Punchy, concise, and reality-based; provides solid ground for the concept of supervision and should act as a day-to-day...
A debut compendium offers tips for employee supervisors.
Early on in her book, organizational and human resources consultant Sever makes a key distinction: “Supervision is a part of management, but it is not the same thing….Similarly, leadership is a part of supervision, but it is not the same thing.” Management involves broader issues than just personnel, and leadership can occur throughout an organization. But supervision, writes Sever, is specifically the management of people. With this notion driving the singular concept of the book, the author keeps her laser focus on the ups, downs, and intricacies of supervision and the interrelationships of these particular managers with their teams. Twelve chapters key into a supervisor’s major areas of responsibility. For example, “How You Act” addresses trust, power, taking action, communication, bad versus good practices, kindness, and self-discipline. “How You Are Part of the Organization” reveals important lessons about the role of the supervisor, including intriguing insights into office culture, the importance of policies, and bullies in the workplace. Each chapter is broken into short, discrete segments (the common-sensical book’s subtitle aptly refers to them as “bite-sized ideas”) that are a breeze to read but are riddled with observations and advice based on experience. Sidebars highlight examples and on-the-job scenarios to bring relevancy to the text. “A Sample Coaching Conversation,” for instance, illustrates how a supervisor helps an employee problem-solve a missed deadline while “Approaching Conflict: Ten Steps” enumerates and describes actions to take to reduce the negative effects of conflict. Particularly helpful are the occasional interspersed “Coaching Corner” snippets in which the author poses thought-provoking questions to engage readers. A cleverly structured Appendix classifies sections of the volume by reading time based on word count. But, an index, which is missing, would have been useful in locating the sections by page number. Sever’s contention is “the role of supervision is hugely underappreciated in most organizations.” This handy guide is an effective antidote to that unfortunate attitude.
Punchy, concise, and reality-based; provides solid ground for the concept of supervision and should act as a day-to-day manual for both veterans and novices.Pub Date: Aug. 23, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-63152-145-4
Page Count: 336
Publisher: She Writes Press
Review Posted Online: Nov. 7, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
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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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