campaigns that promote a vision of a world that is more just and sustainable. We’re hoping to bring you interviews with and insights from them in the coming weeks.

In our conversation, the co-founder of the company connected immediately when we spoke about community entrepreneurs. He related the concept to a book that he recommended called Love Is the Killer App by Tim Sanders, who served as Chief Solutions Officer and Leadership Coach at Yahoo. I later picked up a copy of the book and found that sharing such a recommendation is in fact what the book is all about. As the fate of Yahoo is dominating the business news today, I thought I’d share a taste of Sander’s book.

Sanders writes that success in business comes from offering one’s wisdom and network freely to others and being compassionate, which he calls being a “lovecat.” Despite the groovy-sounding term, Sanders makes it clear that he’s not talking about kumbaya and cheesy team-building exercises. He is talking about practical techniques that, he contends, build powerful benefits for those who adopt them and the networks of people they empower and bring together.

Some of what Tim Sanders writes is reminiscent of conservations that Joe and I have had about creating a new vision of prosperity that is consistent with our values. His writing on scarcity and abundance is a good example of this:

“Once, scarcity created value. Today abundance can create value. In the old days, when we traded tangibles such as gold, the less gold that was available, the higher its value. Supply-and-demand ruled. Now the opposite can be true. Abundance creates power. If you have a great idea for running a business, and it is adapted throughout your industry, your idea is more, not less, valuable. Value today derives from an idea that everyone has accepted, and then competition set in to perfect the execution of that idea.”

These ideas are apparent in the open source software ecosystem, which we hope to draw lessons from that can benefit other types of businesses. They also have clear applications as we transform our economy to one in which local food systems assume greater importance and reducing dependence on fossil fuels and dwindling resources becomes a top priority.

Sanders contends that to succeed one should first develop one’s knowledge, then expand one’s network by sharing that knowledge generously, and spread compassion, by providing opportunities to and caring about others. Of course, these practices can’t succeed if one views them in a mercenary way. Sanders writes:

“This bizlove gig is not an act. I am no Machiavelli, painting a clever picture of deception or pretense for selfish ends. If you are a genuine lovecat, you show compassion for people because you like them. You tell others you are committed to their success because you truly want them to be successful. You read as many books as possible and share your knowledge because you want your contacts to be smarter, more informed, more capable. You arrange meetings between your contacts because you genuinely believe they will like each other, even if you gain nothing from the introduction.”

Or if your business is installing raised bed kitchen gardens, when you notice that a customer who is new to the area owns a diesel Jetta, you introduce her to the local biodiesel coop. Not because you’ll get a referral fee if she become their customer, but simply for the sake of sharing useful knowledge with someone whom you value and would like to help as much as possible.

There’s a lot more to learn from this highly readable book. You can also find a brief outline of the book on the bookoutlines wiki (which is a pretty cool idea in itself), as well as an article adapted from the book in Fast Company. Tim Sanders also has a recent blog post that’s worth reading on his decision to use environmentally friendly business supplies.

Although Tim Sanders is no longer with Yahoo, I have to imagine that the spirit of his work at Yahoo was something that resonated to some degree with founder/CEO Jerry Yang and possibly other top executives at the company. While there were surely multiple factors involved in Yahoo’s decision to reject Microsoft’s takeover offer (with money certainly high on the list), it strikes me as plausible that Yahoo’s management felt that Microsoft’s acquisition history would not bode well for Yahoo and the culture it has sought to promote.  Whatever happens to Yahoo, there are undoubtedly some valuable insights that we can gain from what Tim Sanders has advocated.

Evan

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