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26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Three Simple Steps to being a Better Manager, August 27, 2008
This review is from: Squawk!: How to Stop Making Noise and Start Getting Results (Hardcover)
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Squawk gives you three simple and easy to implement steps to becoming a more effective manager. The book presents these steps in a very engaging story form.
But first let's review some of the reasons you need to take Squawk seriously.
Thirty-two percent of employees spend at lest twenty hours per month complaining about their bosses. Probably a lot of those twenty hours are on company time.
More than 66% of employees are actively considering leaving their current job.
Employers suffer in excess of $360 billion in annual losses due to employee dissatisfaction.
Most managers believe their focus should be in bringing in the numbers ... but most get fired because of poor people skills.
Travis Bradberry uses the seagull as a symbol for today's manager. All too often today's manager swoops in, fails to get complete details of what is happening, squawks up a storm, deposits/dumps on the workers and leaves a mess for others to clean up.
The seagull manager is showing up more and more in today's workplace.
Bradberry gives three simple but effective techniques to shift the way you manage.
1. Set full fledged expectations - make sure the employee's efforts are spent doing the right things the right way. Let them know what is expected and how they will be evaluated in the future. Be sure to get agreement and commitment to work toward established goals.
2. Communication that clicks. Too often managers do not communicate enough and only communicate when things go wrong. Observe what employees say and do and speak openly with them about their work. Communication clicks when it is frequent and in a langauge everyone understands.
3. Paws on Performance - pay attention to each employee's performance - offer praise as often as constructive feedback. Keep your paws on performance.
This is a delightful little book, it can be read in a couple of hours. But the lessons, if implemented, will last a lifetime. It is very simple and straightforward. Anyone can understand and implement the principles.
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16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Who doesn't like a trip to the zoo?, September 22, 2008
This review is from: Squawk!: How to Stop Making Noise and Start Getting Results (Hardcover)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
While so many self improvement books are written with supposedly real scenarios and people to demonstrate a point, I've always found it tough to want to trust the results, as they seem rather staged or manipulated to simply prove the author's point. Often times a reader's skepticism sets in and taints the learning environment.
With using zoo animals and seagulls, rather than people as this book does, the characters don't have that "agenda" feel to them, and I was much more open to learn and trust the subject matter-as crazy as that sounds. Who doesn't enjoy a trip to the zoo and want to be close to the animals and understand their needs to be well cared for and valued? I think that is the key to this book's intriguing lessons and their absorption as has you leaving all prejudices behind and gives you an open frame of mind to learn and understand. As a book about talking seagulls and animals, it is not corny, nor over done, but very well written and a breeze to read.
I think you will find value in looking at your managerial skills from a new angle with the three important lessons seagull Charlie learns from his flock and the zoo's wise animal friends. What can be perceived as poor results or grumblings in employees may actually relate more to your job as a communicator and as a teacher, than some unfixable or resistant flaw they may have. These lessons empower you instead of building resentments or disappointments to the point you blow up or "Squawk". I found this book a real treat to read, quite clever, and think you will find it enjoyable and very valuable as well.
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20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Guilty!, October 9, 2008
This review is from: Squawk!: How to Stop Making Noise and Start Getting Results (Hardcover)
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
SQUAWK
by Travis Bradberry Ph.D.
I'm guilty of squawking, the most ineffective method of management imaginable. SQUAWK shows me why I need to change and how I can change. SQUAWK can benefit all of us, even those of us who do not consider ourselves managers. All of us play different roles, sometimes as managers and sometimes as those being managed.
The natural way to react to people we need to manage is to go off and sulk and then to swoop down and squawk. The final step is to leave everyone else on the team to clean up the mess. By observing the behavior of a mother otter and her young, we learn that much more time is required to train people than we ever believe.
As I read SQUAWK, I realize the ways I have failed as a manager. I find myself identifying with Charlie, the competent but ineffective seagull, who carries a stubby pencil and scraps of paper in his feathers. The concepts are simple adjustments of working methods. The manager is often the manager because he can do the job the best, but once he becomes the manager his job is no longer merely doing his job. It is managing to get others to do the job well. Communication is required to be an effective manager.
Reading Charlie's notes, it's easy to identify with this competent seagull, who is an incompetent manager:
--You have to reveal exactly what needs to be done before you can expect to see it happen!!
--If you aren't staying in touch, you aren't doing your job!!
--Pay attention to each employee's performance, and offer praise as frequently and emphatically as you do the constructive feedback.
Bradberry makes it all sound simple with the use of an entertaining fable with a glorious finale; yet the concept is profound. The author stays around and offers an explanation at the end to make sure that all of us understand that the people are the most important asset of a successful business. He outlines and expands the three key principals:
--Full-Fledged Expectations
--Communication that Klicks
--Paws on Performance
In conclusion, Bradberry says something profound:
"People may join companies, BUT they will leave bosses." SQUAWK has the message of Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don't couched in simple terms. If you work as an employee being managed or as a manager, if you play a role in any organization, if you, or if you are a student readying yourself for employment, read this book!
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