Book Review: "Luck by Design"

As Americans continue to clamber over the rubble of their collapsed portfolios, sniffing for signs of life amongst the shards of shattered assets, Richard E. Goldman arrives with “Luck by Design: Certain Success in an Uncertain World,” two hundred pages of economic and emotional search and rescue. The book represents a steel-toed kick to the rear of those who see success and failure as opposite sides of the same cosmic coin flip. Goldman seeks to convert a nation of lotto scratching, bingo banging, house flipping, Madoff-trusting rubes into a community of folks actively engaged in designing their own success stories.

Goldman has the credentials to pontificate. After college he went to work for, and soon invested in, a little store in Houston that sold men’s suits. By the time he retired in 2002 there were 680 Men’s Wearhouse stores, and Goldman, the marketing mastermind behind the chain’s success, left with a ton of dough and a keen awareness of what separates the winners from the also-rans in our competitive economy.

The book offers a game plan for those who want to get from here to there. It combines the practicality of hard work with the spirituality of being present (Goldman is a strong advocate for meditation and yoga, for clearing the clutter from the mind and tuning into your inner voice). The book is at its best when the author shares his anecdotes about setbacks and advances, the bad experiments (selling women’s clothing was a disaster) and the good (Goldman had a lot of reservations about entering the tuxedo rental business, but MW not only came to dominate the field, it was also a great way to get the younger generation into its stores for the first time).

The title of the book riffs on the old chestnut, “The harder I work the luckier I get.” A more on-the-nose title would have been “Success by Design,” but who wants to read that? Luck is sexy. Luck is magical. Though Goldman uses the word ironically, it’s going to help him sell a lot of books. This should be good for his readers and good for him. Just his luck.

Amazon link: Luck by Design: Certain Success in an Uncertain World