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Another week in the books, and a fitting one to close out, because everything I am handing you today threads the same needle. We are halfway through the year, deep in the part where the work stops being exciting and starts being a choice. So this week's picks all circle the long game in one way or another. The unglamorous, relentless, deeply human work that compounds while everyone else is waiting to feel motivated again. Grab a coffee. Here is what earned a spot this week.
I try to keep this list honest. No filler, nothing I have not actually read, watched, or listened to myself, and nothing that landed here just because an algorithm decided it was trending. If it made the cut, it earned a few minutes of your weekend and it connects to something real. This week the thread is the long game, and once you see it you will not be able to unsee it running through every single pick.
READING
Book of the Week
Unreasonable Hospitality: The Remarkable Power of Giving People More Than They Expect, by Will Guidara.
Guidara ran Eleven Madison Park, and under him it went from a very good restaurant to the number one restaurant in the world. This book is the story of how, and it is not what you would expect. It is not about better food or fancier rooms. It is about a fairly simple, fairly radical idea. That the difference between good and unforgettable is almost never the product. It is the way you make people feel.
The story everyone quotes is the hot dog. A table of foodies mentioned offhand that they had eaten everywhere in the city except a classic New York street hot dog before they flew home. So Guidara ran outside, bought one for a couple of bucks, and had his kitchen plate it as a surprise course in a four star dining room. It cost almost nothing. The guests never forgot it. That is the whole thesis. The thing people remember is rarely the expensive thing. It is the unreasonable, unexpected, you-actually-saw-me thing.
I am reading it through a marketing lens, and it is sharpening how I think about every client touchpoint. In a year where AI can handle the efficient part of almost any business, the moments where you give someone more than they paid for are turning into the only real moat left. This one is going on the permanent shelf.
What makes it land is that Guidara is not preaching at you. He is just telling stories about what happened when his team decided to care more than the situation strictly required. A bottle of something sent to a table celebrating quietly in the corner. A staffer chasing a guest down a New York sidewalk to return a forgotten toy. None of it was in the budget. All of it became the reason people came back and brought everyone they knew. The book quietly reframes hospitality from a restaurant word into a way of moving through any business, and honestly through any relationship you care about.
Get it here: Unreasonable Hospitality on Amazon
ARTICLES
The Reading List
1. AI Is Powering Small Business Growth in 2026
Source: CO by U.S. Chamber of Commerce
Solid, grounded piece on what is actually happening with AI inside small and mid sized businesses right now, minus the hype. The line that stuck with me is that the new competitive edge is not the size of your budget, it is your AI literacy and your speed. A forty person team can adopt and properly set up a new tool in a few weeks while a giant company is still scheduling the procurement meeting. That speed is the whole advantage, and most owners are sleeping on it. The piece pushes the same thing I keep preaching. Pick one high friction workflow and ask whether AI can meaningfully reduce that friction this quarter. Not someday. This quarter.
What I appreciate is that it does not treat AI like a magic wand or a looming threat. It treats it like a skill, something you build literacy in the same way you once learned to use a spreadsheet, and the businesses that win are simply the ones that start before they feel ready and let the competence compound. Less theater, more reps.
Read it here: AI Is Powering Small Business Growth in 2026
2. The Art of Success: 8 Habits of Disciplined People Who Win in the Long Run
Source: Silicon Canals
This one reads like it came straight out of my own notebook. The core argument is that the people who quietly outperform everyone are not more talented or more motivated. They build habits the rest of the world never sees, they run on systems instead of emotion, and they simply stay in the game long enough for compounding to kick in. There is a line in there about the early days of a business, when you publish and publish and the internet does not seem to notice, and how consistency is the thing that buys you the time for the foundation to matter. If you needed a permission slip to keep going through the boring middle, this is it.
It also has a healthy disrespect for motivation, which I am always here for. Motivation comes and goes like the tide. Systems do not. That one distinction is the entire difference between people who talk about success at dinner parties and people who quietly accumulate it while nobody is watching.
Read it here: 8 Habits of Disciplined People Who Win in the Long Run
3. Human First, AI Smart: The Customer Experience Balance for 2026
Source: CMSWire
The perfect companion to the Guidara book. The writer's argument is that in 2026 empathy is no longer a differentiator, it is table stakes, and the brands that win are not the ones using the most technology, they are the ones using it to strengthen trust. The first letter in AI stands for artificial, and there are moments in every customer relationship that an algorithm cannot carry. The whole skill now is discernment. Knowing which moments to automate and which moments demand a real human showing up. Read it back to back with the book and you will start seeing your own business differently.
There is a point in there I keep turning over, that a large share of customers still want a real human the second something gets complicated or emotional. Speed is wonderful right up until the moment a person needs to feel understood, and no chatbot has ever once pulled that off. The winners will be the ones who automate the boring and protect the human.
Read it here: Human First, AI Smart: The CX Balance for 2026
LISTENING
The Conversation
Q&AF Ft. Tim Grover: Avoiding Discomfort, Staying Motivated After Big Wins & Becoming Your Best Self, on REAL AF with Andy Frisella, episode 1031.
Tim Grover trained Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, and Dwyane Wade, and he has spent a career studying what actually separates the relentless from the rest. This episode is a question and answer format, so it moves fast and stays practical. The three themes are exactly the ones I have been wrestling with all week. Why most people quietly build their lives around dodging discomfort. How to stay motivated after a big win, when the hunger that got you there suddenly goes quiet. And what becoming your best self actually requires, which is a lot less inspiring and a lot more repetitive than the highlight reels suggest. If you only have time for one thing on this list, and you are in the messy middle of something, make it this.
Listen here: Q&AF Ft. Tim Grover on Spotify
On Repeat
Grindin', by Clipse.
I know I have put this one in front of you before, and I am doing it again on purpose, because it is just that solid. The Neptunes built the beat out of almost nothing. A woodblock, a couple of cracks, and a whole lot of space. No wall of sound, no clutter. And somehow it hits harder than tracks with ten times the production. There is a lesson buried in there for anyone building anything. Restraint and repetition can carry more weight than noise. It has been the soundtrack to my work blocks this week, and it pairs perfectly with a month that is all about putting your head down and grinding through the part nobody claps for.
Listen here: Grindin' by Clipse on Spotify
WATCHING
On the Screen
Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan, on Prime Video.
Comfort watching for the analyst in all of us. Ryan is the rare action hero whose superpower is patience and pattern recognition. He sees the thing nobody else sees because he is willing to do the slow, unglamorous homework while everyone else wants the dramatic move. The pacing is tight, the stakes are real, and underneath all the spycraft and the ghost-in-the-machine intrigue there is a quiet through line about doing the right hard thing when the easy wrong thing is sitting right there. Easy to put on at the end of a long week, and somehow still on theme. Relentless, methodical, and not in a hurry to be impressive.
Stream it here: Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan on Prime Video
That is the week. Six things, one thread. Put your head down, give people a little more than they expect, and keep grinding through the part nobody claps for. It adds up faster than you think, and usually right around the time you were about to quit.
Resources
Everything from this week, in one place, so you do not have to scroll back up.
Track: Grindin' — Clipse
Tools I Actually Use
A quick note before the list. A few of the links below are affiliate links, which means if you sign up I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. I only ever put my name next to tools I personally run inside my own business. If I am not using it, it is not on the list.
Make.com for the automations that quietly run my content distribution. Get started
Fathom.video for recording and summarizing my calls so I stay present in them. Get started
Galaxy.ai for access to every major AI model in one place. Get started
Rize.io for tracking where my focus actually goes during the day. Get started
Beehiiv for sending the newsletter you are reading right now. Get started
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One step, one day. Grace over guilt. — Dan Kaufman
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