Dennis Kennedy

I have been trying to decide for a while about how best to write on this blog about my reactions to Tom Peters' great new book, Re-Imagine!. Peters is a management guru I've enjoyed, thought about and relied upon for many years. He's an author who seems to either enthuse or infuriate readers, with little or no middle ground.

I'm a big fan. Re-Imagine! is the book I read in 2003 that has had the biggest impact on my thinking and my approach. In fact, some of the new things I'll be doing in 2004 are direct responses to things Peters says in Re-Imagine!

However, I've found the idea of blogging about the book to be a little daunting. The ideas seem a little too big to discuss in the blog format. I haven't yet decided if I will take on that task.

But, today, I was delighted to see that Robert Scoble of the highly-visited and highly-regarded Scobleizer Weblog, has a recent post, Tom Peters is My Guru," that reflects the same "whack to the side of the head" feeling I got from the book. I recommend reading Scoble's post and I look forward to seeing more from Scoble as he suggests that he will be showing influences of Peters in his blog.

I also must agree with Scoble that Peters' chapter called "Women Roar" is one of the most important chapters any business owner could read and ponder, especially for those who think in terms of new year's resolutions and goals for 2004.

His chapter on education is also significant. In it, he poses more questions than answers, but points to some ways to think about education issues. Interestingly, the approach taken by my daughter's school, The College School, provides many answers to the questions that Tom Peters raises about the next directions for education.