I’ve been hammering through books like no tomorrow lately.
Up for review is The One Minute Manager by Ken Blanchard and Spencer Johnson. Incredible book. A total MUST for any business owner who works with a team or with a group of people.
What was a defining factor in buying this book is how successful it’s been and how it’s contributed to many well-known businesses and organizations around the world. Apple, Chevron, AT&T, Wal-Mart, Holiday Inns, Hewlett-Packard, Pepsi-Cola, KFC, Harvard University, US Army, Navy & Air Force, etc, etc…
If this little book has contributed to the successes of all these amazing organizations, then something is up. I wanted to find out what that is and I did.
The essence of the book is based on “People Who Feel Good About Themselves Produce Results.”
When do you work your best? It’s when you feel good about yourself.
It’s the story of a young fellow who is seeking out the One Minute Manager to learn his secrets to how he is such an effective manager. Turns out, his management style comes down to three solid principles:
1. One Minute Goal Setting
2. One Minute Praising
3. One Minute Reprimand
I’m not going to go too far into the details, because you’ll have to buy the book for that. But here is a brief idea of each.
One Minute Goal Setting
At your weekly meetings with your team, each member is required to set goals. This is setting a quick, one minute goal (nothing more than 250 words) on a piece of paper and then giving a copy to your manager and one for yourself. Everything is one minute because in management, efficiency is key.
One Minute Praising
This is rewarding your crew when they’re doing a great job. It’s spending one minute to make them feel good, acknowledging their accomplishments and hard work. Rewarding others for their effort is key to building momentum with your team and having them enjoy working with/for you.
One Minute Reprimand
When people make mistakes, this is when you let them know and give them immediate feedback on it. After letting them know how they messed up and how they could improve it or make it better, you reaffirm that you think well of them but not their performance in this situation.
Ken Blanchard and Spencer Johnson go into these concepts more clearly. The writing style and story is incredible and fun to read. I recommend it for anyone that works with others.
It was so good that I bought the book The One Minute Entrepeneur and The 4th Secret of the One Minute Manager.
Click here to check out The One Minute Manager on Amazon.
Stefan
Executive Coach
Lifestyle Transformations
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Funny… after we ran into each other at the book store today, I sat down and read this book.
What I found is that this book lacks any depth on these broad concepts that other books have tackled in greater depth. For example, the cliche “80/20″ rule is mentioned for One Minute Goal Setting — if you want to know how to truly implement this into your life, read The 4-Hour Work Week, and if you really really REALLY want to use 80/20 in your life read The 80/20 Principle.
Also, the praise for good work is a very basic concept that How To Win Friends & Influence People published many generations ago.
However, the one thing I did take from this book is that we want to lead by encouraging others to manage themselves. Great concept I’ll be implementing into my management strategy.
There are better books out there for learned this stuff. Again, I’d start like this:
1. How to Win Friends & Influence People (great book that will never get old)
2. 4-Hour Work Week (this has the condensed concepts of The 80/20 Principle Book)
3. The 80/20 Principle (amazing book. I’d recommend anyone who likes the “simplicity” movement read this)