Reading Our Way Forward: The Case for CMAC's Book Club

Something happens when a group of club professionals sits down to talk about a book. The conversation rarely stays on the page. It drifts, quickly and naturally, toward the clubs we manage, the members we serve, and the decisions we made last week that we find ourselves quietly reconsidering. That drift, I've learned, is the entire point.

When CMAC's Ontario Branch launched its book club this year, the premise was simple: to educate through reading, to broaden our perspectives, and to commit to continued learning. But the deeper idea, the one I keep returning to, is that our work is, at its heart, about people. In private clubs, we don't manage products or transactions. We build relationships, shape experiences, and steward communities. The skills that make us good at that are not fixed. They can be developed, questioned, and refined. Reading, and more importantly, discussing what we read, is one of the most practical ways I know to do exactly that.

We began the year with Simon Sinek's Start With Why. On paper, it is a book about purpose. In our discussion, it became a mirror. How would you define your club's "why" today? It is a deceptively difficult question. Most of us can recite our club's history, its amenities, its traditions - but articulating why it exists, and whether our daily decisions genuinely reflect that purpose, takes real thought. I left that discussion thinking differently about how we communicate purpose to members and staff alike: not as a slogan, but as something that should be visible in the small choices we make every day.

Then came Adam Grant's Think Again, which asks us to hold our opinions more loosely. For those of us in a heritage-rich industry (I work at a club founded in 1907), this is bracing. We are, by nature, custodians of tradition. Yet Think Again makes a compelling case that respecting the past and remaining open to change are not in conflict. The strongest clubs, I've come to believe, are the ones that can honour their history while still asking, honestly, "What if we're wrong about this?" That question is uncomfortable. It is also where growth tends to live.

Here is what I did not fully anticipate when I joined: the reading is only half of it. The real value emerges in the room, when a colleague from another club describes how they handled a challenge you happen to be facing right now, or offers an interpretation of a chapter you had read completely differently. Our discussions are built around application, not summary. We spend our time not rehearsing what the author said but wrestling with what it means for us: for our teams, our boards, our members. Every discussion closes with a single question: "What is one idea you'll take back to your club?" I have never left without an answer.

That, to me, is the quiet power of this program. It is not about adding another book to a shelf or another line to a résumé. It is about coming to work slightly changed - with a sharper question, a new frame, a little more patience for a difficult conversation ahead. The books we've chosen this year reflect the full breadth of what we do. Purpose and adaptability, yes, but also communication, hospitality, service, culture, and governance. From How to Win Friends and Influence People to Unreasonable Hospitality to The Imperfect Board Member, each one speaks directly to a part of club life we all navigate.

I will be honest about one thing. It is easy to let professional development slip to the bottom of the list. Our days are full, and reading a book for work can feel like a luxury we cannot quite justify. But I would gently push back on that. An hour with a good book and a room full of thoughtful peers is not time away from the work - it is the work, approached from a different angle. The perspectives you gain, the assumptions you challenge, and the relationships you build across the branch all follow you back to your own club.

So, if you've been curious about the book club but haven't yet joined, consider this your invitation. You needn't have read every page, and you certainly needn't arrive with every answer. You only need to be willing to think, to listen, and to bring your own experience to the table. We have several books still ahead of us this year.

Bring your questions. Bring your skepticism. Bring one idea worth discussing. I suspect you'll be surprised by how much you take home.