34% Off Discounts: Best Buy for Now, Discover Your Strengths Review

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Now, Discover Your Strengths Review

Trying to overcome your weaknesses is a waste of time, according to Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton, Ph.D., of the Gallup Organization, and authors of the book NOW, DISCOVER YOUR STRENGTHS (Free Press, 2001).
"Casting a critical eye on our weaknesses . . . will only help us prevent failure. It will not help us reach excellence," they write in their thought-provoking book, the follow-up to the outstanding and best-selling Gallup work, FIRST, BREAK ALL THE RULES (Simon & Schuster, 1999).
Most organizations fail to achieve excellence, the authors contend, because they also fall into the "overcome your weaknesses" trap. Companies do a poor job of tapping the potential already present on their payroll because they try to make employees into something they're not-at the expense of exploiting individuals' innate talents.
Furthermore, Gallup researchers conclude that most of the energy, time, and money that organizations place on trying to hire, train, and develop well-rounded employees is wasted. "When we studied them, excellent performers were rarely well-rounded. On the contrary, they were sharp," the authors quip.
Internet Connection. To actually discover your strengths, you cannot rely on the book's pages. You must go online to complete an innovative web-based assessment that identifies your top five individual talent-strengths (and provides you with a brief custom report that you can print or email to someone, like your spouse or boss).
Oddly, if you like the assessment, you cannot purchase additional assessments for your staff, spouse, kids, or anyone else. For them to access the assessment, they must each buy another book.
Other Weaknesses. The book encourages managers to review and become familiar with their direct reports' strength analyses (so as to manage to each individual uniquely). But the authors provide neither a mechanism nor a process to do this.
You are told to consult the book for suggestions on managing your employees who each embody unique mixes of some 34 different strengths. Dauntingly, the authors tell us there are "over thirty-three million possible combinations of the top five strengths." A well-intending manager apparently has a lot of customizing to do. The book provides scant help for that.
Putting the Strengths concept to work more broadly in the organization is even more complex and overwhelming. Selecting and promoting people, as suggested in the book's "Practical Guide," requires profiling at least 100 employees who are all working in the same job (50 top achievers and 50 clunkers). Then you build a database of statistically significant trait patterns. Then you buy every candidate a book, give them a web connection... Then you try to do pattern matching...
The so-called Practical Guide quickly appears all but practical to all but the largest operations.
Target: HR Folk. The authors also take a swing at their firm's consulting customers-HR departments. They assail broad competency training efforts and write: "Many human resources departments have an inferiority complex. With the best of intentions they do everything they can to highlight the importance of people, but when sitting around the boardroom table, they suspect that they don't get the same respect as finance, marketing, or operations. In many instances they are right, but, unfortunately, in many instances they don't deserve to. Why? Because they don't have any data."
Unfortunately, this book does NOT provide them with meaningful solutions for closing that gap (other than, presumably, hiring Gallup consultants for large scale projects).
My Motivation. Gallup's StrengthFinder report tells me that my top personal strengths include the Maximizer tendency-which compels me to "transform something strong into something superb." And the Command strength--characterized as feeling "compelled to present the facts or the truth, no matter how unpleasant it may be."
The truth is this: One can't help but think that the well-constructed concept advanced in this enlightening and occasionally entertaining book might have gone from strong to superb. But instead, it seems to have been rushed to market to quickly capitalize on the success of FIRST, BREAK ALL THE RULES. And that's too bad. Because this worthwhile book, as is true of many of the people it intends to help, has considerable strengths undermined by what are otherwise correctable weaknesses.

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41% Off Discounts: Lowest Price A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future Review

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A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future Review

A Whole New Mind $16.47 US, is a 2005 release from Daniel H. Pink that covers creative thinking and other aspects of success. Ostensibly geared toward career pros, this non-fiction title analyzes transitions in society as America migrates from an Information Age to a Conceptual Age economy. The text in Dan's book is not academic -- instead it is more biographical, intuitive, observational, and playful. His book is a real triple threat of content, style, and visual presentation.
Word to the wise -- you are in for a slightly different book here -- right of the bat, the author walks us through the procedure of having his brain scanned as part of a project conducted at the National Institute of Mental Health in Washington D.C. This unorthodox introduction (with four photo illustrations) is welcomed by the reader, as it gives the chapter an introspective quality. Pink shares this experience to illustrate normal brain function -- to note a few misconceptions about the way the brain divides work -- and then posits that while most people integrate both left and right brain activity, R-Directed Thinking will increasingly be relied upon in the future, by people that want to succeed in business or life.
Here is the crux of what Pink is trying to relay. America is currently organized around a cadre of accountants, doctors, engineers, executives and lawyers. These "knowledge workers" excel at the ability to acquire and marry facts to data, and these abilities are typically accrued through a series of standardized tests such as the PSAT, SAT, GMAT, LSAT and MCAT. (As an aside, Bush's test-happy Department of Education only serves to increase the number of L-Directed Thinkers, providing corporations cheap labor in abundance.) Pink asserts this regime of L-Directed Thinking in America is diminishing due to three factors: Abundance, Asia, and Automation.
Our guide Dan conjectures -- that in this age of Abundance -- appealing only to functional, logical, and rational requirements is not enough. Design, empathy, play, and other "soft" aptitudes have become the focal point for individuals and companies that want to stand out above the others in a crowded marketplace. Look no further than Apple's design-triumph, the physically appealing and emotionally compelling iPod, for quick confirmation of this notion!
Looking at trends, Pink concludes outsourcing of white-collar jobs (knowledge work) to nations in Asia will have profound "long term effects" on the economic well-being of Australia, Germany, Japan, the UK and the US. Just as factory jobs flowed out of the country during the eighties, globalization of white-collar jobs will soon follow. Consequently, most Americans will need to come up with a new skill set that is not abundant overseas.
Even if Pink is wrong, and Abundance and Asia aren't transforming America, rest assured that Automation is. In long paragraphs, Pink cites specific examples of how Computer Programming, Law, and Medicine have been radically altered by technology. You'll notice this trend in even simpler venues (like self-checkout at supermarket and department store chains) throughout the US. Implication of Pink's research? Transaction based jobs may soon start declining.
Now here are a few key items worthy of consideration -- when it comes to your present or future career track -- according to Dan. Can computers do it faster? Can overseas labor do it cheaper? Are your skills in demand? Are your skills overly abundant?
Eventually we'll all have to find new jobs, Pink theorizes. The Agricultural Age and Industrial Age have fallen away, and the Information Age is fading fast. We're hurtling into the Conceptual Age, where the majority of jobs will be held by people that create something, or by people that are capable of empathizing with others. Most of these jobs will require care, humor, imagination, ingenuity, instinct, joyfulness, personal rapport, or social dexterity.
Writer Pink explains High Concept, High Touch, avenues of growth that are likely to appear, delves into the importance of gaining an MBA or MFA, and then compares the differences between IQ and Emotional Intelligence in rough metaphor. He then closes Part One with two pages of observation on the baby boomer generation, and their newfound gravitation toward meaning and transcendence, and away from the allure of wealth.
Most of A Whole New Mind actually resides in Part Two, wherein Mr. Pink delineates a complex theory of the "six senses" that one could harvest to build a whole new mind. In Dan's worldview, Design is an asset above function. Story is an asset above argument. Symphony is an asset above focus. Empathy is an asset above logic. Play is an asset above seriousness, and Meaning is an asset above accumulation. After an extensive essay about each of these six components, Pink includes a "portfolio" of exercises (further reading, tools, and websites) that one could call upon to enhance this mindset, all being useful.
In the interest of keeping this review at one thousand words I've concentrated on the first half of the book -- since that is the framework that the book is built around. I will allow you the pleasure of reading the majority of part two on your own, but I'll lightly sketch some factoids that I enjoyed in the "portfolios" accompanying Dan's groupings.

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47% Off Discounts: Lowest Price What Color Is Your Parachute? 2012: A Practical Manual for Job-Hunters and Career-Changers Review

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What Color Is Your Parachute 2012: A Practical Manual for Job-Hunters and Career-Changers Review

"What Color is Your Parachute?" has become an American institution. This edition marks the 40th anniversary of the book's first publication, and the book has now sold more than 10 million copies. While I don't usually review books like "What Color is Your Parachute?" I find that it's such a unique and useful book on finding a job that it's worth encouraging people to read it.
My other copy of "What Color is Your Parachute?" is a much earlier one, and I can see by comparing it with this new edition that substantial changes have been made over the years. Unlike many other books that don't seem to keep up with the changing times, this new edition of "What Color is Your Parachute?" seems tailor-made for today's job market. In fact, "What Color is Your Parachute?" has been revised annually every single year since 1972 with the exception of 1975.
I like the way that "What Color is Your Parachute?" has always been more than just a standard guide to how to find a job but has always helped its readers think outside the box. For example, Chapter 1 of the latest edition is titled "How to Find Hope," and hope is something American workers need in an economy that is uncertain at best and shrinking at worst. Embedded in the idea of hope is a strategy of hope and a principle to live by, which is to not put all your eggs in one basket. Instead, you should always have an alternative: two ways to describe yourself, two ways to find a job, etc. And so the rest of Chapter 1 lists 18 ways to find a new job.
Chapters 3-14 go on to describe in detail the heart of "What Color is Your Parachute?" which are the 5 survival skills you most need today. These are the following:
Attitudes Necessary for Survival (Chapters 3-4)
Advanced Job-Finding Techniques (Chapter 5-9)
Advanced Job-Creation Techniques (Chapters 10-12)
Inventory of What You Have to Offer the World (Chapter 13)
Each One Teach One (Chapter 14 on teaching others survival job-hunting)
The book concludes with 4 appendixes on Finding Your Mission in Life, A Guide to Dealing with Unemployment Depression, A Guide to Choosing a Career Coach or Counselor, and a Sampler List of Coaches.
As you can see, "What Color is Your Parachut?" contains much more than just basic job-hunting skills that you can find anywhere else or that you probably already know about. It also gives you a philosophy of job-hunting and of thinking about yourself, as well as advanced techniques for finding a job. For example, Chapter 3 gives advice on how to positively use and think of the time you have when you're looking for a job, and Chapter 7 is all about how to network in this world of social media. It's refreshing to think of the positive uses of the social media, and this chapter demonstrates yet again that "What Color is Your Parachute?" always strives to represent the best current practices for finding a job and thinking about job-hunting.
I especially like the whole idea of Chapters 10-13, on job-creation techniques and inventory of what you have to offer the world. Rather than seeing oneself as a passive and pathetic looker for a job, why not think of oneself as a creator of a job? In our modern economy it's very possible to do this: it just requires you to think differently about who you are and how jobs are described and offered. Even before I had read this updated version of "What Color is Your Parachute?" my wife has done this very thing at least twice. By thinking about her whole set of skills and experiences and using her ability to network, she's talked herself into at least 2 (maybe 3) jobs over the past years, even creating and setting the terms for her jobs.
In summary, "What Color is Your Parachute?" is an excellent choice for anyone who finds himself in the unenviable position of having to find a new job. While that's never a pleasant situation, "What Color is Your Parachute?" will give you greater confidence and hope that you can find a good job, even in a downward economy.

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45% Off Discounts: Best Price StrengthsFinder 2.0 Review

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StrengthsFinder 2.0 Review

Strengths Finder 2.0 is the follow up to Gallup's Now, Discover Your Strengths. The book includes a revamped version of the StrengthsFinder test that shows you not just what your top five strengths are, but also how you rank in the rest of the 34 strengths from Clifton's model. The new book is light on content (very light) but the test is a substantial improvement.
Here's how the book is set up:
StrengthsFinder: The Next Generation
(A short introduction explaining the need for the enhanced edition of the test based upon new thinking and research in strengths psychology)
I: Finding Your Strengths
(A 30-page overview of strengths psychology and how the Gallup system works)
II: Applying Your Strengths
(150 pages outlining each of the 34 themes including what people with that strength look like, how to manage them, and ideas for action if you have that strength).
The StrengthsFinder
(If you haven't taken it before, the code to take the test is provided in a packet inside the book. You actually have to buy the book to take the test)
Emotional Intelligence 2.0 is another book I really enjoyed that follows the SF 2.0 format. Obviously, that test measures emotional intelligence (EQ), but Emotional Intelligence 2.0 has a unique format where the test tells you which of the book's 66 strategies will increase your EQ the most.

StrengthsFinder 2.0 Overview

Do you have the opportunity to do what you do best every day? Chances are, you don't. All too often, our natural talents go untapped. From the cradle to the cubicle, we devote more time to fixing our shortcomings than to developing our strengths. To help people uncover their talents, Gallup introduced the first version of its online assessment, StrengthsFinder, in 2001 which ignited a global conversation and helped millions to discover their top five talents. In its latest national bestseller, StrengthsFinder 2.0, Gallup unveils the new and improved version of its popular assessment, language of 34 themes, and much more (see below for details). While you can read this book in one sitting, you'll use it as a reference for decades. Loaded with hundreds of strategies for applying your strengths, this new book and accompanying website will change the way you look at yourself--and the world around you--forever. Available exclusively in StrengthsFinder 2.0:(using the unique access code included with each book) * A new and upgraded edition of the StrengthsFinder assessment * A personalized Strengths Discovery and Action-Planning Guide for applying your strengths in the next week, month, and year * A more customized version of your top five theme report * 50 Ideas for Action (10 strategies for building on each of your top five themes)

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