Stop your complaining, quit your bellyaching, just jump in and take responsibility for needed changes yourself; and most of all stop asking questions that put blame elsewhere, and replace them, with questions about what you can do to make things better. That's the message of this tiny book, repeated repeatedly over and over in large print on small pages and illustrated with suspicious true to life anecdotes of customer service workers being rewarded for going above and beyond duty in order to make customers happy and being unexpectedly rewarded for doing so. No wonder capitalist corporations hire Mr Miller to come in and motivate their workers to buckle down, knuckle under, and work harder without complaint.

Well it's worked for John G. Miller. He now has his own corporation (QBQ Inc) for which he is CEO, a cadre of motivational speakers (including his own daughter), and his own website (http://www.qbq.com/) where he sells books and a seven week study guide designed for Christians.

Who could imagine you could make a career from one of grandma's homilies? But then, motivational speakers sell themselves more than their messages, and an enthusiastic fellow with a friendly smile and a simple upbeat message can go far in this world. Think Ronald Reagan. Yes, I guess that's a complaint. ( )

A book on personal responsibility. And a good one at that. It shows you how to take charge and not wait on others. ( )

Truly godawful. Firmly in the school of "take a single decent but common-sense idea and develop it into a pseudo-religious doctrine, then beat it over your reader's head over the course of 100+ large-print pages."

Miller is not a particularly good writer, technically speaking, but he has a remarkable capacity for sounding like a complete and utter tool.

A common thread in the stories he presents as examples are customer service workers being rewarded for paying for things out of their own pockets, for dubious reward (one such parable has the employee rewarded with a substantial tip, which she smarmily contributes to the "employee pizza fund" because it is against the policy of the big box retailer that employs her to accept tips.)

That said, Miller's fundamental point - that the fastest, best way to get something done is to take responsibility for it oneself - is valid and probably worth saying. But when he devotes a chapter to what's wrong with the question "why?" ("leads to victim thinking...") it just really makes me dislike him and his book. Not recommended. ( )