Brandon Webb, a former SEAL sniper turned CEO, and John David Mann argue that success means choosing one priority and executing it flawlessly. Webb shares a training drill called the "edge shot" that shows how a moment's lost focus costs you in combat and business alike.
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Hello, Book Thinkers family. Today's book tip is going to come from Total Focus by Brandon Webb and John David Mann. Brandon Webb is the SEAL sniper turned CEO, and John David Mann has co-authored and been involved with a lot of great books. The Go-Giver series is one of my absolute favorites, and a book that I still talk about today, The Recipe by Chef Charles Carroll and John David Mann, is a book that I absolutely adore. So, Total Focus. I read this book over the last month because in my full-time job, we have a little book club that I started, and each week we review a fourth of a book. We chose Total Focus. One of my colleagues actually picked it, and I jumped at this opportunity. I really, really, really enjoyed reading this book. Brandon Webb, former SEAL sniper. He's been deployed overseas a couple times into combat, and he's a very, very, very seasoned military guy, but then he brings those experiences into business as well. So he's the CEO of the Hurricane Group, and he's been involved in a lot of really cool business situations as well. So this book is about total and absolute focus. Brandon says that if there's one principle that you want to focus on the most, it is the fact that you need to focus on one thing and execute to the best of your ability. Focus on that one thing and win, win, win. So this book, he affectionately calls it The 7 Deadly Habits of Highly Effective People. And within this book, there are 7 principles that kind of end in total focus. I'm going to read a situation because I thought I was very focused. I mean, I've been focused for a long time. I think I'm more focused than the average person. And I think that I've cultivated the ability to work and to kind of narrow my vision into one specific task. But listen to this drill right here, because when I read this, I'm like, wow, I could never do that. So Brandon, when he was teaching SEAL sniper school, his students had to participate in different drills, and he was an entire— or he was able to control and kind of build the program the way that he wanted. And listen to this exercise right here, it's crazy. So, quote, we had one particularly difficult drill we called the edge shot. We'd place all the students at 800 yards and inform them that their targets would appear in the vicinity sometime Within the next 3 hours. This meant those SEALs might spend as much as 3 hours on the scope concentrating and waiting. There was one student who diverted his eyes from his line of view for just a moment, just long enough to wipe the sweat from his brow. And when he looked up, he saw his target disappearing from view. I still remember his anguished, no! He received a failing grade. A little sweat and discomfort is no reason to lose your focus. High-pressure situations occur just as much in combat as they do in business. And whether it's a negotiation that you're going to walk into or you get hit with a lawsuit, you need to be able to respond to that situation with total focus. So the 7 deadly habits that you're going to learn how to become very focused in this book are worth checking out. If you've read this book, comment below, let me know what you think. I really enjoyed it. I'm going to read some of Brandon's other work, and I'm going to get a little bit more involved in some of his online content as well. So with that, go read something, have a fantastic day, and let me know if you have any questions. All right, take care. Bye.
