A convincing rebuttal of the “Great Man” theory of history.
Debunking myths about leadership.
Drawing largely on standard biographies, four-star general McChrystal (Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World, 2015, etc.), former Navy Seal Eggers, and Marine Corps veteran Mangone offer lively, succinct profiles of 13 leaders from diverse fields with the goal of examining assumptions about leadership as well as “challeng[ing] traditional leadership models.” Structured to emulate Plutarch’s Parallel Lives, the book pairs leaders to compare and contrast their qualities: Walt Disney and Coco Chanel represent business founders; Albert Einstein and Leonard Bernstein, geniuses; French revolutionary Robespierre and Iraqi jihadi Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, zealots; 15th-century Chinese fleet commander Zheng He and 19th-century American abolitionist Harriet Tubman, heroes; New York politician “Boss” Tweed and Margaret Thatcher, power brokers; and Martin Luther and Martin Luther King, Jr., reformers. Confederate general Robert E. Lee, once “a symbol of stoic commitment to duty” whom McChrystal grew up admiring, merits a chapter of his own. Rather than devise a checklist of leadership traits, the authors ask why each individual emerged from their particular context as a leader: “What was it about the situation that made this style of leadership effective?” They dispel the idea of leadership “as a process-driven, action-oriented practice…of influencing a group toward some defined outcome.” Instead, they assert that leaders provide “a meaningful sense of direction” that is “clarifying and comforting.” In all cases, they see that to understand the power of a leader, “one must look away from the leader and toward the followers and institutions that enable them.” Leaders may be courageous and charismatic, but beyond those attributes, “they deliver something” that followers need or desire. Followers, therefore, must hold leaders accountable and “shape and confine their leaders’ styles.” Leadership, the authors maintain, cannot be reduced to a formula but “is contextual and dynamic” and “more about the symbolism, meaning, and future potential leaders hold for their system, and less about the results they produce.”
A convincing rebuttal of the “Great Man” theory of history.Pub Date: Oct. 23, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-53437-2
Page Count: 480
Publisher: Portfolio
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2018
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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