Author: Camille F. Bishop,
PhD
Publisher: Authentic Publishing
ISBN:
978-1-934068-37-3
'We're in This Boat
Together' is a 2-in-1, a business novel and a dissertation about the
Leadership Succession Between Generations or the Generation Gap and
its effects on leadership. The experiment with the format is laudable
but the result is a little unsettling. Read on for my
perspective.
When the request for review came, I asked for and
got a peek into the first few pages of the book ending with the
prologue. I skipped the preface etc. and read the prologue and was
thrilled. Here is a book on management with a good focus on
leadership transition between the generations written like a business
novel and the prologue was so good in style! I accepted the review
request and got the printed book.
The book is printed well,
the paper quality is good, the type is clear and the readability is
good. As already mentioned, the starting is good, rather racy in
fact!
The book is about the team building exercise through a
river rafting expedition, an exercise to which a team of four from
the IT Department of a mid-size company was sent by the management.
The team starts as four independent individuals wondering why they
were sent for this and ending up as a well knit team at the end of
the expedition, in which they were subjected to challenges that test
their willingness and ability to work as a team in a crunch
situation. The team finds a real life parallel in the office when
leadership transition takes place. The concept is good and the
parallel of the river with its rapids is highly apt to life in
general and change management in particular. Thus the author is to be
commended for taking up a worthwhile topic in change management.
Leadership transitions are brought on by several factors and the
leadership transition brought on by generation gap is an important
element. There are other factors of course that affect leadership
styles.
The book adopts a rather novel approach. The text
keeps alternating between the smooth flow of a novel and the
not-so-smooth flow of a good dissertation on the effects of
generation on leadership. The smooth flow of the novel like
presentation is interrupted by the highly academic dissertation on
the leadership styles of the different generations. Much as the
author tried to present that part in a simple and readable style, the
transition is too abrupt. This continued throughout the book.
Having
read and enjoyed management books written in the novel format (who
hasn't read The Goal?), as well as a non-fiction essay format, I
found the sudden changes in the style and the pace rather unsettling.
It is as if the author was affected by the river!
I hope the
author will attempt a smoother transition between the two formats in
a future edition. I believe that it is possible to convey all serious
topics on science and management through the novel format.
Click Here To Purchase We're in this Boat Together: Leadership Succession Between the Generations