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95 of 104 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Get Beyond the Bad Advice that Family and Friends Give, April 1, 2008
This review is from: The Adventures of Johnny Bunko: The Last Career Guide You'll Ever Need (Mass Market Paperback)
Young people mostly get their career advice from friends (who usually don't have any more experience or knowledge than they do) and family (who base their ideas on what worked three decades ago). Either way, you get off track pretty easily.
There's plenty of good career advice in books and articles, but most young people wouldn't sit still long enough to read those sources. A Whole New Mind author, Dan Pink, comes up with a great solution: Create a career advice book in the form of manga.
Most career writers when they want to simplify a message use a fable, with a few illustrations that show the key perspectives. The fable is clearly secondary to the details.
In The Adventures of Johnny Bunko, the story is more interesting than the advice. Having read a lot of Mr. Pink's writing, I thought I knew what he would probably advise. But I didn't realize that he would make the story so interesting, and that the manga format would add so much power to the story telling. Nice work!
What's the advice? Let me rephrase to make it clearer to you:
1. Don't be rigid about planning out each step well in advance . . . it's not possible to do.
2. Build on what you're good at (Peter Drucker originated that one) and avoid relying on what you aren't good at.
3. Focus on what you can do for others (start with the boss) rather than what's in it for you (you can read more about this in How to Be a Star at Work).
4. Keep at it. Practice makes perfect.
5. Take on big challenges and learn from them.
6. Make a difference.
I like this advice. I hope my youngsters will read this book and apply it. I know they probably wouldn't if it came from dear old Dad.
If I could add one piece of advice, it would be to:
Set some written goals about how you want to spend your life. Those goals will help you keep focused.
Well done, Dan Pink and Rob Ten Pas!
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12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Good for what is it, but less than it claims to be, September 27, 2009
This review is from: The Adventures of Johnny Bunko: The Last Career Guide You'll Ever Need (Mass Market Paperback)
Being quite the fan of Daniel Pink, I was excited to see that a new work of his had appeared. The book is a quick and easy read, the illustrations are fun, and it definitely contains a number of important career gems. HOWEVER, it falls far short of being "The last career guide you'll ever need". The book explores *what* to do, but says nothing about *how* to do it, which is just as important. Perhaps that would be more difficult to communicate in a short manga work.
All in all, this is probably worthwhile. Calibrate your expections appropriately, and you won't be disappointed. But don't expect to read this and have all your career problems melt away - there is a LOT that needs to be covered that isn't touched on here.
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9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Don't let the presentation fool you...content rich., August 5, 2008
This review is from: The Adventures of Johnny Bunko: The Last Career Guide You'll Ever Need (Mass Market Paperback)
Having read all of Daniel Pink's other books, I was excited to see this on the shelf. I started with Free Agent Nation a few years ago, which gave me a totally new perspective on the whole concept of work in the 21st century. I then worked my way into A Whole New Mind, which gave me--a mostly right-brained technology worker--hope for the future in a previously left-brain dominated world. It's neat to see not only the world itself shifting from left-brain to right-brain, but also to see this author's presentation jump into an obviously quirky/fun style. I loved the other books, but then again I love to read. I was a little concerned about the Manga style at first, but I didn't pick it up because of the style or the graphics: Mr. Pink's books are all extremely thought-provoking, and have pointed me in the right direction many times (not just job searches and career moves). So, yes, I bought the book simply because of the author's name on the side, but when I flipped through it in the bookstore, I realized it had a lot of substance. Like any good parable, it's an entertaining story about a fictional character who is just like a lot of us at work. I love the fact that the author's eating his own dog food here, by presenting this book in a fun way that draws you in (he talks about content -> design -> story in his previous book). I read this book once all the way through too fast...and then went back and re-read it when I had more time, and picked up a lot of things I had missed the first time around. It resonated so much with me that I let my girlfriend read it (she loved it) and I'm thinking of loaning it to other friends who seem bored with their jobs/lives. I've been reading a lot of books lately that have given me back far more than I've put into them monetarily. My only concern is that people might overlook or dismiss this useful book simply because of the Manga presentation. Once you start reading, the characters come to life (especially Johnny, for anyone who's done the same job over and over again without really finding joy in it), and you start to see ways of improving your own situation. If you enjoy reading this book (I know I sound like Amazon or whatever making recommendations), go back and take a look at Free Agent Nation (although it is a few years old, it has good advice and entertaining stories) and A Whole New Mind (more recent, and pulls the author's thoughts together into a more detail-rich and current book than the first). This book certainly stands alone, but you might enjoy rounding this parable out with the full-scale novels of his other two books. To summarize: unless you're totally, 100% happy with your current job or life situation, you should read Johnny Bunko to see if there aren't a few things you might be missing. Warning: side effects may include increased cravings for Asian food eaten with chopsticks!
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