Wise, inspired reading.
A former professional lacrosse player offers insight into the perennial human quest for excellence.
For Rabil, whom the New York Times called “the LeBron James of Lacrosse,” choosing challenge is the way not just of the champion, but of anyone who seeks what champions have in common: greatness. He begins by considering the amateur stages of a champion’s journey, which are necessarily characterized by exploration and experimentation. For the person who walks this part of the path, “the goal is to find the thing that…will eventually inspire” full commitment. After that, the individual must leave behind fear to move beyond what Arnold Schwarzenegger has called the “daydreaming” phase to goal setting and methods that include daily workouts/practice, as well as confronting setbacks with realistic optimism. The next stage is that of the professional. The freedom to play now becomes imbued with seriousness: “You have to invest more of your time, more of your resources,” and be more aware of the competition than ever before. The discipline of the amateur now becomes insanity “about the craft.” Being a professional also means learning how to work with others on a team because greatness means asking for help and letting others help make you better. “You should be able to do anything, but you can’t do everything,” writes the author. The final stage of the champion’s journey involves letting go “of attachments and expectations” and, like soccer great Abby Wambach, seek to be forgotten so that the greatness of others can emerge (“I want to leave a legacy where the ball keeps rolling forward”). Accessible and practical, Rabil’s book will appeal to anyone seeking not only to understand what it takes to succeed, but also to understand the courage, discipline, and grace it takes to become a champion. Bill Belichick provides the foreword.
Wise, inspired reading.Pub Date: May 7, 2024
ISBN: 9780593545492
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Portfolio
Review Posted Online: Feb. 2, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2024
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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