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Summary: For Executives in Cut Throat Times
Review: ...This is the leadership book that lays it on the line for leaders in the trenches. Don't look here for fancy theory. This is the stuff you really need to survive today in the world where people really live.I am so glad I read this book. I use the lessons it taught me every day. And I do mean it taught me. The discussion questions in each chapter are so important. I felt like I was in a great discussion group. This made the book real for me. Interactive. A great experience!
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Summary: Leadership Materpiece
Review: A minor masterpiece of how leaders can survive - and thrive - in today's complex organizations. This book is practical, it makes sense, and it works! With an amazing insight into leadership survival kit for leaders is a must read for all who are interested in understanding and becoming a better leader.
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Summary: Perfect for all leaders!
Review: At long last! Kunich and Lester have written a book about leadership that actually shows you how to be an effective leader, in today's real world, not in some fairy-land ivory tower. This book is worth its weight in gold. Genius!!!!
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Summary: This is the heart of leadership.
Review: Beginning with a foreword by bestselling leadership guru Kenneth Blanchard, this book never lets up until the back cover. It actually moved me to tears in several places, especially during the accounts of the heroes of September 11, 2001 and World War II icon Raoul Wallenberg. Truly inspiring. And the idea-laden chapters on time management and mentoring should be declared national treasures. I found the discussion questions at the end of every chapter to be very valuable, too, because they forced me to think about what I was reading and apply the lessons to new situations. The book changed me, for the better.
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Summary: Uncommon sense
Review: How can a book make all the myriad challenges facing leaders at every level seem so logically manageable? This one does the impossible. It cuts through all the nonsense and makes sense of it. Troubles with managing time effectively, difficulties with inspiring Generation X slackers, mentoring people who could care less about being mentored, communicating with people across cultural and generational divides--it's all here, and then some. Kunich and Lester have distilled the leadership and management scholarship and made it usable. By everyone.
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Summary: Fun, Fast, and Informative!
Review: I don't know what book the California guy read before he posted his two totally wrong reviews about Survival Kit for Leaders. The book I read was fun, written with real style and passion, loaded with fresh new insights and examples, and capable of inspiring me to real action. The chapter on heroes, including Raoul Wallenberg and the passengers on Flight 93, was the most touching thing I've ever read in a leadership book. If you can read it without crying, you must be the reviewer from California. Plain and simple, this book rocks. Get it and learn from it. You won't ever be sorry.
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Summary: Fun, Fast, and Informative!
Review: I don't know what book the California guy read before he posted his two totally wrong reviews about Survival Kit for Leaders. The book I read was fun, written with real style and passion, loaded with fresh new insights and examples, and capable of inspiring me to real action. The chapter on heroes, including Raoul Wallenberg and the passengers on Flight 93, was the most touching thing I've ever read in a leadership book. If you can read it without crying, you must be the reviewer from California. Plain and simple, this book rocks. Get it and learn from it. You won't ever be sorry.
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Summary: Definitely Number One on Management, Leadership
Review: I really wish this book had been around about 15 years ago when I was first getting started in my career. I could have saved hundreds of dollars I've spent on other books on time management, leadership, managerial theory, mentoring, TQM, Six Sigma, and all the rest. I also could have saved myself so much heartache and disappointment from mistakes I made and hard-knock lessons I had to learn myself, the real hard way. This book is so terrific, and so unique. It has it all, everything I wish I knew then and I'm glad I finally know now.
I really appreciate the several examples of Hispanic leaders Kunich and Lester use to illustrate various principles of effective leadership and mentoring. Jaime Escalante, Roberto Clemente, and several others hit home for me. I also liked their frequent use of noted (or notable) African-American leaders, like Marva Collins and Jackie Robinson. Not many books do this, or do it this well, and I think it is so important for minority people to know about these kinds of great role models so well can help lead our own people to higher achievement and progress. Very inspiring.
I had never heard of Raoul Wallenberg before I read "Survival Kit," but now I will never forget him. Why his name is not a household word synonymous with hero, I have no idea. These authors show so beautifully his incredible example of courage, creativity, resourcefulness, self-confidence, and ability to inspire others to have hope when everything seems hopeless. In these post-9/11 times, we all can use heroic examples like Wallenberg to point the way to survival and victory, one person at a time and one nation at a time. Every school kid, and every adult in the free world, should have the opportunity to read Chapter 3 of this book, and learn how one person can change the world even when it appears that the world is coming to an end. I didn't know I needed any more heroes in my heart, but Kunich and Lester have taught me that I did need to make room for Raoul Wallenberg. Now his example inspires me every day.
I thought the "quality quadrants" chapter was also one of many highlights of this book. It's the single best illustration of how management and leadership are related, and interrelated, that I have ever come across. It also shows, very powerfully, how good intentions and hard work don't necessarily add up to the results we want. More important, it shows how we can all "do right things right," no matter where we and our organization are starting from. Arriba!
As a person who regularly has to act as mentor and role model to lots of young people, I also found the chapters on effective feedback and mentoring extremely useful. These guys say things so clearly and so memorably, and have a real knack for making the most difficult and complex concepts understandable. The lessons stay with me, because I worked through them using the fabulous discussion questions at the end of every chapter. What a great idea! Why don't more books do this? By forcing me to think through each topic for myself, in detail, and in specifics, these questions kicked me into active learning mode. You can't read this book like a couch potato. It grabs you by the shoulders and shakes you real hard until you are fully awake, and it compels you to actually think. Think about it!
I think "Survival Kit" is the best book of its type available anywhere. Actually, there really is no other book of this type. The memory-sticking devices, the great discussion questions, the unconventional examples, the unique innovations on quality, inspiration, and time management...I've never really seen them anywhere else. "Survival Kit" is in a class by itself, and at the head of the class. Just wonderful.
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Summary: What more could you want?
Review: I'm so delighted with this spectacular new book. I thought I'd seen, heard, and read it all when it comes to leadership, management, how to mentor, the quality movement, time mgmt, and all that. In fact, I almost didn't even buy this book, because I expected just another recycled, rehashed, instant book like too many of the others I've bought. Those other books are now permanent dust-gatherers in my bookshelves or space-holders in my basement. But this one...wow!
I don't know what more anyone could want from one book. This is the one to get if you want to have a leadership/mgmt library consisting of just one book. So help me, I'm not exaggerating. I couldn't believe how the book makes all the tired old subjects brand new and even thrilling. How can anyone make time mgmt thrilling??? You'll have to read the chapter in "Survival Kit for Leaders" to see. Same for the great chapters on how to inspire, how to mentor, how to give and receive good feedback, legal advice for leaders, leadership vs. mgmt, etc., etc., etc.
I loved the mnemonics and the end-of-chapter thought-sparking food for thought questions. They really got me involved, and they made me learn the material. In fact, I learned more from reading and working with this book than I did in entire courses in Business School. It's that good. The ideas and the methods are that good.
The foreword by leadership idol Kenneth Blanchard is excellent, too. It took some courage for Blanchard to endorse this book and write its foreword, because "Survival Kit for Leaders" could wind up challenging his own "One Minute Manager," "Gung Ho," and many of this other books in sales and influence. Not just an entertaining and enjoyable read, but a life-changing one.
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Summary: Shame on the author and publisher!
Review: I'm writing you because of the FALSE reviews and recommendations on amazon. Shame on those who pollute the review pool with self serving recommendations.
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