Download Why Loyalty Matters: The Groundbreaking Approach to Rediscovering Happiness, Meaning and Lasting Fulfillment in Your Life and Work epub

Review Essay
"Why Loyalty Matters"
Troy D Ivie
Excelsior College

I have often felt that the world we live in today is absent a sense of loyalty. Loyalty to our family and loved ones, to ourselves, and to our careers is becoming a thing of the past in this fast paced, competitive information age. For decades, we have been told that loyalty gets us nowhere, and we always have to look out for number one. We have been told that in order to succeed we have to constantly reinvent ourselves, let go of past relationships, and move on to where the grass is greener. In search of a broader sense of why we humans have lost our sense of loyalty, I came across a book called "Why Loyalty Matters", written by Timothy Keiningham and Lerzan Aksoy, with Luke Williams. The authors conducted extensive research on the topic as well as basing the book on a loyalty study completed by Ipsos Loyalty. Founded in 1975, Ipsos is a global research company headquartered in Europe. This book breaks down the essential elements of loyalty that provide a profoundly moral message: that the quality of our lives, the productivity of our careers, and the depth of our relationships are certainly related. This book taught me that loyalty is a key ingredient of a life lived well.
The Why of Loyalty
"A happiness that is sought for ourselves alone can never be found; for a happiness that is diminished by being shared is not big enough to make us happy" (Merton, 1955).
This element focuses on today's use and meaning of the letter "I". It is true that what we lack in terms of community, loyalty, and trust, we can make it up with our unprecedented spending power by buying insurance, legal aid, protection, etc. In today's society, who needs loyalty anymore? This chapter also includes a short assessment of ourselves, and what role loyalty plays in our lives. This helped me understand the why of loyalty, and it naturally led me to the next element.

Know Yourself
We probably are all aware of some elements of Steven Covey's "Seven Habits of Highly Effective People". Habit number five tells us to seek to understand people, and then be understood. I have often disagreed with this, as I believe knowing yourself first is paramount. How are we supposed to understand what motivates others if we don't know what motivates us? This element in Loyalty Matters is explored here, as it goes into how we each have our own relationship style. Once again, the authors brilliantly use this to transition into the next element of loyalty.
Building Loyal Relationships
Aristotle said, "Nobody would choose to live without friends, even if he had all other good things". This element explains what we think of as our strongest loyalties. We tend to group our friends, family, spouses, and loved ones in this. These loyalties have the greatest influence on our happiness. Sadly, the research in this book indicated a downward trend in the number of quality friendships since 1985. In fact, one-quarter of Americans report having no close friends in whom they could confide things that were important to them. What I found interesting was that the book also revealed through research how important making our relationships work is to us. There are over 50,000 books in print on how to make friends, as well as more than 100,000 books on relationships (Keiningham, Aksoy, 2009). So why the disconnect? This chapter in the book explores this phenomenon as it relates to this age of information.
The Economics of Loyalty
This loyalty element explores the fact that nothing will take up more of our time as adults than work-not family, recreation, eating, or even sleeping. Loyalty in the workplace certainly is a link to our overall happiness, as well as frustrations. Research conducted by the authors revealed four key elements of satisfied employees in virtually all workplaces. Am I a capable employee? Do I experience a steady state of job satisfaction in terms of what I get accomplished? Do I struggle with loyalty to my colleague vs. loyalty to the overall organization? Am I a productive employee? These particular job related questions are what I struggle with the most when I attempt to balance my personal life with my professional career. These factors are all interconnected. This element is my favorite because it explains that our work is much more than a means of putting food on the table. Our loyalty to our co-workers influences us in ways that extend far beyond the workplace. It shapes our identity, influences our psychological health, and connects us to others.
Toxic Loyalty
Former British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli once quipped, "Damn your principles! Stick to you party". This element simply reviews how loyalties can be misused. History has shown us it is possible to be a loyal Nazi, Klansmen, mobster, or gang member. It is also possible to be a loyal but abused spouse. Research in the book revealed that 60 percent of us report having relationships to which we feel loyal damage our emotional and psychological well-being.
Faith and Loyalty
This element is exposed in a variety of instances across the world today, as it focuses on the subject of religion. Muslim faith, Christianity, and the division of church and state all contribute to levels of instability, creating global centers of gravity for conflict and controversy. Loyalty to one's religious beliefs may conflict with the demands of civil law.
Finally, the book really drove home the idea that even though each of us is unique at our core, we all want the same things: to be happy, to be fulfilled, and to be loved. We fail to recognize, however, that this wish for our own happiness and for a more peaceful world rests on the same foundation: our loyalty to one another.

References
Keiningham, T., & Aksoy, L. (2009). Why Loyalty Matters. Dallas, TX: BenBella Books, Inc.
Merton, T. (1955). No Man is an Island. New York, NY: Harvest book. Harcourt Inc.

In Why Loyalty Matters, Tim Keiningham and Lerzan Aksoy continue the work we started together as authors of Loyalty Myths. In this volume, Tim and Lerzan delve far deeper into the psychology of loyalty and its relevance to the individual's well-being. The book is a masterful exploration of the role loyalty plays in creating our own personal happiness and success. And, it carries these insights into our corporate lives, explaining how loyalty effectively fortifies organizations in today's challenging market - both with customers and employees. The LoyaltyAdvisor component and the chapter on teaching loyalty are truly unique contributions to the field! I commend Tim and Lerzan for further evolving the work we started together in Loyalty Myths!

This book provides very interesting perspectives on the topic of loyalty, not just from a business view point, but also from social and psychological angles. It is an excellent resource for those interested in understanding the dynamics of loyalty formation, and how loyalty can be created and preserved in a variety of contexts

I do not agree with the other reviews posted on this book. I found the book very boring and non-insightful. The best chapter was chapter 1, "Why Loyalty Matters" then it goes on to define different types of loyalties according to the authors. It defines toxic loyalty, gang loyalty, religious loyalty, family loyalty, pretty much all the loyalties we know exist. To make matters worse. It was written in a college paper structure, with end notes and APA style citations. In my opinion, very little effort was taken in turning this research paper into a commercial paperback. It is very boring and reads like a college paper. The tables and graphs also seem forced into the paper and don't really support any structural premise or reveal any groundbreaking research. Very disappointing with an illuminating example of how book covers are used to sell material.

Why Loyalty Matters: The Groundbreaking Approach to Rediscovering Happiness, Meaning and Lasting Fulfillment in Your Life and Work
I found the Economics of Loyalty particularly compelling. Too often books similar in nature to this simply say do this and that and the other thing and it'll improve _______ (fill in the blank). But all too often, there aren't any numbers. Or not enough of them. Or the wrong ones. Or the heuristic models are either incomprehensible or just plain silly. Keiningham, Aksoy & Williams avoid all these pitfalls and delve deeper, providing not only the projected financial returns that loyalty offers, but also pointing out how to measure it.

They start their arguments by asking THE question one learns in business school. THE one with the obvious answer. Why do businesses exist? "To make a profit." They counter this axiom by quoting the great Peter Drucker, who not only believes this to be wrong, but goes farther by stating that such an ultimate goal is destructive in many ways. Instead, he says that "the purpose of a business is to create a customer." Accepting this as the primary goal has much the same effect as discarding Euclid's fifth postulate in geometry - a new geometry, with radically different theorems and proofs that describe the world in a discomfiting, but trustworthy, manner, is born. Creating a customer is the new lynchpin of economic benefits in a loyalty universe.

But the authors don't fall into the trap of ignoring the financials. And financial results are, ultimately, driven by models. And models require data. The authors separate the wheat from the chaff, the information from the noise, providing approaches that will yield the right data to drive the "hard" numbers that managers (rightly) turn to when times are tough.

I highly recommend this book.