Written by business Guru's Kenneth Blanchard and Spencer Johnson, the One Minute Manager proposes three key secrets to effective management. Utilizing a junior manager, just getting started on his management track as the disciple, each of these three key secrets is gradually revealed by a much more senior manager in simple and easy to understand examples and messages. This much more senior manager is the One Minute Manager that the book is based upon and is a very well respected leader by his staff and other managers.
The 3 secrets discussed are: (1) One Minute Goals - goals should be agreed upon and written down during the course of meetings between managers and employees. These goals should be a simple, brief statement and they should be reviewed occasionally to ensure that progress is being made. (2) One Minute Praisings - in a nutshell, catch someone doing something right! Its very easy to find fault, but praising when deserved is an even more powerful method of coaching and will show great dividends. (3) One Minute Reprimand - as much as you'd like to only give praise, when an employee makes a mistake it is important to reprimand them immediately and specifically so that they know exactly what they've done wrong. It is very important that the One Minute Reprimand also includes a step at the end where you should inform the employee that it was specifically the action that was at fault and that you do not have any issue with the employee.
Recommendation
The One Minute Manager is a quick read, probably 1-2 hours at the outside. It is also a book that bears repeated reading as although the message is simple, carrying it out is difficult and constant repetition and practice is needed to ensure that you are doing it right. It is a very good book for starting managers and one that I would highly recommend.
Fiction Book - 10 Best X-Men
Although not specifically a single book, Comic Books have been a huge influence on my early reading and this site, provides a really well rounded recap of the 10 Best story arc's in the X Men Universe. Definitely too detailed to go into here, suffice it to say that if you were to read each of these different series, you would have it all! Death of key characters, tragedies aplenty and some of the best storylines in Comicdom.
