The chapter title was “Give Up Golf, Retreats, Off-Sites, and Trade Shows.†Cloutier sure bashes golf a lot in this chapter where he feels for the most part it just costs business owners a lot of time and money. Example, factoring in how much you have to spend on memberships as well as looking at how much business you really brought in as a direct result of being on the golf course. From what he mentions, most people bring in nothing unless you are rubbing shoulders with a very well known billionaire.
Although the chapter does seem to dive into other forms of activities that people claim they do to increase business such as conventions, trade shows and seminars where he gives his reasons why he thinks they can be bad. He used Tony Robbins’ seminars as an example where he felt that it was a little perplexing how people spend tens of thousands of dollars and time worshipping a person as if it was a cult when they could be focusing on their business.
I guess it comes down to realistic goal and planning. If you play golf specifically in hopes that you will meet your next billionaire customer or that attending a seminar is the answer to your wealth and productivity issues then that is just like the lottery mentality I’d say. I would treat things like that more for fun and growth personally.
I was a little confused about the trade show part though as to me it depends on what type of industry you are in. Example, I can’t see why it wouldn’t be a good way for like manufacturers to meet other potential companies and customers to either buy or sell its products.