A potentially useful collection of solid, common-sense advice but not the prophetic vision it claims to be.
Johansen, Press, and Bullen’s sweeping treatise on how a contemporary workplace crisis has created new ways to transform office life.
According to Johansen, Press, and Bullen, a “time of global turmoil” culminating in the Covid-19 pandemic has resulted in “office shock,” a crescendo of employee discontent. The sting of obvious inequity, lack of diversity, absence of a positive office culture, and low job satisfaction has brought about a crisis in work culture. However, the co-authors claim that this crisis has also paved the way for the “Great Opportunity,” which is a chance to formulate a brighter vision of office life. The co-authors envision this future broadly—they are interested in the entire sphere of work-life that goes beyond the traditional office to the “officeverse” and the “archipelago of anytime/anyplace mixes of media—including office buildings—that you will be able to choose among to determine where, when, and how you work.” To assist with the decision-making process that determines what the offices of the future will look like—they will be “tailor-made, and personalized” to maximize the happiness of their employees—the authors provide an “office shock mixing board,” a practical tool indicative of the book’s pragmatic orientation. For example, a “spectrum of purpose” swings from individual to collective goods, while a “spectrum of belonging” covers the space between the value of difference in the workspace and the comforts of familiar ways of doing business. Also, the authors sketch a concise and edifying history of office life, from the traditional “hierarchical” kind to its modern “networked” improvement. Yet despite the book’s celebrations of visionary thinking, most of what’s offered here consists of familiar formulas with the now commonplace peppering of the “latest neuroscience findings,” which are too general to count as substantive evidence. Characteristic of the book’s genre, the co-authors spout plenty of neologisms and corporate jargon: “Full-spectrum thinking is about recognizing patterns across gradients of possibility.” But if one can push past the deluge of corporate-speak, this guide to workplace contentment may offer a practical way to transcend traditional creativity-stifling office work.
A potentially useful collection of solid, common-sense advice but not the prophetic vision it claims to be.Pub Date: Jan. 17, 2023
ISBN: 9781523003679
Page Count: 296
Publisher: Berrett-Koehler Publishers
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our...
A psychologist and Nobel Prize winner summarizes and synthesizes the recent decades of research on intuition and systematic thinking.
The author of several scholarly texts, Kahneman (Emeritus Psychology and Public Affairs/Princeton Univ.) now offers general readers not just the findings of psychological research but also a better understanding of how research questions arise and how scholars systematically frame and answer them. He begins with the distinction between System 1 and System 2 mental operations, the former referring to quick, automatic thought, the latter to more effortful, overt thinking. We rely heavily, writes, on System 1, resorting to the higher-energy System 2 only when we need or want to. Kahneman continually refers to System 2 as “lazy”: We don’t want to think rigorously about something. The author then explores the nuances of our two-system minds, showing how they perform in various situations. Psychological experiments have repeatedly revealed that our intuitions are generally wrong, that our assessments are based on biases and that our System 1 hates doubt and despises ambiguity. Kahneman largely avoids jargon; when he does use some (“heuristics,” for example), he argues that such terms really ought to join our everyday vocabulary. He reviews many fundamental concepts in psychology and statistics (regression to the mean, the narrative fallacy, the optimistic bias), showing how they relate to his overall concerns about how we think and why we make the decisions that we do. Some of the later chapters (dealing with risk-taking and statistics and probabilities) are denser than others (some readers may resent such demands on System 2!), but the passages that deal with the economic and political implications of the research are gripping.
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our minds.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-374-27563-1
Page Count: 512
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
IN THE NEWS
These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.
A helpful guide to working effectively with people from other cultures.
“The sad truth is that the vast majority of managers who conduct business internationally have little understanding about how culture is impacting their work,” writes Meyer, a professor at INSEAD, an international business school. Yet they face a wider array of work styles than ever before in dealing with clients, suppliers and colleagues from around the world. When is it best to speak or stay quiet? What is the role of the leader in the room? When working with foreign business people, failing to take cultural differences into account can lead to frustration, misunderstanding or worse. Based on research and her experiences teaching cross-cultural behaviors to executive students, the author examines a handful of key areas. Among others, they include communicating (Anglo-Saxons are explicit; Asians communicate implicitly, requiring listeners to read between the lines), developing a sense of trust (Brazilians do it over long lunches), and decision-making (Germans rely on consensus, Americans on one decider). In each area, the author provides a “culture map scale” that positions behaviors in more than 20 countries along a continuum, allowing readers to anticipate the preferences of individuals from a particular country: Do they like direct or indirect negative feedback? Are they rigid or flexible regarding deadlines? Do they favor verbal or written commitments? And so on. Meyer discusses managers who have faced perplexing situations, such as knowledgeable team members who fail to speak up in meetings or Indians who offer a puzzling half-shake, half-nod of the head. Cultural differences—not personality quirks—are the motivating factors behind many behavioral styles. Depending on our cultures, we understand the world in a particular way, find certain arguments persuasive or lacking merit, and consider some ways of making decisions or measuring time natural and others quite strange.
These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.Pub Date: May 27, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-61039-250-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: April 15, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2014
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