January & February 2025 Book Club: Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara

[PessoAlumni]

Hey Square Readers,

You voted and chose Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara as our Square Readers Book Club book for January & February 2025!

We’re so excited to kick off the new year with this book focusing on the core of our businesses: our customers. This book was also featured in Season 2 of the hit show, The Bear, in an episode all about giving service and taking pride in one’s work, and I can’t wait to dive in. 

Here’s a quick summary:

Unreasonable Hospitality: The Remarkable Power of Giving People More Than They Expect

“Essential lessons in hospitality for every business: Radical reinvention, a true partnership between the kitchen and the dining room—and memorable, over-the-top, bespoke hospitality. The answer to some of the most pernicious business dilemmas is to give more; and the magic that can happen when a busser starts thinking like an owner. Today, every business can choose to be a hospitality business— we can all transform ordinary transactions into extraordinary experiences. Find the magic in what we do—for ourselves, the people we work with, and the people we serve.”

We’ll start reading on Monday, January 6th, so get ready and pick up a copy at a local library, bookstore, Amazon, or anywhere else! We’ll have discussion threads and conversations all throughout the two months, so keep checking back to the Square Readers Book Club. 

We will once again have @DinaLRosenberg, co-owner of Amityville Apothecary in NY, co-hosting for this round of our book club. With an MBA, a ton of small business experience, and an absolute expertise in customer service, she is the perfect person to help guide us through this book. 

Tell us in the comments:

• Are you excited about this book? 
• What do you hope to learn?

Here are the next books we’ll read together:

• March & April 2025: Obviously Awesome by April Dunford
• May & June 2025: Atomic Habits by James Clear
  
• July & August 2025: Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss
• September & October 2025: Company of One by Paul Jarvis 

Don’t forget to:

• View and Subscribe to all threads about this book

We can’t wait to read with you!

Pesso

[RuckusDonuts]

Fantastic read, highly recommended! 

[PessoAlumni]

Thanks, @RuckusDonuts ! We hope to have you in our discussions when we start up in January! 

Are there any new takeaways and lessons that stuck with you from reading it? 

[RuckusDonuts]

I'm in the process of rereading it (with a hi-lighter this time) so will share what I mined as valuable 🙂

[PessoAlumni]

Love it! Looking forward to hearing your thoughts as we go through it, @RuckusDonuts !

We'll have some discussion threads set up by us, and feel free to make some new ones in the group yourself!

[HC_Charlie]

This sounds like a great read! I like to think I take this approach in my customer service...however, I'm never sure if my approach is making a difference in repeat business (I'd like to think so!). I'm curious if the book material will address how to calculate rewards or results from this approach.

[PessoAlumni]

Thanks for jumping in, @HC_Charlie !

I totally get that and feel the same way -- I always think I'm going above and beyond, but in reflecting maybe it doesn't land with customers and I haven't been as amazing as I'd like to be.

Good point about being able to track and how to see the impact. Hopefully it goes into that too!

Looking forward to reading it along with ya and hearing more of your thoughts & perspective in our discussions as we go! 

[bonny]

Even if you aren't sure if your approach is making a difference with your customers, if you feel good about the experience, so will they. Passion and a positive attitude are contagious. I'm not sure how you would measure that metric, but I think that is the overall takeaway from this book.  

[CareyJo]

I'm slightly stressed about getting it read in the time period because most of February is time off for me.  I know, it's okay if I have to skim or can't finish but I still like to get through the whole book.  I will be offline for three weeks in February...

I've often felt that a lot of hospitality is so fake because people are either dealing with a rude person they have to pacify or it comes across as not genuine and just for money.  One of the biggest things I have always expressed in my business groups is to be authentic and have integrity.  If we're serving people from a place of authenticity, then our hospitality won't feel or come across as fake.  Just curious to see his take on it...

[PessoAlumni]

That's so exciting that you're able to take that time off in February, @CareyJo -- so excited for you! Of course absolutely no worries if you don't finish it in time, but we'll miss ya during your time off either way!

Such a great point about the line between being authentic and being overly nice despite what one is really feeling -- thanks for bringing that up! I think this book dives into more of setting up a culture of going over the top in treating customers ridiculously well and setting up processes to provide exceptional service and treatment of customers. I think Hug Your Haters went more into how to handle rude customers, while Unreasonable Hospitality is more about creating an environment of hospitality. But we'll find out for sure soon!

Really looking forward to diving into it!

[CareyJo]

I hope you're right! 🙂

[HC_Charlie]

I think the hope is when you create an environment of Unreasonable Hospitality, you can minimize rude and unhappy customers. I think it's about preventing and heading off unhappiness before you have to deal with it. And in the event you have to deal with an unhappy or rude customer, the author of the book talks about assuming a person is essentially a good person, who for whatever personal reason may be having a bad day or dealing with a difficult personal issue. This may connect to the idea of Hugging your Haters (although I didn't read that one).

[thecedar]

Looking forward to this one! 

[PessoAlumni]

Thank you, @thecedar ! We just posed our Opening Discussion and I'd love to hear your pre-reading thoughts

[bonny]

I'm about halfway through the book. It's been fantastic so far! 

[PessoAlumni]

That's so great to hear @bonny ! I'm just about the same and really loving the insights I'm learning so far-

[CareyJo]

I started it this morning - it's awesome!!!  Good pick @PessoAlumni!!  Another easy read!  I read chapter one this morning and I love his writing!

[PessoAlumni]

I'm so glad you're digging it so far, @CareyJo ! It's a great mix of narrative and flat out tips and is such an easy read.

Don't forget to jump on over to share your thoughts in our opening discussion (no reading needed!).

[Traderandco]

Have just started reading this book, and so far it's really great and inspirational! Looking forward to the full read and discussions.

[PessoAlumni]

Wonderful, thanks so much for joining us here @Traderandco ! I'm so glad that you're liking it so far and getting something out of it already.

You can jump into our first opening discussion to share your thoughts so far-

[EMstudioWA]

Still on the waiting list from the library, I might see what others have to say about this one and join in on the next book (I’m already on the waiting list for the next 2 books since it seems like these are popular titles right now).