Breaking Out: How to Build Influence in a World of Competing Ideas - Hardcover

"To take the next steps in turning your now crystallized idea into a life path, Read Butman's Breaking Out." -- Kare Anderson, Forbes.com "an interesting tome on leadership as the storytelling demonstrates how 'breaking out' has occurred in the past." -- Product Development and Management Association "In a world overflowing with new ideas, why do some catch on and blossom, and others not? Drawing on interviews with "idea entrepreneurs" (including Al Gore), Butman explains the relationship between the person who comes up with an idea and those that spread it, highlighting what it takes to make an idea popular." -- Business Digest "Breaking Out is populated by a surprising crowd of creatives--from Ralph Waldo Emerson to Eckhart Tolle, Ben Franklin to Blake Mycoskie (TOMS shoes), Mohandas Gandhi to Barack Obama--that reflects Butman's belief that idea entrepreneurs 'seek to influence the thinking of others, not repress it or dismiss it. They want change, not power.' There is no doubt that you will learn from Butman, and these inimitable "idea entrepreneurs," no matter what your message and medium." -- 800 CEO READ ADVANCE PRAISE for Breaking Out: Nicholas A. Christakis, MD, PhD, Professor, Harvard University; coauthor, Connected: The Surprising Power of Our Social Networks and How They Shape Our Lives-- "In Breaking Out, John Butman gives the marketplace of ideas the human form it deserves. He vividly explores the life history of ideas, the people who espouse them, and the world into which they are flung." Eric von Hippel, Professor, MIT Sloan School of Management-- "John Butman teaches people to better understand, develop, and communicate their core work-related passions--a very important matter." Maryanne Wolf, John DiBiaggio Professor of Citizenship and Public Service, Tufts University; author, Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain-- "In this compelling book on the emerging concept of an 'idea entrepreneur,' John Butman brings to life and propels our understanding of this new cultural phenomenon, and in so doing, makes his own contribution to its role in our society. Bravo!

How do you gain influence for an idea? In Breaking Out, idea developer and adviser John Butman shows how the methods of today's most popular "idea entrepreneurs"--including dog psychologist Cesar Millan, French lifestyle guru Mireille Guiliano (French Women Don't Get Fat), TOMS founder Blake Mycoskie, and many others--can help you take an idea public and build influence for it. It isn't easy. Butman argues that the rise of the "ideaplex" (TED, Twitter, NPR, YouTube, online learning, and all the rest) has caused such an explosion in the creation and sharing of ideas that it has become much easier to go public--yet much harder to gain influence. But it can be done. Based on his own experience in advising content experts worldwide, Butman shows how the idea entrepreneur breaks out--by combining personal narrative with rich content, creating many forms of expression (from books to live events), developing real-world practices, and creating "respiration" around the idea such that other people can breathe it in and make it their own. The resulting idea platform can reach many different audience groups and continue to build influence for many years and even decades. If you have an idea and want to make a difference in your organization, build a change movement in your community, or improve the world in some way--this book will get you started on the journey to idea entrepreneurship.