Creatively written, cleverly packaged advice for organizational leaders.
A fictional work highlights leadership principles.
In the tradition of the blockbuster book Who Moved My Cheese? (1998) by Spencer Johnson, corporate veterans Desiderio and Frino have crafted a business fable that metaphorically compares beekeeping with leading a business. The story centers on Catherine, now a successful organizational consultant, who narrates a flashback story of how she evolved from her role as owner of a rapidly growing essential-oils business. While vacationing with her family on a tourist farm, she crosses paths with the place’s owner and beekeeper, Henry Ives, the former CEO of a marketing firm. Her chance meeting with Henry and subsequent conversations with him about how bees function inspire her to send motivational emails to her managers while she is away. For example, when Henry explains the nature of the honeybees’ hive, Catherine sends her leadership team an email that reads: “The hive is at the core of learning and growth and bees provide the nourishment for all things to grow. Bees work together and are focused on the same mission.” As the story unfolds, a number of leadership principles derived from what Catherine learns about bees are revealed. Of course, all these principles begin with the word Be—“Be Transformational,” “Be Curious,” “Be Growth-Minded,” and so on. The authors keep readers engaged by adding other characters and depicting various educational and sometimes amusing farm scenes, as when Catherine’s family feeds the pigs. Particularly enlightening is the last part of the book, which steps away from the farm narrative to expose how staffers back at the office are reacting to the emails sent by Catherine, who is not fully aware of the transformational impact she is having on her organization’s culture. The similarities of the beehive, worker bees, and even the queen bee to a well-oiled company run by humans are not only relevant, but at times startlingly accurate as well. The authors very effectively make the connection, although some readers may roll their eyes at the overabundance of bee-related puns. Still, as business fables go, this one largely succeeds.
Creatively written, cleverly packaged advice for organizational leaders.Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9781394165261
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Wiley
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 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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