An often engaging argument for taking a more holistic approach to office work.
An enthusiastic endorsement of a new approach to organizational design in business settings.
In this debut book, Creel passionately advocates for a system that he calls “Adaptive”—a technology-enabled, collaborative corporate structure that minimizes hierarchy, values workers’ skills more highly than office politics, and coaches employees toward continual improvement. Creel explains the philosophy behind his program, places it in the context of two centuries of organizational design, and lays out, in broad terms, how to develop an Adaptive workplace using communication tools, such as Slack and automated chatbots, or bots, which can offer advice and help with repetitive tasks, and are designed to meet a company or team’s specific needs. Numerous examples from Creel’s experiences developing Adaptive teams at multiple companies provide detailed illustrations of the process, and of the opportunities it presents for businesses. The book concludes with an assessment of potential challenges to implementing an Adaptive structure in the workplace, but its overall message is one of strong support for the concept. Creel is a dynamic writer (“There is something inherently less agitating about a bot suggesting you should do something good for you than a human telling you the same thing”), and it’s not hard to get swept up in his enthusiasm for the topic. That said, his description of tools that are “designed to gamify work discipline” does seem excessively utopian. The explanations of how to implement various techniques are generally clear and actionable, although many readers will need to look elsewhere for specifics regarding the aforementioned bots, which are a crucial element of the Adaptive system. The book is also hampered by the author’s tendency to vaguely attribute conclusions to “studies” and “research” without providing specifics. On the whole, however, Creel provides a thought-provoking, enjoyable text that provides some solid insights about making meaningful changes in the workplace.
An often engaging argument for taking a more holistic approach to office work.Pub Date: Aug. 26, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5445-0268-7
Page Count: 274
Publisher: Lioncrest Publishing
Review Posted Online: Oct. 22, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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