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Leading with Kindness: How Good People Consistently Get Superior Results

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Leading With Kindness is a philosophical book written to promote a sound leadership principle. Kindness should not be viewed as an option to motivate and inspire others to superior achievement. This book helps to dispel the myth that demonstrating kindness as a leader is somehow "wishywashy" or "soft." In a world where shallow managers believe that bullying or intimidating others is an effective strategy,

Leading With Kindness is a fresh read. Its information comes from two psychologists who support their ideas with proven concepts, interviews with corporate leaders worldwide and real world examples. As Baker states, "I decided to write this book in order to advocate a different kind of management - a more progressive one based on an understanding of the individual
and an appreciation of the unique talents and contributions each person can offer."

Written in six chapters with an appendix, Baker and O'Malley discuss the six ingredients of kindness. Building upon this foundation they expand the scope of the book to explain what they believe are eight leadership principles in the fourth chapter. Further along in the book they continue to expound the importance of leading with kindness to examine "four qualities that great leaders are able to instill in others" which include self-confidence, self-control, self-awareness, and self-determination.

Leading With Kindness is a very good book boldly discussing a neglected topic in modern business environments. The plain truth is that leaders who demonstrate compassion, concern and kindness motivate others to grow beyond themselves for the benefit of the entire organization. On the other hand, those who manage by intimidation and fear attain only temporary results because they stunt creativity and emotionally sicken those who work with them. In this case, co-workers only desire to achieve the minimum of expected performance, while many subliminally work to obstruct the organization through a passive form of vengeance and retaliation. This book powerfully offers a large amount of information on why leadership and kindness go hand-in-hand. However, because it is written by individuals with academic experience, it is sometimes difficult to follow. Some sentences are so structured that they need to be re-read over again to grasp the original intent. Some readers may find this a challenge.

Bill Baker and Michael O'Malley have written a great book, a must read!

This book has a multitude of gems... for business leaders who desire to lead consistently with positive passionate acts and deeds and personalize and develop relationships with all the people they engage with on a daily basis... and for those who don't and could!

Bill and Michael document many successful companies whose leaders have established this "kindness" culture... and do win the super bowl... the World Series... the gold metals!

In business kindness is viewed as a weakness, and the perception of kind leaders is that they are ineffectual. LEADING WITH KINDNESS shows how this can become a business leadership trait and profiles world business leaders who have developed this trait to high success. Six ingredients of kindness are identified, linked to business pursuits, and assessed for pros and cons. Business leaders will find LEADING WITH KINDNESS a key to incorporating more humane actions into their pursuits.

One of the points addressed in this book is that at the time of printing, nine states were considering allowing employees to sue management. Why it is essential to read this book is because of the Supreme Court decision in 2000 determining that the first amendment does not and will not protect harassment at work. Avis Rent a Car took a harassment case all the way to the Supreme Court through appeal and lost.

This book was a little disappointing. Inspired to read it by watching the Charlie Rose interview with Bill Baker it seemed like it would be an intriguing read. Instead it seemed to espouse common sense leadership skills. Which brings up the question: are the basic personal skills deteriorating badly enough that leaders and teachers have to emphasize them this much? I expected some more depth in the book.

...and it isn't half good either.

[This review focuses on the technical qualities of the audiobook, and has less relevance for purchasers of the paper book.]

The tone, timbre, crispness, volume and recording level of the narration is faultless.

I really like the mp3 disk format that puts all the book on a single disk. That's splendid. I prefer the disk formats of audio books compared with the audio downloads that DRM invariably hobbles. And getting the book in one disk is much more efficient than six.

As for the content of this book, I believe there's a good message here, and I look forward to finishing the book. ON the downside, in my opinion, the authors excessively utilized multisyllabic expressions compositing constructions extensively overelongated. Short words in short sentences would have been better.

There is a serious problem with the audiobook. Each of the six tracks has a length of 1 hour or more. One of the authors was CEO of the Westinghouse radio network. I am surprised he would let this one go public. What audience will listen attentively to a speaker on any subject for a full hour? The publisher must be out of her mind. After listening for 15 minutes, you may be half out of yours.

I used my old Pyro audio software to chop each track into 16 pieces so I could manage this monster on my mp3 player. Sure, my amateur segments make for rough starts and ends, but I can easily replay a choice piece, or find where I was when I left off, or shuffle to and from tracks of another book, all of which become annoying with the original.

I copy audiobooks to my mp3 player and listen to them in that format. This works well for me. They weigh next to nothing and fit in the smallest pockets. I audiobook on my commuter bus to and from work, while working in the garden, and while hiking on weekends. I like multitasking and variety (Perhaps that just means I have a limited attention span.), and I like to shuffle the tracks of several audiobooks and throw in a few tunes as well. After a while I will have listened to the whole book in some order or other several times. That works well for me.