Best regards,

Bob

Johan, what an honor to hear from you, our Afrikanns publisher. Thank you for taking the time to write.

I know that John and his wife, Ana, will be traveling overseas a lot in the next year and perhaps they will be able to visit your beautiful country. While I currently have no plans to be there in the near future, I certainly look forward to one day having the privilege of visiting.

Best regards,

Bob

Regards

Johan

Hi Bob and John David,

Thanks for the e-mail messages about the translation of the Go-Giver into Afrikaans with references to my previous e-mails to you. It is indeed a fine translation, but your original version still remains my preferred cup of business coffee!

The Go-Giver is a hit with all business and personal contacts I encounter here in South Africa. In fact, I have made the principles part of the DNA of my business world and social interaction! As I mentioned before your principles is an articulation of an approach that is part of our diverse nation’s approach to interaction and why living in our young but exciting democracy is such a miracle of hope and ubunthu!

Since August of last year when I read your book and became a walking ambassador, I have given copies of the book to more than 50 people (all CEOs, COOs, MCOs, other business connections and personal contacts whose opinion and lives I value). It has now become standard practice at Stone to give a copy to each business associate that we work with in consulting to clients as well as to each client that we engage with. The practice is to provide a client with a copy early on in the relationship and we have found that the simple truths contained in the book does not only guide and add value to our relationship with our clients, but in turn brings value to the relationships they have with their business contacts, co-workers and communities. Whenever our leading bookstore chain Excusive Books, runs out, Amazon.com saves the day! You can also read on my website http://www.stoneconsult.net where I explain the impact The Go-Giver principles have had on my business if you navigate to the section “Stone Gems”.

In the “Go-Giver spirit” (a coined phrase we constantly use in our business interaction), we are actively involved in developing entrepreneurial job creation opportunities in the township tourism industry by the support of the Adopt-a-Guesthouse programme. Here with Africa’s leading hotel group, Southern Sun as main sponsor, we focus on supporting entrepreneurs in Soweto and other previously disadvantaged areas to build self-sustaining tourism businesses and create sustainable jobs through guesthouse business ventures. The guesthouses offer a safe and comfortable overnight experience in some of our most historic locations of our South African cities. The Soweto guesthouses are located close to what was Nelson Mandela’s home during the struggle years and close to many anti-apartheid struggle sites and museums. Well-run and safe township tours bring our country’s history to life and it often is a life-changing experience, especially for foreign visitors to our friendly country. Our support and in fact everyone that is involved is on a free of charge basis to really give back of our expertise on route to build our nation and its prosperity. Please visit http://www.bookaguesthouse.com for more information and to support our entrepreneurs (mostly women) when you plan to visit South Africa.

Still living the Go-Giver principles, we also started a professional initiative in partnership with the South African campus of the acclaimed Monash University of Australia to add value across the communication industry in the entire sub-continent of Southern Africa. This Monash Business Communication Initiative conducts regular Forums for debate about enriching business communication across various topics and approaches, continued professional development in the form of our Incubator lecture series and an Online Community where communication practitioners can interact and participate in constructive communication with their peers. You can see more about this on http://www.commsinitiative.co.za. I must mention that at the launch of the initiative on 12 May this year I explained about the principled of The Go-Giver and invited all the 80 or so influential guests to get a copy and make the principles their own. I also explained that the initiative is driven in the “Go-Giver spirit” and for the components that there is a cost, it is merely to cover supplier costs and is not a commercial venture to make money.

One of the best business testimonies to your book’s principles in my daily business life is the Circle of Stones, an informal association of like-minded businesses and entrepreneurs. When people join the Circle, this first step is to read The Go-Giver to understand the spirit of the Circle. Only from there we then collaborate as complementary businesses, adding real value to clients in a spirit of cooperation and synergy of offering. There are no mark-ups, no commissions, no kick-backs, no stealing clients, no cross-ownership, and no onerous contracts with loads of restrictive clauses. We all just operate on adding real value, being compensated fairly for business value added, using our influence in an ethical way to build business for everyone in the Circle that brings their unique offering to the table, being authentic in living the values without over-selling and lastly, being open to receiving opportunity, learning and growth from the other partners and from people we encounter in our business lives. It is very interesting that for the Circle members, your principles have found translation into the way we all do business in some way. So, on behalf of all of the Circle of Stone members and the lives they touch in sunny South Africa, thank you for articulating an approach that allows prosperity, humanity, fairness and ethics to flourish in business!

If ever you want to come to our beautiful country, let me know how we can help to celebrate the Go-Giver spirit ubunthu-style (in American, English, Afrikaans, Zulu, Xhosa or any other of our eleven beautiful national languages) in our very special part of God’s living artwork called planet earth.

All the best and keep up the Go-Giving!

Willem S Eksteen