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nenenest's review against another edition
4.0
I was given this in a bundle of free books. I only decided to read it as it had short chapters and looked like it might be fun. It’s in alphabetical order and some topics have a couple of lines, nothing has more than 3 pages. I don’t generally read business books. However this is a very entertaining one and if I was a businessman I feel the advice would be helpful. Four stars only because some of it is out of date.
toddlleopold's review against another edition
5.0
If you're a manager, read this book. If you're a staff employee, read this book. If you're a bureaucrat, paper-pusher, VP or CEO, run far away from this book, because you're the problem.
Amazing that Townsend wrote this book in 1970 and revised it in the early '80s -- and despite the fact that it was a best-seller the first time around and is now considered a business classic, it remains ignored by most in the business/executive community. (Because when it's your ox that's being gored ...) I wonder what Townsend, who died in the mid-'90s, would make of these days of huge executive-staff pay disparities and Wall Street weasels. He'd probably start a company and never take it public.
It depresses me that so little of the book's recommendations have become commonplace, but that's human nature for you: look out for No. 1, and screw everyone else.
Amazing that Townsend wrote this book in 1970 and revised it in the early '80s -- and despite the fact that it was a best-seller the first time around and is now considered a business classic, it remains ignored by most in the business/executive community. (Because when it's your ox that's being gored ...) I wonder what Townsend, who died in the mid-'90s, would make of these days of huge executive-staff pay disparities and Wall Street weasels. He'd probably start a company and never take it public.
It depresses me that so little of the book's recommendations have become commonplace, but that's human nature for you: look out for No. 1, and screw everyone else.
afox98's review
2.0
Yawn. Seems to all be common sense to me, and there's no flow to the book. It's just a collection of alphabetical topics.
eb00kie's review against another edition
5.0
Iconoclastic, counterintuitive, ridiculously funny but concise - I say "but" because repetition is the only way I've seen teaching work outside science
rosaskyer's review
5.0
Read in 2018 in Norwegian edition from 1970(!!). Salvation Army ftw ;) This book is a real saver to keep yourself sane in a world where the workplace can be at times insane. It can help you ground and go “ok, I am still sane”.
jameseckman's review against another edition
4.0
The section on computers and their priests is still relevant today and I'm sorry that Townsend was unable to become the curator of the Harvard MBA school museum of horrors after a richly deserved closure.
Also time for a reread.
Also time for a reread.