Q 259: How to motivate people?

In Freedom, Inc., Brian Carney and Isaac Getz include an excerpt from James McGregor’s classic, The Professional Manager, in Chapter 8:

“The answer to the question managers often ask… – How do you motivate people? – is: You don’t. Man is by nature motivated….His behavior is influenced by relationships between his characteristics as an organic system and the environment….Creating these relationships is a matter of releasing energy in certain ways rather than others. We do not motivate him because he already is motivated. When he is not, he is dead.”

Years later, in Up the Organization, Robert Townsend concurs: “Provide the climate and proper nourishment and let the people grow themselves. They’ll amaze you.”

Q #201: Which business books provide the most and the best takeaways?

In response to the question posed, here are the eleven books selected by a panel sponsored by 800-CEO-READ:

The First 90 Days
Michael Watkins

Up the Organization
Robert Townsend

Beyond the Core
Chris Zook

The Little Red Book of Selling
Jeffrey Gitomer

What the CEO Wants You to Know
Ram Charan

The Team Handbook
Peter Scholtes, Brian L. Joiner, and Barbara J. Streibel

A Business and Its Beliefs
Thomas J. Watson Jr.

Lucky or Smart?
Bo Peabody

The Lexus and the Olive Tree
Thomas Friedman

Thinkertoys
Michael Michalko

More Than You Know
Michael J. Mauboussein

All are worthy selections but, in my opinion, any list that omits Guy Kawasaki’s Reality Check is incomplete. In terms of quality and quantity of takeaways, none of the aforementioned eleven even comes close.

Check out Jack Covert and Todd Sattersten’s The 100 Best Business Books of All Time.

Comments, questions, requests, or suggestions? Please share them. They will be most welcome and I thank you for them. Best regards, Bob