Richard Farson

This book is the antithesis to the flood of leadership and management books in the last 5 years. No special techniques, magic potions or long lost secrets are presented. Instead Farson pokes at all the conventional wisdoms and exposes many farses. He stretches your mind. Don't read this to get a raise next month at work. Read this to make yourself more insightful.

Let’s lay this on the table first – the name, and the concept, could quickly become an overdone conceit. This book could quickly fall into the “Everything you know about management is wrong, when they say left you go right, oo-oo-oo I’m going to shock you with my wacky thinking” category. In addition, the cover of my edition holds two major strikes – it is a business week bestseller (I find that smaller books [172 pages] that are best sellers are usually those dreaded parables show more that tell you how to “manage/lead” as told to the author by a janitor he once met in the men’s restroom of the Washington DC subway system – or something to that effect), and the forward is by Michael Crichton (big name, what business substance would he bring to the table?) But the juxtaposition of management and absurd in the title caught my eye in the bookstore, and a quick perusal of the contents swayed me to make the purchase.

Likewise, do not let any of these excuses dissuade you – this is a good book with good insights. Yes, the author works a little hard sometimes trying to go with that “every myth you know is untrue” line, but the few clunkers are worth the rest of the symphony. The book is divided into broad sections (Human Relations, Communication, Change – all the normal management areas) that are then divided into two or three page discussions of paradoxes in leadership. This makes the book easy to digest, and (more importantly) easy for the reader to stop and think about sections as they are completed. This you will need because, although the book is in the aforementioned sections, this does not mean there is necessarily a logical flow between the individual chapters. Reading them as a group won’t hurt, but stopping often to think these through will really prove valuable.

So what is the content? Here’s just a few of the things I found looking back through multiple dog-eared pages. Paradox – “The More Important a Relationship, the Less Skill Matters” The deeper thought – “People learn – and respond to – what we are.” So what’s the big deal? – managers all spend a lot of time trying to develop management and leadership skills, and development of those skills is less important than being the model for what we really want others to be. Paradox – “Big Changes Are Easier to Make Than Small Ones” The deeper thought – “…the time a committee takes to discuss an item on the agenda is inversely proportional to the amount of money involved.” So what’s the big deal? – Two quick thoughts. One, knowing this, reapportion the amount of work done – skip the minor changes or limit the discussion, get deeper into the big changes. Two, don’t bother with the small changes – they take more time and get less done – big change is good.

These two only give a piece of what’s going on here – and I’ve done a relatively poor job of trying to explain the impact. Context is everything. This is a book well worth reading through to see how it applies to you and those around you. It is on the list of ones to include even if you have a limited bookshelf (right after you get that Tom Peters stuff in there.) One quick caveat. I loaned this to a manager I was mentoring. He had many problems that directly related to concepts in the book. He read it, thought it was interesting, went on his merry way, and quickly moved on to a new job (not his decision.) As with any business book, it is only as good as you allow it to be. However, I think you’ll find this one of the easier ones to use for making those applications. (No, not easier to read than a parable book, but easier to find something of worth in it.) show less

Well worth the quick read -- informative and inspiring, with plenty of inspiring and instructive stories.

Great practical reminder of the issues we deal with as leaders/managers.