Win at Home First: An Inspirational Guide to Work Life Balance by Cory M. Carlson came out in May 2019 and runs 221 pages. Brian Tome, the founding pastor of Crossroads Church in Cincinnati, is credited on the book alongside Carlson. An earlier version of this review left him out.
It is published through Cloud Rider Publishing, a small independent imprint, so this is closer to a self published book than a Zondervan or Thomas Nelson title. That is not a mark against it, but it explains the lighter editing in places.
Where Carlson is coming from
He was a corporate executive before he became a leadership coach. He is married with three kids. The book is written out of the specific problem of a man who is good at his job and is quietly losing his family to it.
The central move is in the title. Carlson argues that most men have the order backward, treating home as what is left over after work takes what it wants, and that reversing the order is a decision rather than a feeling. He is direct that this costs something at work and does not pretend otherwise.
What is actually in it
Building a personal and family vision. Rest and whether you actually take any. Marriage, including the part most Christian business books skip. Raising kids with something more deliberate than proximity. Then a back half on doing better at work precisely because home is handled.
Chapters are short with reflection prompts, which suits the reader it is aimed at. A man who is too busy to read is unlikely to finish a dense book, and Carlson clearly knows that.
The honest criticism
It covers familiar ground. If you have read anything in the work and family category, the ideas here are not new. Carlson’s contribution is the framing and the directness, not original insight.
It also assumes a fair amount of control over your schedule. The advice fits an executive or a business owner better than it fits a man working shifts or holding two jobs. That reader will find parts of it hard to apply and the book does not acknowledge him.
The Scripture use is real but light. This is a Christian business book more than a theological one.
Worth your time?
Yes, if you are in a demanding role and you already suspect you are trading your family for it. The value is in being told plainly, with a plan attached, by someone who did it himself.
No, if your problem is not ambition. This book is aimed at men whose work is winning, and it will not speak to a man whose situation is different.
An earlier version of this review described bedtime discussions and new weekly family check ins started by a review team. Those stories were invented and have been removed.