Give and Take
From the author of million-copy bestseller THINK AGAIN
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4.5 • 12 Ratings
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
The New York Times bestseller
'Brimming with life-changing insights' Susan Cain, author of Quiet
'Excellent' Financial Times
Everybody knows that hard work, luck and talent each plays a role in our working lives. In his landmark book, Adam Grant illuminates the importance of a fourth, increasingly critical factor - that the best way to get to the top is to focus on bringing others with you.
Give and Take changes our fundamental understanding of why we succeed, offering a new model for our relationships with colleagues, clients and competitors. Using his own cutting-edge research as a professor at Wharton Business School, as well as success stories from Hollywood to history, Grant shows that nice guys need not finish last. He demonstrates how smart givers avoid becoming doormats, and why this kind of success has the power to transform not just individuals and groups, but entire organisations and communities.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Contrary to popular belief, good guys don't always finish last, and, in fact, an altruistic mindset can help people get ahead professionally. Whenever we interact with others in a business situation, we need to decide how to comport ourselves: focus on our own goals, or give without worrying what we'll get in return. A giving personality has the power to launch a career or deep-six it. Wharton professor Grant uses psychology and behavioral economics to explain how and why givers can succeed or fail. While takers are often very successful (Ken Lay, for example), they frequently lose credibility. Givers, on the other hand, are better salespeople and are more likely to be believed. Grant shares the stories and philosophies of givers and takers, including comedian George Meyer (a writer and executive producer for The Simpsons) and Craig Newmark of Craigslist. Through Grant acknowledges that taking is sometimes necessary, for most people, giving is not only the best way to succeed professionally, but to be happy. Ending with "actions for impact" so readers develop the right mix of mostly give and some take, Grant drives home programmer and networking genius Adam Rifkin's five-minute rule: "You should be willing to do something that will take you five minutes or less for anybody."
Customer Reviews
Rigorous insights into human behaviour and self improvement
This book will be of interest to anybody who is interested in human behaviour, and also anyone on the self-improvement path.
I’ve had the pleasure of being taught by Grant (count that as a conflict of interest if you like) and he is a walking encyclopaedia of both rigorous psychological studies, and interesting theories, which he applies to his work and his writing. In addition, he practices what he preaches: he is an extremely generous teacher, with an almost-obsessive desire to help his students’ make progress in any way that he can.
There is far too much “self-improvement” literature available based on nothing more thant the professional aspirations (and self-delusion) of well-meaning authors.
Amongst it all, there are some volumes that take their subjects far more seriously, and their authors demonstrate their own experience in the subject, while also dedicating their own lives to formal and rigorous study of their area of interest. Grant’s “Give and Take” sits in this category.
As such, I highly recommend it.
Could be an article
It stops adding value after page 10