Customer Reviews

Mining Group Gold: How to Cash in on the Collaborative Brain Power of a Group

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One of the most valuable lessons I learned in my brief time as a researcher at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center was that meetings need not be unending wastes of times. When I first noticed this and asked how it was possible that so much always seemed to get done, no mater who was involved, I was given a copy of the Tom Kayser book "Mining Group Gold".

What a wonderful and unexpected surprise reading it was! Although concrete steps are given to guide people into getting the most out of working together and, more important, thinking together, its basic value comes from the way it enables folks to remain themselves - only do a better job of it.

Since leaving Xerox three years ago to be a consultant for Microsoft, General Electric and Sun Microsystems, I've given numerous copies to new cohorts so as to make life easier and the flow of work more efficient for all.

I have used what I learned by reading Mining Group Gold in a wide variety of consulting and operational settings over the past three years: with multi-functional teams in a medium sized data communications high technology company and a start-up software development company, with the board of directors of a subsidized housing agency, with teachers and administrators at a primary school, with groups of principals responsible for implementing new curriculum in their schools, and with senior administrators at a leading geriatric care facility.

I speak from experience, then, in stating that Mining Group Gold is straight-forward, intuitively sound technology which can have profound effect on the style of facilitators in carrying out their difficult roles, and on ALL members of a team, a work group, (or even a board of directors!) to increase their sense of ownership, and their commitment to outcomes.

It's an easy read, and I recommend it as the best available resource in my experience for creating and continually improving meeting effectiveness.

The entire book is an outstanding reference for improving meetings. Just the agenda portion has helped our company improve the quality of meetings 100%. From planning through execution, Mining Group Gold gives you all of the steps necessary to hold productive, meaningful meetings. A must read for any organization that is implementing Continuous Process Improvement!

Thomas A. Kayser has set forth a systematic means for gaining the maximum benefit from meetings.

Starting with John Kenneth Gailbraith's infamous attribilious amphigory: "Meetings are vital to those who want to make sure nothing happens" Kayser leads the reader through the labyrinth of traditional meeting quagmires and enables everyone to profit from combining their brain power optimally.

In practical, no-nonsense terms, nothing is left to chance. Those who practice the lessons will reap the immediate and continued rewards from the old axiom of time being money!

The statistics are frightening at the exorbitant dollars wasted on unproductive meetings and the negative impact on employee morale. Tom Kayser's book Mining Group Gold is a "How To" on how to reap the powerful and rich benefits of unlocking collaborative brain power. Tom's book is incredibly useful as it provides a step by step approach that can be implemented immediately and very easily. Mining Group Gold is not only a practical approach but the methodology is tried and true. Tom Kayser has over thirty years of experience in organizational effectiveness where he has then articulated a Mining Group Gold approach that takes complex human interactions and unravels them into powerful and priceless outcomes that drive solid business results.

Reading Mining Group Gold was part of our Toolbox at the beginning of our MBA program at Hult IBS. The book gives great inside to the power of team work. It provides tools for various situations and problems that might occur when working in a team. Different roles of team members are getting defined and common traps are described.

The book provides powerful insights to managers, students and people that are organized in team and group work. Especially for people that facilitate teams, Mining Group Gold is a great resource for discovering hidden traps and common obstacles. It leads the reader to the knowledge of the great performance that teams can achieve, if they are formed well and roles are defined and structured. For the process of forming and structuring of teams, Mining Group Gold offers tips and tools and provides the reader with helpful thoughts.

This is really as much a book about effective leadership and management as it is about group facilitation. Solidly grounded in the author's experience at Xerox, it teaches everything needed to make your group sessions far more effective than it currently is. It also includes guidesheets, tables and surveys that you will find useful in planning, facilitating and evaluating your sessions.

I read Tom Kayser's book in the early 1990's when it was originally written for Xerox. The new edition is a fine adaptation. The book has been immensely helpful to me as a facilitator. It gives great instructions to a new and experienced group leader.

Mr. Kayser understands group dynamics. By reading and more importantly, following his "recipes", you will find that meetings are both more efficient and effective.