This is the third book I’ve read that is connected to the 2016 Cubs’ championship season. I am quite willing to read 100 more if more people write about that team 🙂
The Plan by David Kaplan, a ESPN radio personality and CSN Sports host in Chicago, is another fun book for nostalgia and good feels about that amazing Cubs year and really this golden era of Cubs baseball after years of brutal baseball.
What I liked about the book was that the focus on infrastructure and the organizational aspect of leading change from futility to excellence. Kaplan is a well connected guy so there’s some stuff in here that were not in other books, but especially related to how the Cubs were run in the 80’s, 90’s, and 2000’s. It was a bit shocking to see just how poorly some aspects of the Cubs organization was led, with a lot of it stemming from ownership issues.
This book perhaps gives the best insight into organizational leadership and culture shaping of the 3 main books out there right now so it was fascinating to hear more about what was behind the scenes to what I observed as a fan from afar. There’s a focus on how Tom Ricketts led change from an ownership standpoint, how Theo Epstein and Jed Hoyer led change with the baseball operations, how Jason McCloud led change on the scouting and player development side, and how Joe Maddon led change at the major league level with the players.
There’s a lot of different windows into how leaders sought to create a different culture and aggressively reach their goal. It shouldn’t be surprising that a big part of all of that leading change involved a commitment to treating people well and having an authentic and upfront environment that can handle truth and reality.
So as a Cub fan, it’s a fun book. But it’s a great case study of a great group of leaders were put together with a big vision in front of them. The history of the organization was full of people focusing on “winning” but with a short-term view. There was a general and consistent failure to see the big picture over time. This book and story is a case study of the power of leaders when they can strive for the book picture without short cuts with a clear understanding of what the potential impact will be if they are successful.
Another great book is The Cubs Way by Tom Verducci, which has a lot more on the actual World Series in 2016 in its design. That might be my favorite of these books. There is a lot on how players were acquired, but The Plan is more about the organizational infrastructure. I also recommend Teammate by David Ross which has tons of great stuff on winning culture and team health from the perspective of a player. It has a lot of good stuff from 2016, with a lot of personal bio and anecdotes, but good player focused perspectives of 2016.
