Fish! A Remarkable Way to Boost Morale and Improve Results

Rating:
Summary: This book is pretty bad...
Review: This is one of the all time worst books. I can't imagine getting anything lasting out of this overly simplistic piece of work. This is worse than the cheese book. The 4 main points of the story were hardly new and the actual "story" was was simply awful. I loved the way they introduced the husband on one page and then killed him off on the next page to give the main character an excuse to move to Seattle. That was deep. And what a great touch having her marry the fishmonger in the end-it darn near brought a tear to my eye!
I wish the powers that be in Corporate America would stop inflicting this SEE SPOT RUN nonsense on employees-it is insulting and hardly produces the desired effect. This may be the worst business book that I have read because I got nothing of real substance out of the book.

Rating:
Summary: Great, inspiring read but poor teaching methodologies.
Review: FISH is written in a parable (short story using fictional characters) format, reminiscent of the style apparent in the classic, bestseller The One Minute Manager. The goal of the FISH Philosophy is to learn how to boost morale and improve operational results in a business organization. As the authors put it "Enclosed are the keys to creating an innovative and accountable work environment where a playful, attentive, and engaging attitude leads to more energy, enthusiasm, productivity, and creativity."

The four key points of the philosophy are:

• Play - have fun and create energy at home or at the office.
• Make their day - how can you engage fellow employees, customers and make each other's day?
• Be Present - How can you make sure you are fully available and aware during conversations with people? It is about create a greater sense of intimacy between individuals.
• Choose Your Attitude - Each day you choose how you are going to act or which "side of the bed" you wake up on. The choice is yours and, the way you act, affects others.

In my opinion, this business parable, like the rest of them, is great and horrible at the same time.

It is a great read for the following reasons:

1. It is a quick read. I read it in about 2 - 2.5 hours and I am a fairly slow reader.
2. The book is able to illustrate one point extremely effectively. For example, in this book they show how workers attitudes can impact a setting and how many of us don't understand how our attitude impacts our work setting and quality of life.
3. These are the kinds of books that employees will read as they are 100-150 pages in length and easy to read so a massive investment of time and energy isn't required by employees.

It is a poor book for the following reasons:
1. The authors never give you ways to implement the ideas. Once I was done reading the book I was thinking, "WOW, this is great stuff. Now how do I implement it in my company and, more importantly, what will it take for this to be successful." Which leads me to the next point...
2. While they illustrate certain key elements in the book they neglect to mention that:
a. Employees must trust management.
b. Top managers must be fully committed and "practice what
they preach."
c. Both of the above points are conveyed in the story but
the authors don't tell you about the importance of what
academics term "social capital" in an organization.

My concluding thoughts: This is a brief, simple, but elegant book that is an eye opener for those of us who grew up with notions like: "Work is serious, let's have no fooling around!" or "Profit is 'the only' way to measure business success." I commend the authors on conveying this to readers. HOWEVER, the cons outweigh the pros in this book. Like I pointed out, I really enjoyed reading the book and thought it was pretty effective in showing how an organization can completely turn around but, at the end of the day, no tools were presented to help the reader understand how to implement the FISH philosophy. If top managers don't cooperate or "practice what they preach" or understand why and how this philosophy works it goes nowhere, just like most management programs designed to attain all of the above mentioned goals of productivity, energy, etc.

If you want a great book on business principles I highly encourage everyone to read "The Essential Drucker" by Peter Drucker. Jack Welch is a big Drucker fan and this book is a compilation of his best work of over 60 years and 30 books on management principles.

Rating:
Summary: Think motivational books don't work? This book is for you...
Review: I'm not kidding, it will change your mind. It's an incredible book. Coming from me, that's a huge compliment, given that I normally think most of this motivational stuff is just salespeople pitching common sense fluff to make a buck. "Fish!" will change the way you think about your workplace and your life. It's a very simple story, and somewhat cheesy at the end, but you won't regret reading it. There's nothing in here that you haven't heard before, but it's the way it's presented in the context of workplace that too many of us are all too familiar with that really makes the philosopy carry so much weight. Don't be surprised if, after reading the book, you find yourself wanting to spend your lunch break in Seattle one of these days.

Rating:
Summary: Fish? Where's the beef?
Review: There is a more substantial tale in this little book than in Who Moved My Cheese but it suffers from the same drawbacks.

As a sideshow in a management education course then this is really OK but as a serious contribution to improving management it does not pass muster.

Fish is a well written, cautionary tale of attitude at the workplace. It has a serious message and I am sure that it has some applicability.

Part of the reason that I am against these types of management parables is that by their very existance it shows that we as managers in business are failing in our duties to inculcate these attitudes in our staff. It says an awful lot about us that it requires such books to get the job done.

In a way, my attitude in writing this review is wrong. I do not have a particularly positive attitude about it. We all want a happy workplace and we, as managers, should use every tool in the manager's toolbox to achieve this. Some employees sneak through the net and are not happy, positive people and they reuire more attention than the others. In many areas though, the current structure of jobs mitigates having happy employees. When many people are having to work at two jobs just to make ends meet they may have a happy and positive disposition but they may also be having to work many long hours and look to work as only a source of income.

I found the message in this book to be a good one. It held my interest throughout. The author has a good writing style which holds the readers attention.

I encouraged others to read it. Despite it's brevity, they as managers, did not have the time. I passed the book on to no-managers. Few people read it. The ones that did had only a cursory recollection of the contents. The video worked better but it was talked through. Our asscoiates want instant gratification. They do not want to read, and most see no value in reading which most associate with school.

This book and it's ilk should tell us that we need to go back to the drawing board in training and developing managers. We do need to get this particular message over but we need to find a better way to do it.

Rating:
Summary: A great read for anyone in the work force stuck in a rut.
Review: This book is very informative and easy to read. It has easy tips to improve moral, which includes your own.

Rating:
Summary: Written to help corporate employees find their way
Review: A manager's guide to morale boosting in the workplace, Fish! A Remarkable Way To Boost Morale And Improve Results is another excellent management parable by the collaborative team of Stephen C. Lundin, Harry Paul and John Christensen, and draws from the fun-loving fishmongers at Seattle's Pike Place Market for its material. Recently widowed and mother of two, Mary Jane Ramirez is asked to engineer a turnaround of her company's troubled operations department, described as a "toxic energy dump." Most reasonable managerial heads would cut their losses and move on. But Mary Jane takes up the challenge with the help of head fishmonger Lonnie. Fish! (based on a popular corporate education video) was written to help corporate employees find their way creating and maintaining pleasant and productive workplace. Effective motivational management techniques are deftly embedded in an entertaining and engaging read. Also available in large print and audio download formats.

Rating:
Summary: Fishmonger lessons for the rest of us
Review: This is a wonderful little book in the tradition of 'Who Moved My Cheese." Fish! explores some of the trickiest and toughest concepts in management - employee motivation and performance improvement. The book introduces a parable that can be used, simplified, or made more complex, depending on your needs. All the ideas are simple and so are their solutions that will guarantee powerful results. The main premise is that you should:

1. Choose your attitude. Your attitude is your choice and is not dictated by anyone, or anything else. If you choose to enjoy your work, you will.
2. Make their day - Make someone day every day of your life. Do something extra, even if it is little or small.
3. Play. All work and no play makes for low morale and bad attitudes. So make your work routines playful and enjoyable for everyone.
4. Be Present. That's the same as saying as forcus on every moment of your life. Don't watch your life go by, BE THERE every minute.

This book should be read by everyone. I cannot think of a single profession or any situation where the lessons of this book cannot be applied with wonderful results. This is a must read for anyone who is tired of existing from day-to-day and has finally made the decision to LIVE.

Rating:
Summary: Interesting methodology but applicable everywhere?
Review: This book, is great, it gives you another vision to your boring, work, life, or anything, the story in the book is great however consider this:

Altough the book says; that you must find in your mind a way to use this methodology at any kind of work or situation, I dont find it that easy, as in the case of the book that they mention that they improved their work enviroment however they dont said how they did that.

Im a Industrial engineer and honestly the book is great but I dindt liked that they do not explained how they improved the story told in the book.

Rating:
Summary: An Act of Cod.
Review: I had recently read, Life Strategies: Doing What Works, Doing What Matters, by Philip McGraw. A simular central theme as in Fish! Get more out of life with a better attitude.

Fish! A Remarkable Way to Boost Moral and Improve Results varies in that we are given a story. Mary Jane and her husband move from So Cal to Seattle. He to work for Microlucid and she for a finance company. He dies a year after they move. She is lost.

She is offered a promotion, which she normally would have declined, but the increase in income was too hard to pass up. The promotion meant managing a non productive non responsive division of the company. The "zombies" the group was known as.
Her charges arrived late, they did not answer the phones, some had been given computers more that two years earlier and had not even bothered to learn how to use them.

One day, while at Seattle's Public Market, she spots a fishmonger. These guys are part fish sellers and part football players. Fish flinger. When a customer orders a fish, the catch of the day is delivered via the forward pass. I've seen this for myself. How those guys catch those slippery critters is beyond me.

What Mary Jane does to turn her group of slugs around is what Fish! is all about. So I won't give away the plot. Fish! is an excellent book, a bit short on pages, but it packs a punch. I enjoyed it. Cammy Diaz-lawyer

Rating:
Summary: There's something Fishy going on, and it's about time!!!
Review: I am so thankful right now!! I have sense enough to see the purpose. This book will NOT fix your workplace issues, only YOU can. But it will give you some insight as to what may help repair that which is broken at work. It starts with one person: you.
Several reviews have indicated, quite eloquently I may add, that attitude IS everything. NO, you cannot fix stupid, unmotivated, closed-minded, and dull. But if your co-workers have a dusting of humor, or an inkling as to how to BE positive, this book will enhance your workplace and bring it back to life. But it starts with you, the reader.
I KNOW, we did it! We are a hospital, people die here, and no, it is NOT fun. But we smile more, we joke more, and our patients LOVE the whole thing. There is NO "nursing shortage" where I am. And there is also no shortage of fun. We spend more time at work, awake, with those we work with than we do at home with our loved ones. If your workplace is TOXIC, get out quick, before it poisons you! OR...try being as much a part of the solution as you are the problem. Smile more, go out of your way for someone, laugh, go that extra step and try being POSITIVE. You will be amazed at the outcome.
Indeed...
"It's a simple choice". If you are unhappy with your workplace, remember: you CHOSE to go there today. This book will give you ideas to make the workplace better for you, but only YOU can fix it, quit looking for momma to.
In addition, it is probably best not to look for something in everything. Not every book will save you from your woes. This is a light, quick, throught-provoking read and I believe that's all it was meant to be. This of course assumes that all can think, and be provoked in a positive way...
Bravo!