3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Sophomoric Approach to Helping You Turn Around Your Employees, June 6, 2009
This review is from: Instant Turnaround!: Getting People Excited About Coming to Work and Working Hard (Hardcover)
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Though this book has some decent information, most everything contained within is so simple that it should be obvious to anyone that has spent anytime in management. The material is perhaps better suited as an introduction to management in a high school class or 101 college course. It teaches you to motivate through trust, not fear. It teaches that positive reinforcement works better than being negative or overbearing. Got it, check. I was hoping to get new ideas from this book - perhaps a way to motivate employees that wasn't obvious. Unfortunately, this book simply re-states what good managers should really already know.
Let me stress that I think the message and idea behind this book is a great one. Learn how to treat your employees and make them excited about coming in to work. Once they're there, lead them to apply all of their effort to the job they do. However, I just think this book presents the actual methods of achieving this in all too simplistic a nature.
It seems this book, and many just like it, was banged out by a PhD that applies basic psychology to the workplace without having spent any time actually working in the environments they wish to help you improve. I not only want to know why... I want to know how. Tell me how it worked in your workplace. Give me real world examples, not just basic pie in the sky ideas.
Overall, this is a great idea for a book that ultimately falls short on delivery.
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5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Critical Idea; Pollyanna Writing Can be Off-putting, June 5, 2009
This review is from: Instant Turnaround!: Getting People Excited About Coming to Work and Working Hard (Hardcover)
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This book is Management 101, Light. The basic premise is a critical one for anyone in a management position: "paying positive attention to the people who work for you has a DOMINANT impact on their productivity." This is a message every manager needs to understand and internalize.
While the authors add a number of sidebars and references to studies that support their points, the main portion of the book explores this fundamental concept told as parable, and this is where the message weakens. The story of Nancy Kim and her "turnaround" of the fictitious "BizTrenz" is told in such a Pollyanna fashion as to risk alienating readers. The airline Nancy and her cohort visit is a thinly disguised Southwest Airlines, and the overnight transformation of J.T. from an S.O.B. who couldn't see his employees as anything but numbers to "Supportive Boss of the Year" is less than believable. Nevertheless, if you can get around these negatives, this book is a worthwhile and quick read for a busy executive.
Consider "Instant Turnaround" an appetizer. For those wanting more "meat", read "Nuts" by Kevin and Jackie Freiberg, for a look at the management practices at Southwest Airlines and consider "The Carrot Principle: How the Best Managers Use Recognition to Engage Their People, Retain Talent and Accelerate Performance" for a more in-depth discussion of this topic.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Fun storytelling, good read for your employee facing managers, June 20, 2009
This review is from: Instant Turnaround!: Getting People Excited About Coming to Work and Working Hard (Hardcover)
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"Instant Turnaround" employs the popular format of storytelling to teach a management lesson, like "Fish" or "Who Moved My Cheese." A fast good read that you can get some benefit out of. However, if you're looking for the magic bullet to the eternal challenge of getting people to do what they were hired to do - especially in our current economy - you'll be disappointed.
The major problem with all of these type of books is their over simplification of the issue - along with their implication that accomplishing their outcome (here being turnaround and employee job satisfaction) is easy. Balancing the often conflicting pressures of people and the business (numbers, profits, stock equity, etc) is challenging, much more difficult than this book admits. Not a serious business or leadership book, but an enjoyable read that will remind you of many fundamentals.
There are summary points after every chapter, along with a chapter that clearly outlines the steps and behaviors to turn work into a exciting place that employees look forward to coming to
Goal: to turn work into a destination - a place that employees are excited about coming to every day.
Step 1: Focus on people as well as performance numbers
Step 2: You bring out the best in people by motivating with trust instead of fear
Step 3: Turn work into fun.
Step 4: Senior management must execute Destination: work with frontline employees.
Some key behaviors are:
- Be nice because you care, not because you want something
- Don't come across as someone who superior, instead reach out and embrace employees as equals
- Thank people in ways that are meaningful to them
- Regularly circulate among employees, letting them get to know you while listening and getting their opinions on things which you act upon when appropriate
- Smile and do things that brightens each person's day.
Mr. Tamayo summarized the positive elements of "Instant Turnaround" the best: this book is "a simple, effective way for every manager to create a work environment of genuine care, where people willfully choose and act toward getting desired results. For the new supervisor or manager, this superbly written parable provides a good foundation from which to lead others. For the experienced middle manager and executive leader, a 90-minute investment of reading time is enough to remember and acknowledge that the key to inspiring others to do their best lies in satisfying their needs first."
The best use of this book may be to let grumpy front-line managers read it so that you can set your expectations with them.
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