Customer Reviews

The 12 Bad Habits That Hold Good People Back: Overcoming the Behavior Patterns That Keep You From Getting Ahead

5 star:		(28)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

Think of this book as a psychologically-based opposite to Stephen Covey's 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

The authors are both business psychologists, executive coaches for those with career problems, and directors of MBA career development at Harvard Business School. The book is well illustrated with examples of their concepts, drawn from actual cases they have worked on. I suspect you will recognize people you have met, as well as yourself, in these cases.

As the authors are well aware, a major flaw can sink someone who is otherwise a top performer. Improving an area where the person is strong will do less good than getting the substandard area up to normal or better.

Based on their years of experience they note, 'The ways people fail in their careers, however, are quite limited. People fail in the same ways, for the same reasons, over and over again, from one industry to another, from the lowest level to the highest . . . Moreover . . . many . . . people are amazingly unaware of the patterns of behavior they exhibit that are resulting in failure.' Talk about unconscious incompetence!

Part I of the book identifies 12 behaviors that can hold you back.

1. Never Feeling Good Enough (acrophobia or fear of career progress)

2. Seeing the World in Black and White (meritocrat or not seeing the relevance of loyalty, self-interest, or personality)

3. Doing Too Much, Pushing Too Hard (a hero, with an Achilles heel from overdoing it)

4. Avoiding Conflict at Any Cost (peacekeeper, who avoids even healthy conflict such as that required to overcome misconceptions)

5. Running Roughshod over the Opposition (bulldozer, a male role similar to an offensive lineman in football)

6. Rebel Looking for a Cause (rebels, who want attention more than results)

7. Always Swinging for the Fences (a home run style swinger who strikes out most of the time)

8. When Fear Is in the Driver's Seat (a pessimistic worrier, a naysayer out of fear)

9. Emotionally Tone Deaf (Mr. Spock from Star Trek, low emotional intelligence)

10. When No Job Is Good Enough (Coulda-been, who moves on because they feel inadequate, but don't want to face up to that)

11. Lacking a Sense of Boundaries (People who talk out of school)

12. Losing the Path (Alienated people who have lost their career vision of what they want from a career)

Each chapter in Part I contains a description of the dynamics of each pattern, how that role plays out in an organization, what the origins of the pattern are, and how to break the pattern. In the last case, the advice is sometimes different if the pattern is your own versus when you are trying to help someone else (such as a subordinate or peer) to do so. These are at least two examples in each section, evenly balanced between women and men.

In Part II, the authors look at the four psychological causes of these 12 behavioral problems:

1. Having a negatively-distorted self-image.

2. Not seeing the perspectives of others.

3. Not coming to terms with authority.

4. Not being comfortable with using power.

The authors describe in the chapters of Part I which of these base causes are involved with which patterns, and chapter 16 gives you help with examining your self-image. There is also a good section in Takeaways for ways to make the needed changes. The chapters also contain useful material to understand your own perceptual style from a Jungian perspective.

I found all of this material clear, and usefully directive.

But something more important was missing. I did not feel any strong desire to change, even where I could identify weaknesses. If you are like me, you will need to talk this through with your spouse, a close friend, or a colleague to help create the motivation to change. If you can afford and find an executive coach, that would be a good route also. If you cannot, you will have to rely on self-help. In this regard, you might find it useful to read or reread a book like Anthony Robbin's Awaken the Giant Within, which is excellent for helping to create the necessary self-motivation to change.

My suggestion is that you think about a situation that will probably happen in the future that you will regret for the rest of your life if you do not change. Maybe you'll have to move to another country to get a new job, and be cut off from your parents at a time when they need your help. Or perhaps your struggling teenager will have to move at a bad time in his or her high school years, harming your teenager's development. You know better than I what the risks are in your life and what you would regret. But do take the time to create a specific, realistic fear to replace the unrealistic one(s) you have today.

Very well written psychology book on human behavior that you can commonly find in your organization. Not much jargons but in plain simple english. It not only describes the twelve behavior patterns that holding good people back, but also does suggest how to fix and manage them.

To depict the 12 hebavior patterns, the authors cleverly use different simple scenarios and business cases to address the orgins of the problem & pattern. They explain why the behavior patterns may limit your career advancement and how should break the behaviour patterns. I personally found that some patterns breaking approach could be helpful but some don't and lack of practical details. The authors seem to suggest most of the cases that the root of these behaviour patterns are arised out of childhood development. Well, I am not sure this is completely correct but you can certainly find more explanation in Part II of the book.

The 12 bad habits that hold good people back are listed below:

1. Never feeling good enough
2. Seeing the world in black & white
3. Doing too much, pushing too hard
4. Avoiding conflict at any cost
5. Running roughshod over the opposition
6. Rebel looking for a cause
7. Always swinging for the fence
8. When the fear is in the driver's seat
9. Emotionally tone-deaf
10. When no job is good enough
11. Lacking a sense of boundaries
12. Losing the path

To make readers easy to understand and remember these 12 behavior patterns, the authors also name these bad habits as the following easy terms:

1. Acrophobe
Feeling in their heart of hearts that they don't deserve to be where they have been placed.

2. Meritocrat
Seeing the world black & white, with answers that are right or wrong, all weighed on a perfectly fair scale and judged accordingly, on their merits alone.

3. Hero
Constantly trying to do too much and pushing too hard on both themselves and other people.

4. Peacekeeper
Going out of the way to avoid conflict, because of uncertainty about how it will end up.

5. Bulldozer
Talking and acting tough, bullying people, taking no prisoners, and leveling anyone and anything that gets in the way.

6. Rebel
To defy authority and everything associated with authority, including societal tradition, company custom, and good taste.

7. Home run hitter
Expecting & demanding extraordinary and immediate success.

8. Pessimist-Worrier
Seeing the negative and almost nothing but the negative; and worrying about it to excess.

9. Mr. Spocks
Having a hard time recognizing and understanding fear, love, anger, jealousy, greed, compassion, and other emotions in themselves or in others.

10. Coulda-been
These people have very little tolerance for hard work and little patience, not because they're lazy, but because doing the work to get to the top means that they're not already there. When they seem to be saying is "No job is good enough," but what they actually feel inside is "I'm not good enough for any job."

11. Loose Lips
The person who lacks an appropriate sense of boundaries doesn't understand that some subjects belong in the office and some belong only in certain corners of the office and definitely not outside.

12. Dig Deeper
Feeling they have lost their sense of direction, or a sense of enthusiasm that has dimished or disappeared for reasons that are not immediately clear.

If you want to know more details, you can find very rich information from Part II of the book. It includes not just a description of the core psychological issue for each behavior pattern, but tools you can use to access yourself in each area, and execrises that you can do to strengthen those weaker psychological "muscles."

Overall, this is a pretty interesting book you may want to put in your own collection.

Many of us, including myself, spend a huge amount of time and energy trying to "get the job done" not realizing that some of the behavior patterns are making our work lives more stressful, less effective and in some cases making you---or your employee---a difficult person to work with.

I picked this up after searching online for a career transition book. The authors, two guys from Harvard, have written a really fantastic guide to managing your career. If you know anyone who has had negative performance review, has problems being a "team player" or if you are a manager that has an employee that everyone in the office perceives as "difficult", do yourself a favor and pick-up a copy of this book.

These guys have practical exercises and explanations for some of the bad behaviors we have at work---procrastinating, falling behind, constant feelings of stress or anxiety. Far from the "touchy feely" approach of many of the self-help schmaltz out there, these guys are from the business world and offer real steps and real solutions to modify the negative behaviors. (eg. you may be a natural worrier and never be worry-free, but you can cultivate new ways to process the worry so that it doesn't interfere with your "getting the job done.")

In my opinion, a must read!

Some books are Godsent for those who are perplexed and truly want to know the answers to their problems. This is one of them. If you have been recently fired or are in a career rut, and don't completely understand why, then buy this book and read it cover to cover. The odds are VERY high you have more than one of the 12 bad habits which is killing your career.

As always, it takes some humility to admit your own flaws and correct them. This book provides solid basis for starting the path to your own career enlightenment.

I thought that there was a lot of really good content in Waldroop and Butler's "Maximum Sucess", in addition to a very logical organization and a cystal clear style of writing littered with concrete examples to make the points come to life. The book is divided into TWO PARTS, the first dealing with 12 behavior patterns that are destructive to one's career and the second dealing with the four underlying psychological dynamics that are the root causes of these behaviors. I find this organization to be very satisfactory from a writing perspective as well as from the standpoint of human psychology, that the roots of our behaviors are in our minds, in what we are mentally. I read the authors "Discover Your Career in Business" (1997) in October 1999 and it really helped me to understand my own interests and the kinds of positions in business which were a good fit for a person with those interests. The authors combine a deep knowledge of human psychology with an understanding of how business works, a rare combination. Ultimately, this is a book about knowing oneself, mastering one's character flaws, and becoming the kind of person one is capable of becoming; it is about self actualization and fulfilling one's potential, specifically in a business career. After reading their first two books, I can't wait for their next production! ---- Greg Feirman (Gfire77@yahoo.com)

I use the words complexity and perspicacity to discuss this book because the nature of the material the authors write about--the human mind and its behavior--is necessarily complex, while the authors display a very acute sense of those complexities.

If you are a well-read, emotionally literate, self-aware person, this book contains many ideas and tools you can use to "get ahead" in business. Its scope, however, is not limited to the business world. One would think that Bridget Jones et al would do well to use the ideas presented in this book. At heart the book is not so much about the behaviors that hold you back in the business world, but, rather it is about the behaviors that hold you back, period. The business world just contextualizes the nature of the consulting practice the authors have and the audience to whom they write (typically business students and executives).

I'm surprised this book never topped the business book charts as it is really quite excellent. As they say in the book- there are many different paths to career success in different fields / industries but the number of ways people's careers typically go wrong are surprisingly few. The book describes twelve of these "bad habits" (e.g. "Seeing the World in Black and White", "Rebel looking for a cause", "Doing too much, pushing too hard").

For each habit, the book describes:
i) The symptoms of each habit
ii) The impact on the organization
iii) How to break the pattern (if it's you)
iv) How to manage people like that too.

Often, many of the habits don't make themselves a problem until mid-career, as a person gets closer to management, where "soft" skills and politics become more critical. One very interesting note is how the authors mention that the very skills / personality attributes that may have contributed to your success so far (e.g. avoiding conflict, pushing hard, being very black-and-white etc.) need to be tempered or reined-in to continue to advance your career up the ladder.

The first part of the book is about the 12 habits themselves, the second part is about the typical underlying psychological issues / causes.
In that final section they discuss some core themes / approaches on how to help people, including seeing things from others' perspectives, understanding issues with authority and also how a negative self-image can lead to many of these habits.

The two authors have quite a lot of authority, they are psychologists by training and work for Harvard Business School where they are often called in to big companies as executive coaches. Many of the stories they related about executives and other professionals are really quite amazing in and of themselves.

Notably it's not a book about berating people for who they are, just about helping them understand why they commit certain career faux pas and how they might avoid it if, and this is important, IF they truly want to.

In my own case I found some of the habits particularly enlightening in terms of past incidents over the years I've observed or experienced; whether the habits were mine, a co-workers or that of a boss.

In my opinion, this book is a perfect follow-on to Stephen Covey's "7 Habits of Highly-Effective people" since you could follow Covey's program to perfection but still trip up if you aren't aware of any of these habits you might exhibit (and not even know it).

The book is divided into 2 parts Part I identifies the 12 bad habits that hold people back. Part II identifies the causes of the bad habits

There is something for everyone. Certainly we all have some or many of these bad habits in full or partial degrees. Authors do a nice job in defining the habit and providing examples.

You will find a number of "ah-has" along with sharp piercing observations. For example, for the Meritocrat:

"one of those people who insist that proposals, ideas, products - virtually everything in life - must be considered strictly rationally, on their inherent merit, their absolute, true value. They see the world in black and white - without colors or shades of gray. If the meritocrat ruled the world, all decisions would be put through some sort of merit-weighing machine. Emotions, politics, sentimentality, loyalties, favoritism would play absolutely no part...he or she consistently talks about the ways things "should" be, about the unfairness of life, railing about how the well connected, the meretricious, and the conniving rise to the top, while the honest and the principled fall by the wayside...the meritocrat fails to see that people are complicated, with many shades of gray...sometimes to win the battle you have to negotiate and compromise - promise something to someone to get him or her to join your side - which goes against the code of rationality...the person who thinks this way is acting almost as an anti-Machiavellian, someone who loathes politics and flattery and the compromises of deal making. Most of us, it is true, would rather deal with the meritocrat than his polar opposite, the unprincipled schemer for whom ideals have no value. The schemer is loathsome in his treachery; the meritocrat insufferable only in his self-righteousness.

While there is something for everyone, I found myself skipping many sections of the book that I didn't find applicable or perhaps at the farthest end of an extreme of my bad habit.

While the book does an excellent job in describing and giving examples of bad habits, it falls short on practical ways to change.

The book is dense, thick and slow moving - while examples were used liberally, I found it to read like an academic textbook and found it difficult to stay engaged.

Finally, who says good packaging doesn't work. My eyes locked in on the sharp fire engine red packaging on the shelf and I had to have it.

The 12 bad habits that Hold Good people back are:

Part I:
1. Never Feeling Good Enough (The "Acrophobe")
2. Seeing the World in Black and White (The "Meritocrat")
3. Doing Too Much, Pushing Too Hard (The "Hero")
4. Avoiding Conflict at Any Cost (The "Peacekeeper")
5. Running Roughshod Over the Opposition (The "Bulldozer")
6. Rebel Looking for a Cause (The "Rebel")
7. Always Swinging for the Fence (The "Home Run Hitter")
8. When Fear is in the Driver's Seat (The "Pessimist Worrier")
9. Emotionally Tone-Deaf ("Mr. Spocks")
10. When No Job is Good Enough ("Coulda-been")
11. Lacking a Sense of Boundaries ("Loose Lips")
12. Losing the Path (losing sense of direction or enthusiasm) ("Dig Deeper")

Part II: The Psychological Issues behind the 12 Behavior Patterns:
1. Taking Others Perspectives (Not being able to take/see other people's perspectives)
2. Coming to Terms with Authority (Not coming to terms with authority)
3. Using Power (Inability to use power comfortably, skillfully, effectively)
4. Looking in the Mirror: Examining Your Self-Image (Having a negatively distorted self image)

Both authors are directors of MBA Career Development at Harvard. Although this is rather academic book, it is also full of real life examples that enhance its understanding. They list 12 habits, how they hurt success, their etiology, and their possible amelioration. At times it gets a little unnerving as these bad habits are all traced back to one's relationship with one's parents. It seems like the ONLY answer they have for their cause. I also grimaced a bit when they recommended drugs for people that say what they think too quickly. This would have been a better book if they left the field of psychiatry/psychology to their respective experts. I did enjoy the delineation of the 12 habits and see how they can be destructive. I am sure that many will see themselves and those around them in these categories. I did, and for that increased awareness:

Four Stars

If you want to achieve your goals and activate your sales like never before, you need to break through your bad habits (...). This book helped me do that! The barriers that I had put in front of myself crumbled like so much rubble at my feet and now I am charging ahead, surpassing my goals and wowing everybody around me. I've streamlined my whole organization, begun to see every human interaction as an opportunity for me to win, and become a customer-focused consulting machine. This kind of success once seemed impossible, but it was really just a matter of turning a few bad habits around. Thanks Jim & Tim!