Customer Reviews

We're in This Boat Together: Leadership Succession Between the Generations

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I've been recommending this book to women who volunteer with the ministry I work with and mentor groups of younger women. There is so much insight into why the different groups think the way they do. Understanding is a great step in working together well.

I loved the novel idea. It made it an attention keeper, a memory tool and an easy read even for a busy mom.

This book has really helped me understand why different generations work the way they do. Working with someone from the Silent generation is very different compared to working with a Millenial. Expectations and on the ground work ethic and attitude is different, but you all have the same goal... just a different way of accomplishing the goal. This has helped me understand how to communicate and find a way for everyone to be a winner.

This book is a 2-in-1, a business novel and a dissertation about the Leadership Succession Between Generations or the Generation Gap and its effects on leadership. The experiment with the format is laudable but the result is a little unsettling. Read on for my perspective.

When the request for review came, I asked for and got a peek into the first few pages of the book ending with the prologue. I skipped the preface etc. and read the prologue and was thrilled. Here is a book on management with a good focus on leadership transition between the generations written like a business novel and the prologue was good in style! I accepted the review request and got the printed book.

The book is printed well, the paper quality is good, the type is clear and the readability is good. As already mentioned, the starting is good, rather racy in fact!

The book is about the team building exercise through a river rafting expedition, an exercise to which a team of four from the IT Department of a mid-size company was sent by the management. The team starts as four independent individuals wondering why they were sent for this and ending up as a well knit team at the end of the expedition, in which they were subjected to challenges that test their willingness and ability to work as a team in a crunch situation. The team finds a real life parallel in the office when leadership transition takes place. The concept is good and the parallel of the river with its rapids is highly apt to life in general and change management in particular. Thus the author is to be commended for taking up a worthwhile topic in change management.

Leadership transitions are brought on by several factors and the leadership transition brought on by generation gap is an important element. There are other factors of course that affect leadership styles.

The book adopts a rather novel approach. The text keeps alternating between the smooth flow of a novel and the not-so-smooth flow of a good dissertation about the effects of generation on leadership. The smooth flow of the novel like presentation is interrupted by the highly academic dissertation on the leadership styles of the different generations. Much as the author tried to present that part in a simple and readable style, the transition is too abrupt. This continued through out the book.

Having read and enjoyed management books written in the novel format (who hasn't read The Goal?), as well as a non-fiction essay format, I found the sudden changes in the style and the pace rather unsettling. It is as if the author was affected by the river's rapids!

I hope the author will attempt a smoother transition between the two formats in a future edition. I believe that it is possible to convey all serious topics on science and management through the novel format.

I worked as an engineer and manager for nearly 4 decades in a large manufacturing organisation and have seen firsthand the leadership changes and the disruption that they can bring in the life of individuals. I therefore recommend the book.

The generation gap can be bridged; it just needs to be done right. "We're in This Boat Together: Leadership Succession Between Generations" is an exploration of business teamwork and its value using a fiction situation spanning four generations, from the Silent Generation to the Millennials. Using a white water rafting team building exercise, the four learn the value of team work, and when the company spirals out of control, they are prepared. A fable of the modern business world, "We're in This Boat Together" is a fine recommendation for those who want to understand the value of corporate team work.

Although I've never white-water rafted, I have canoed down spunky rivers with precarious bends & turns. Also having experienced some leadership transitions, I can easily understand the white-water rafting analogy. Without each person contributing to the process the boat would have capsized. So in transitions it takes everyone - with each generation's strengths - working together to make it successful (easier said than done!) This book is entertaining, instructive, and practical. I liked the fictional characters - they helped put flesh on a topic that could otherwise be dry, academic, or theoretical. The wealth of research and direct conversations with the range of age groups makes it a helpful & relevant tool for anyone heading toward organizational transition.

Transition of leadership in a company, family business, church, volunteer association, or nonprofit group is closely examined by understanding the generation gaps. Four generations are defined and analyzed for their responses to different leadership styles.

This innovative business book grabs the readers interest from page one by using the analogy of team building to white-water rafting in a fictionalized story. With the global economy now a part of the business world, leaders need this excellent resource; more than that, everyone in the workaday world will benefit by this read.

I approached this book with real anticipation because I thought it was about organizational leadership transitions, especially in ministries--a topic I have a lot of interest in. But I was disappointed. The first problem was that much of the dialogue in the fictional boat ride around which the book is centered seemed contrived and artificial. More importantly, most of the book presented yet another re-hash of the supposed characteristics of the different generational groups like baby boomers, Gen-Xers, etc. Bishop fully accepted the typical stereotypes about this generational groupings, with hardly an acknowledgement that you can find individuals in every generation across the full spectrum of personality types and leadership styles. Birth order alone makes a huge difference in leadership styles in every generation. So Bishop's uncritical acceptance of these now rather tired and stale stereotypes left me wishing for more substance. Then unfortunately, she spent very little time on leadership transitions in ministries. George Verwer originally recommended the book to me (long before it came out) around the time Bishop interviewed him as she was writing the book. She says in the book she interviewed other ministry leaders as well. But she gives very few substantial insights on leadership transitions in the whole of this 203-page book. I received much more help from a one-hour personal conversation with Verwer on the topic. So I was left wondering why Bishop didn't provide more help on this topic that has so many leaders searching for answers. This could have been the go-to book on leadership transitions, especially for Christian organizations. As I search for my successor as president of the International Institute for Christian Studies, I will also have to continue my search for a good book on leadership transitions.