PEAK, 2nd Edition

Preface

Deep down I always knew that business could be done differently. I founded and grew my company, Joie de Vivre Hospitality, with this rebellious spirit. But it wasn't until I was rocked to my foundation with a desperate economic downturn that I was truly able to see the power of my principles.

Celebrated restaurateur Danny Meyer told me he wrote his book Setting the Table because it helped him move from the intuitive to the intentional in how he ran the Union Square Hospitality Group. Brazilian CEO Ricardo Semlar has said he wrote his books The Seven-Day Weekend and Maverick to address one of his director's questions about whether what works in practice for their company could also work in theory. I decided to write Peak because it allowed me to combine three of my greatest interests: writing, psychology, and business. Writing this book required me to reconcile how Joie de Vivre has successfully interpreted one of the most famous theories of human motivation into how we do business. But my learning was most profound when I discovered dozens of other peak-performing companies that have also consciously and unconsciously relied on Abraham Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. It wasn't just my little company that was fond of Abe's pyramid. Yet, taking all of this learning and turning it into a book was quite a task. Thankfully, at a very young age, I knew I wanted to be a writer when I grew up, so all the time spent researching and writing just helped connect me back to a lifelong ...