Lead Your Boss – The Subtle Art of Managing Up – A Review
There are very few leaders who don’t have a boss and, as any leader knows, sometimes it’s necessary to lead the boss as well as subordinates. But how? As the book’s title suggests, such leadership is a subtle art.
John Baldoni presents a laundry list of techniques for the leader who wants to lead up. After all, helping the boss succeed is really a basic part of leadership responsibility. You want your subordinates to help you succeed and you should strive to help your boss succeed. In Lead Your Boss: The Subtle Art of Managing Up, he breaks the subject into three areas, each building on the next.
It’s important to know what the leader needs. Remember, the goal is to help him or her succeed and knowing what they need is essential. Like the boss, a subordinate leader needs to be able to think strategically, while also being creative. Of course diplomacy usually leads to success. Probably one of the harder parts of leading up is knowing when and how to push back. Good leaders appreciate honest feedback from subordinates and good subordinate leaders know how to provide it.
Being a leader means being in a team. To be effective, the leader must know what the team needs. Of course teams are complex things and so Baldoni’s next step, knowing what the team needs is also complex. Here he suggests a number of techniques that will help the leader understand the team’s and most importantly the team’s members’, needs. Armed with that knowledge, the leader can then more effectively lead, both up and down.
With knowledge of what the leader needs, and what the team needs, the leader in the middle can now ask the pivotal question; what can I do my help the leader and the team succeed. Here Baldoni spends some time on two skills that are essential to leading, whether it’s up, down, or sideways. First is resilience. A leader won’t always win, especially not the first time, making this a critical skill for the leader’s own sanity. The other is to treat other people well. People are what leadership is all about and the leader who treats people well is much more likely to succeed. Of course, being able to deal with the word “no” is important as well.
In Lead Your Boss, Baldoni gives us a handbook of leadership skills that apply to all levels of leadership. A word of caution though. If you’re looking for a book that spells out in simple steps how to get your boss to do what you want him or her to do, this isn’t it. The title states this is a subtle art, and indeed it is. It’s also a subtle theme in this book and in reading one learns that perhaps the best way to lead the boss is to first master the art of leadership itself.
TRUMP – The Art of the Deal Book Review
Almost everyone has heard about Donald Trump and his massive amount of accrued wealth, but most have no idea how he made it. Some think he’s in real estate, others thinks he owns businesses, but quite frankly, those are just some of the methods of madness he chooses to use. Donald Trump is actually in the art of “Deal-Making” and you’ll learn all about it in this book.
I will talk about what I think the most important concept of the book is. If you don’t want to read this book, I think you should at least read the chapter on this concept. The concept is about using negative thinking to help you negotiation, make deals, and accumulate wealth. I’ve read a lot of books but this is the first one I’ve heard that tells you to think negatively to gain an edge.
Trumps outlook on deals is that if you can handle and accept the worst part of a deal then you can let the good take care of itself. Whenever you go to put a deal together always think of the worst outcome and see if you can accept that before going in. If you can’t accept it, then either don’t waste your time or try harder to ensure you don’t get that result, but what better way to go into a deal knowing that the worst possible outcome is acceptable to you.
At this point you may be thinking, “that’s stupid” the worst part of any deal is that it doesn’t happen, and if that’s what you’re thinking then I am not making my point clear. Everyone has a different idea of what the worst thing they’ll accept out of the deal is and if yours is the deal just won’t happen then you should definitely read this book to help you up your “worst standards”.
The other parts of the book are also packed with good information. You will learn about Donald’s father and how he was in the construction business and Donald’s decision not to follow in his fathers foot steps. You’ll get to spend a week in the office with Donald. You will learn about some of the major deals he made, the difficulties involved with each, and how he made them happen.
In summary, there’s a lot of things you can take away from this book, whether you just want to know who Donald Trump is or apply his principles to your own life, there’s something for everyone. I give this book a 9/10 for its insightfulness.
A Review of Andy Warhol Pictures
Decades ago Andy Warhol pictures were a real revolution to the world of art. All the important aspects of our culture have been more or less shaped in his pictures and that’s a fact whether you love him or hate him (and most people either do the first or the second). Pop art would never have done what it has already if it wasn’t for Andy Warhol and his pictures. He was way ahead of his time and helped define the genre.
The first pictures, in which people can actually see that the fame of the artist and his status, along with the work of art, presented as a fetish cult status are far more important than the work itself, were the ones of Andy Warhol. His pictures are also the first place where people can find synthesized and differentiated high and low art. Artistic appreciation of the popular culture presented as a thing not less worthy of administration than any other culture coming before or after is shown in Andy Warhol pictures more than in the works of any other artist before him.
Andy Warhol posters were hanging all over my room when I was in college. Actually the first Andy Warhol picture I saw ever saw was the cover of the first album of a popular at this time group called the Velvet Underground. The picture itself was one of his most famous ones – the picture of a banana which you’ve probably seen lots of times virtually everywhere. I can admit that I discovered the pictures of Andy Warhol just because The Velvet Underground were big fans of his and I on my turn was one of the biggest they had.
I can never deny originality of Andy Warhol, even not being such a fanatic about him anymore. Some people find it strange to call original a person who during his entire life did nothing else but copied other people’s works, but I still think he was real genius. Most people don’t ever consider that such works like advertising works could be called art, at least till they see an Andy Warhol picture. After that people’s eyes do change and this is enough to prove that there is some real value in Andy Warhol. And even if he blew my mind when I first saw his pictures in college, I don’t think he could be called an ill wind as in the saying “it is an ill wind that blows no mind”.