Beans is the story of how Passion, People, Personal and Product can help you improve your work experiences. And how the only way we can successfully judge our results is by looking at them through what we call "The Eye of Intention".
Foreword
Bob Nelson, Ph.D. (Author, 1001 Ways to Reward Employees & 1001 Ways to Rewards and Recognition Fieldbook): 
This is a true story about The El Espresso coffee shop. Although the real-life coffee shop goes by another name, this small business is typical of many other businesses, large and small, that operate every day across America and around the world. The El Espresso has chosen to stay small and do what it does best: serve its customers well.
In this age of headlines about corporate executives run amok, Jack and Dianne Hartman, the owners of The El Espresso, are the kind of businesspeople who deserve a little good press. For more than twenty years, they have stayed true to their values and their principles. In the process, they have created a business that has earned the reputation for creating Seattle's best coffee - coffee good enough to make people willing to line up in the rain to buy a cup.
I work with thousands of managers and business owners every year, most of them looking for ways to create a more successful business. The answer is simple: Hire the best people you can, allow them to be who they are, treat them fairly and reward them regularly, instill in them a love for serving the customer, and the customer will come back faithfully. These simple truths are the message of Beans.
To help you apply the principles of Beans to your own workplace, the book poses some great questions at the end, designed to help you examine the state of your own relationship with work - whether you are the owner, the manager, or an employee.
I invite you to read this short book and discover how these four principles for running a business in good times and bad might energize your employees, your customers, and quite possibly your entire organization.
As you read Beans, you will experience a business where everyone wants to be a regular, where the customer is known and respected, and there is an honest blur between serving people and running a business.
Learn the lessons of Beans and this can be your business, too.
Authors' Note: Beans will demonstrate clearly, like a good cup of coffee, the quality of your work experience is a direct result of what goes into making it. How you choose what the ingredients will be and what proportion of each you use will determine how good a final product you will brew. Beans will ask you to stop and reflect about the 4 P's and how each of them play out in your work:
- Passion
- People
- Personal
- Product
It is our hope that what you will learn from Beans will help you to discover how to create long-term success in your work and your life - in good times or bad.
Editorial Reviews: Harry Paul (Co-Author, Fish!: A Remarkable Way to Boost Morale and Improve Results"):
"In this delightful and deceptively simply tale...managers and employees in companies of any size can find truth, values, and an inspiring blueprint for better business."
Beverly Kaye (Founder/CEO Career Systems International & Co-Author, Love 'EM or Lose 'EM: Getting Good People To Stay):
"This book is like a cup of good coffee: it doesn't take long, it has been carefully pulled using the best ingredients, shared with love and laughter meant to promote a conversation, create a jolt and a burst of energy."
BJ Gallagher Hateley (Co-Author, A Peacock in the Land of Penguins):
"Every once in a while a small book comes along that conveys an important message in a simple yet elegant way. Beans is such a book. It brings us back to business basics."
Bob Rosner (Syndicated Columnist "Working Wounded" & Co-Author, The Boss's Survival Guide):
"Quite simply, this is a terrific true story with lessons for people in any kind of company, in any industry."
