I just finished reading Daniel Pink’s The Adventures of Johnny Bunko. It tells the story of a NextGen kid who hates his job as an accountant for a large firm. Then into his life comes a genie who changes it with six points of important advice. I thought, uh-oh, here’s just another self-help book. But the advice is sound. One doesn’t actually read the book. It’s one long cartoon called “manga,” the Japanese comic format. This makes it quite engaging. You can finish it in less than an hour—but unlike other quickie self-help books, the ideas stick. It would be interesting to experiment with this format for b-school cases.
A propos of some of my previous postings, the third point is “It’s not about you.” The genie says, “Of course you matter, but the most successful people improve their own lives by improving others’ lives. They help their customer solve its problem. They give their client something it didn’t know it was missing. That’s where they focus their energy, talent and brainpower. …The most valuable people in any job bring out the best in others. They make their boss look good. They help their teammates succeed. So pull your head out of your…ego. Then sit down and get back to work.”
Yes.
Posted by Robert Bruner at 04/14/2008 01:39:09 AM