The Other 90%: How to Unlock Your Vast Untapped Potential for Leadership and Life - Softcover

Cooper, Robert K.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 060980880X ISBN 13: 9780609808801

Publisher: Crown, 2002

Synopsis

For centuries, it has been assumed that there are vast limits to human capacity. Now, although a host of scientific discoveries prove this wrong, a mindset of limits persists, blocking us from our greatest possibilities and leaving us feeling bombarded by stress, change, and uncertainty. No matter how hard we work, no matter how much we give, we're still not getting what we hoped for. There is another way.

Dr. Robert Cooper, a neuroscience pioneer and leadership advisor, urges us to take a radically different view of human capacity. We are mostly unused potential, he says, employing less than 10 percent of our brilliance or hidden talents. In easy-to-follow steps, he explains how to develop and apply the art and science of your hidden capacity.

The art is the motivation and inspiration coming from the wonderful stories that are the heart of The Other 90%. Dr. Cooper draws on his wide-ranging insights and experiences to show how it's possible to make a difference in yourself and others.

However, inspiration without a way to turn vision into reality is an empty vessel. Combining art with science, Dr. Cooper provides extraordinary help in the form of specific, little-known practical ways to use the latest research in neuroscience, performance psychology, and work physiology for excelling in a pressure-filled world. He shows you how to:

* Increase energy at work -- and have more energy for personal and family life.

* Activate the brain's "alertness switches" to defeat pressure and stress.

* Use not only the brain in your head but the ones in your heart and gut.

* Motivate exceptional ingenuity and performance in yourself and others.

The most exciting breakthroughs will not come from advances in technology but from a deeper realization of what it means to be most human and alive. Many of the choices that can dramatically change our lives are simple and practical -- yet few people know what these choices are or how to apply them in work and life. The Other 90% is your guide to new territory and new challenges.

About this title

Review

Some 10-to-90-percent splits are good, like giving one-tenth of what you make to those less fortunate or putting 10 percent of it into a smart saving plan. Others are bad, like being a miserly 10-percent tipper or using only that tiny portion of the capabilities of your powerful computer software. Worst of all is the fact that most of us use only 10 percent of our intelligence and creativity potential, leaving vast quantities of what we're capable lying dormant, unused and untapped. It's this ratio that Robert Cooper hopes to help reverse with The Other 90%, his inspirational guide to waking the sleeping giant within each of us.

Cooper groups his observations and advice under four keystones: trust, energy, farsightedness, and nerve. In a diagram at the beginning, he illustrates each of these keystones with insights quoted from an unusual mixture of literary and political figures, setting the tone for a book that mixes tales of the famous with those of the unknown and moments of ordinary life with the eureka moments of exceptional triumphs. He promotes trust in its broadest sense, such as incorporating and blending all three streams of intelligence (brain, heart, and gut) into decision making, and trusting oneself enough to escape the trap of comparison. He shares simple suggestions for cultivating calm energy, so as to be quick and effective without rushing, and encourages readers to learn the difference between the trivia in life that counts (and drains us of precious energy) and that which doesn't. Being farsighted, for Cooper, is essentially learning to align more of your actions--and ultimately your life--with your biggest dreams. And nerve is the art of developing a thick skin and making adversity your ally on the road to achieving those hopes and ambitions.

The Other 90% suffers a bit from the problem of many inspirational books, being so densely packed with anecdotes that the good advice is sometimes lost in a blur of well-intentioned examples. Indeed, some of Cooper's most profound comments leap out of the least elaborate stories, such as the memory of his grandfather gazing at Sirius, one of the brightest but most distant stars, and explaining that he did this "because it draws my gaze the farthest away from where I'm standing right now." But Cooper's enthusiasm is timely; the accepted notion that we only use one-tenth of our capabilities was revised a few years ago by studies indicating we only use one ten-thousandth. So there's room for all kinds of improvement. --S. Ketchum

From the Back Cover

"A beautifully inspirational and truly insightful leadership book for the digital age!"
-- Stephen R. Covey, Ph.D., author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

"A timeless and unforgettable message! Nothing else in the leadership field compares to the emotional intensity and practical value of this book. Share it with everyone you know."
-- Ken Blanchard, coauthor of The One Minute Manager

"Every once in a while a book comes along that forever changes our view of what's possible in our daily lives and in the world of work. The Other 90% is that kind of book. Robert Cooper brilliantly upends conventional thinking about human capacity."
-- Nancy L. Badore, Ph.D., founding director, Executive Development Center, Ford Motor Company

"Robert Cooper's message can change the future of leadership. . . . When his work was compared to twenty widely recognized leadership experts, Cooper received the highest ratings, including inherent value, usefulness, applicability, and overall results."
-- John C. Horton, founder and president, The Leadership Center, Atlanta

"This is a vital wake-up call to find the untapped potential in yourself and others."
-- Martha Rogers, Ph.D., coauthor of The One to One Future

"Goes right to the heart of what matters most in leadership and life, with compelling insights from neuroscience, inspiring stories, and practical new tools. This is priority reading for us all!"
-- Bob Nelson, Ph.D., author of 1001 Ways to Reward Employees

About this edition

• Publisher: Crown
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 060980880X
• ISBN 13: 9780609808801
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 316