Leadership and the One Minute Manager: Increasing Effectiveness Through Situational Leadership by Ken Blanchard (Author) Patricia Zigarmi (Author) Drea Zigarmi (Author)
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This is the first book in the One Minute Manager series I’ve read, and I haven’t yet decided if it’ll be the last. I am doubtful, not because of the substance of this slim volume, but because of its grating style.
It’s written like a story where the main character, an insufferably smug “One Minute Manager”, advises a wide-eyed “Entrepreneur” about management and leadership. The Entrepreneur is led around to meet members of the OMM’s top team, learning that our hero doesn’t treat everyone the same way. In fact, he goes out of his way to diagnose each individual’s development level (the situation), and then respond accordingly with the right mix of directive and supportive management (the leadership).
This is top advice, and it’s based on a nice model that all fits together very neatly (Situational Leadership, nice, but lacking in scientific foundations – or at least the research it’s based on is not explained), so it’s worth reading … when The Entrepreneur takes this advice she sees her company flourish, so that’s rock solid proof right there.
I respect the intention of trying to write a management text-book in a fun and accessible style – after all, what they are trying to communicate is actually fairly simple – it’s just that the style they chose didn’t work from a personal perspective. That said, I read it very quickly (though with little enthusiasm) and easily understand what they were trying to say, so I guess I have to reluctantly accept that the concept worked.
Filed under: Leadership, Management
