Tao of Coaching: Boost Your Effectiveness at Work by Inspiring and Developing Those Around You
£3.23
Lessons already learned? - Hmm. To be honest, I found the book a bit facile, I came to this having had my one-time cynicism about life-coaching well and truly eroded both by good books, and a series of excellent face-to-face coaching sessions. But I do know that people don t necessarily respond like machines just because you push the right buttons, and (from bitter experience) people don t necessarily handle even the most skilful and careful encouragement and intervention, in the appreciative way they are supposed to do! This book makes it look so easy..... just change your approach and the world will run like a well-oiled machine.Also, I had hoped we had got beyond categorising people as ISTJs, ENFPs etc... deal with people as people, for crying out loud, don t fit them in boxes just to make yourself feel more comfortable. It doesn t get you very far.I m thinking that many people would feel a bit patronised by being instructed to read this, while those who need to learn its lessons would never be convinced to read it anyway. But fundamentally it talks sense, so it gets _some_ stars from me.
Fastest learning in a while - This book follows Alex in his career progress whilst giving practical examples for coaching. Great reading for middle managers.The insight for each situation helps the reader grasp potential coaching situations - in and out of work - and each chapter has hidden messages of other coaching skills to use. I read this book in 4 hours and I really enjoyed it. You can do the exercises, refer to the theory, become absorbed in Alex s life and note parallels to your work politics or simply wryly smile at the cartoons in each chapter. Landsberg points out that accommodating individual differences is key, whatever your learning and reading style, much of the content should hit home.
great for the new coach or manager, 22 November, 2002 - This was the first title I read when I became a coach and I found it to be the best introduction one could hope for.It provides a step by step guide to the founding principles of coaching and is intelligently simple.The tale of Alex that runs through the book made it an enjoyable read but I found it to be a rather artificial (Anyone who behaved as ineptly as Alex in the company I work for would have been sacked years ago).Overall this book is a great introduction to business coaching but does not go far enough to be of value to those with experience in the role. I would suggest reading it when you start to coach and then give it to someone who would like to start to coach.
great for the new coach or manager - This was the first title I read when I became a coach and I found it to be the best introduction one could hope for.It provides a step by step guide to the founding principles of coaching and is intelligently simple.The tale of Alex that runs through the book made it an enjoyable read but I found it to be a rather artificial (Anyone who behaved as ineptly as Alex in the company I work for would have been sacked years ago).Overall this book is a great introduction to business coaching but does not go far enough to be of value to those with experience in the role. I would suggest reading it when you start to coach and then give it to someone who would like to start to coach.
Mediocre and Behind the Times - This book, though first published in 1996 is apparently based on training sessions run by those well-known *consultants* McKinsey and co. way back in 1990.Have we really learnt nothing new about coaching in the course of the last 12 years? To be blunt, if you put this little book up against *some* of the latest publications on the subject you might conclude that we d learnt nothing at all in that time.Unfortunately, for this author, The Tao of Coaching only stacks up well in comparison to the less significant entries in the coaching genre.Compare it with the better books now available on Coaching, and this set of stage managed situations and mechanical solutions looks more like a book that has seriously LOST it s Tao.Whilst there are undoubtedly a few good ideas here, the majority of the book - especially the author s tedious creation Alex (whose cloddish behaviour is used to illustrate the book s main points) - is tired, mediocre and totally unrepresentative of coaching in the new millenium.This *may* have been a welcome addition to the Coaching library when it was first published. Now it s just well past its sell-by date.