Customer Reviews

The Universal Traveller: A Guide to Creativity, Problem Solving & the Process of Reaching Goals (Crisp Professional Series)

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I first found this book in 1974. I still have it. This book approaches problem solving and personal values within the framework of a travel guide. How do you get from HERE to THERE?

Well, how do you get to New York from Los Angeles? How do you determine that New York is even where you want to go in the first place?

Simple, without TELLING you what to decide, it SHOWS you how to decide for yourself.

A MUST BUY/MUST STUDY BOOK. I first found the Universal Traveler Creative Problem-Solving Guide in its 1976 edition and have kept it by my bed to review frequently since then. It is a special treasure of tips on getting organized mentally. It balances critical thinking with psychological factors superbly. This is a book to study, to cull and to keep at your side for a lifetime. I have bought it as a gift for very bright, deeply analytical friends, who universally share my opinion of it. It is the most thorough critical thinking and problem-solving book I've ever read. It starts at the VERY BEGINNING of your thought processes to analyze a problem, to set a goal and to reach solutions and goals. It presents reaching goals and problem-solving as a journey, and uses travel as the metaphorical presentation. I prefer the 1976, brown and tan edition published by William Kaufman, Inc., with its delightful, historical and turn-of-the-century pen sketches to the more modern, more structured, less playful 1991 edition.

A MUST READ: I first found the Universal Traveler Creative Problem-Solving Guide in its 1976 edition, and since then have kept it by my side to review frequently. It is a special treasure of tips on getting organized mentally to solve problems and to meet life's challenges. It balances critical thinking with one's psychological factors superbly. It presents reaching goals and problems--solving as a journey in life, and uses travel as the metaphorical means of conveying its ideas. It starts at the very beginning of one's thought processes to analyze problems, to set goals and to reach solutions and goals. Its life problem-solving strategies are "whole" methods that combine mind, sense and emotion. I like the 1976, edition, with its delightful historical, turn-of-the-century pen sketches. The new, 1991, edition is reorganized and presents the authors' evolutionary travels in problem-solivng adventure, and has late 20th century pen sketched metaphors. This is a valuable book to have. It is a good modern companion to the Dale Carnegie books "How To Win Friends and Influence People" and "How to Stop Worrying and Start Living". It is a great choice for helping to set and met New Year, New Century and New Milenium resolutions.

I have been using this book since I began teaching design and the design process 16 years ago and LOVE IT! BUT, for some reason this version has removed a number of very helpful images and drawings. SO, I recommend ONLY the original Brown cover or the NEW UPDATED CLASSIC in BROWN cover.

I purchased this book in the early nineties because it was a required book for a design methods 101 class within a four-year design program. It would have been worth my while to have read it in it's entirety then but, unfortunately, I failed to do so until years after I had received my degree. Having done so earlier may have saved me years of frustration of not fully understanding creative idea generation and development, and consequently, not realizing I was working with and for people who fostered, out of the same ignorance of the creative problem solving process, a non-creative work environment. I have since read The Universal Traveler many times as it has become a major source in my own intellectual inquiry into the psychology of creative problem solving. This is a must read for anyone who values creative thought and who desires the freedom only process awareness can bring. Seperate yourself from the pretenders.

The book was shipped on a timely basis and there was only minor highlighting.
Good book for motivating college students, but editions are similar enough not to warrant buying a later edition.

Fantastic book. I have owned this book since 1974 and I love it. The author's approach to problem solving is just as inventive today as it was then. The book is a guide to using your creativity to think out of the box and arrive at unexpected solutions and goals.

I thoiught this book was very inspiring, to help you go after your dreams. It give you all diffrent types of paths to follow tot make it happen. DO IT !!!!

Being Don Koberg, the author of The Universal Traveler now in it's just released Thirtieth Anniversay Classic Edition, I can assure anyone interested in buying this book that Jim Bagnall is not the author but rather my associate and soley responsible for the graphics, not the text, of this and other editions wandering about during the past three decades.