Fail

She does make several incisive points, though. Contrary to what many of us believe, there is very little mobility out of low wage work, even if one works hard. Also, low wage earners in most other affluent countries are significantly better off than their counterparts in the U.S., which is touted as the Land of Opportunity.

This book, for all its shortcomings, did make me think differently about low wage earners and the problems they face, but if you're only going to read one book on the subject, I'd recommend Nickel and Dimed.

Of course, Shulman has an agenda, but it is one backed up by facts, quoted in her book and elsewhere. It is undebatably true that the job situation in the US is changing for the worse, and it doesn't take this book, or others, to prove it, but simple observation. However, it is great to see many of the facts I've heard so many times elsewhere collected in a single volume.

Sadly, Shulman is probably preaching to the converted. While I agree with every point in the book, its doubtful a Conservative or corporate-apologist would -- but then again, they are the ones who got us in this mess and are profiting from it, so what do they care? For me, this book makes me want to read more, so I think I'll check out "Nickled and Dimed" now....

The language Belbin uses is friendly and easy to read and so the book is ideal material for trainers and students alike.

A classic book which should be included on every HR Trainers bookshelf.

While Belbin's title suggests this book is simply about business management, the content of the book is of much wider applicability. This book is a valuable, perhaps indispensable, source for anyone involved in collaborative endeavors. The book would be useful if it merely answered the question "Why do collaborative (creative, decision-making) teams succeed or fail?" Belbin goes much further than that. He tells us how to proactively build teams that are predisposed to succeed and, equally importantly, how to adopt strategies that will lead to success on the part of teams not so fortunately constructed.

I have found this book very useful in building, and teaching the building, of software product development teams, and heartily recommend it for that purpose.

If only the author actually got to the point and described what he calls "Ultra Solutions" in a manner that wasn't so annoying, this would be an ok book. The content is potentially interesting, but is wrapped in so much fluff that I found it impossible to finish the book.

THIS IS NOT A BOOK FOR YOU, IF YOU ARE A N.AMERICAN COLLEGE GRAD WHO BLENDS IN PASSIONATE MEDIA-SPUN OPINIONS WITH LARGE DOLLOPS OF PERSONAL IGNORANCE; AND WHOSE READING RANGE STOPPED SOMEWHERE SHORT OF YOUR PRESCRIBED TEXTBOOKS PLUS 'WHO MOVED MY CHEESE'!

THE GERMAN REVIEWER ALSO PUTS HIS FINGER ON THE PROBLEM THAT THIS IS A TRANSLATION FROM THE GERMAN INTO 'AMERRYENGLISH'. PERHAPS SOMETHING HAS BEEN LOST IN THE PROCESS, BUT NOT MUCH FROM WHAT I CAN SEE.

IT HELPS IF YOU ARE FAMILIAR WITH KARL POPPER'S WORK, EVEN MORE SO IF YOU BELIEVE THAT POPPER WAS THE MOST IMPORTANT EPISTEMOLOGIST OF THE 20TH CENTURY.

WATZLAWICK IS A POPPER POPULARISER WHO DOESN'T PATRONISE.

DON'T TOUCH THIS BOOK, IF YOUR IDEA OF A GREAT TREATISE ON MANAGEMENT IS 'THE ONE MINUTE MANAGER', OR IF YOU IMAGINE THAT PETER DRUCKER IS MUCH MORE THAN A WSJ COLUMNIST.

BUT, IF YOU TAKE DECISION-MAKING SERIOUSLY, BELIEVE THE 'PETER PRINCIPLE' STILL APPLIES, EVEN MORE SO TODAY THAN WHEN IT WAS WRITTEN (BY A CANADIAN, IF I'M NOT MISTAKEN), THEN THIS AMUSING LITTLE GEM WILL DELIGHT YOU.

WARNING: WRITTEN IN 1988, IT PREFIGURES THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION WITH UNCANNY ACCURACY. THE TITLE SAYS IT ALL. IN A NUTSHELL, HIS EXPOSITION, AS I READ IT, PREDICTS THAT A VERY NASTY SHOCK IS NOW LOOMING FOR AMERICA, WHICH WILL ONLY ADD INSULT TO THE TERRIBLE WTC INJURY ALREADY INFLICTED.

WHAT A TRAGEDY THAT 'ULTRA-SOLUTIONS' ISN'T ON GEO'S NIGHTSTAND, AT A TIME WHEN AMERICA NEEDS BRAINS INSTEAD OF BOMBS.

If the book had stopped with raising the question about how to invest so that you had financial security, and exposed all the risks as it does, it would have been a five-star book.

If the book had only looked at the importance of assuming that the future is unpredictable, and discussed alternatives about how to reduce the risk of that unpredictability, it would have been a five-star book.

Where the book gets into trouble, is that it offers unqualified recommendations that will get you into financial trouble. I graded the book down two stars for this problem.

The book argues that you focus on your day job (your career) as task one. Very few people will ever get to the point where investments replace earned or operating business income. Most financial books skip over this very important point.

Further, the book makes the important distinction between money that you should not take risks with and money that you can afford to lose. And it reiterates that distinction often and effectively. The money you plan to retire on is money with which you should not take much risk, and the money you have saved above that you can try other things with.

I particularly admired the many ways Mr. Browne documents the likelihood that any way you learn about to "beat the market" will soon do very poorly. Although this will not be enough to discourage the inexperienced from avoiding "taking a flyer," certain lessons can only be learned the hard way by most people.

So what's the real problem with investing? Prices fluctuate . . . a lot. These fluctuations cause investors to do the wrong things. They buy high and sell low. Ouch!

Mr. Browne's solution is to put together a portfolio that will protect you against the downside circumstances of high inflation, deflation, prosperity, and deflation. Although he doesn't say it, he wants your investments to be steadier in value so you won't be tempted to buy high and sell low.

Here is where the thinking gets a little dicey. How much downside risk you need to protect against depends solely on two things: the likelihood that you will sell at the wrong time and how long you will hold the asset. So the solution will tend to differ for each person. And I'm not quite sure how anyone assesses anyone's emotional tendency to buy and sell at the wrong time.

So let's shift focus. How can you avoid taking a ride downward? In nominal terms, that's not too hard. Stay in cash. You will always get some return, and if you are holding government short-term securities (like Treasury bills) or are in a government-insured savings account, there is little risk of losing your principal. For example, in tax deferred accounts, the returns on cash now are well above inflation. So in some environments, you won't even lose buying power.

So if you are close to retirement (or needing the money), it makes sense to be almost totally or totally in cash.

If you are 20 years old, the question turns around. Over a period of 40-50 years, cash will probably earn you a lower return than any other investment you can make. But can you handle the volatility? You should probably assume that you cannot handle the volatility. So you should have a fair amount of cash too in your "investment" rather than your "speculative" funds.

But you can handle that risk, too, in another way. You can save more money than you need to retire on (or for your children's education or whatever). Then the volatility will only take you down towards the minimum sums you need to have, not take you below your targets. If this approach feels comfortable to you, it is a better solution. You will earn more money and have less lifetime risk.

There are quite a few areas where I have problems with his advice. They are too numerous to outline here, but I will mention a few:

He ideally wants you to own 25 percent of your portfolio in gold in Austria or Switzerland. First, if you are over 60, I think that's very risky. If the value of that gold goes down, you've just lost. You won't probably hold it long enough to make the loss back. Second, you will increase the chances of being audited by the IRS if you honestly declare that you have a foreign bank account. Third, you will have violated the law if you do not. Fourth, what if you and your spouse die in a car accident? Are your heirs going to find that gold? Do you really need these problems?

He also encourages you to have your money in stock mutual funds and to select three for diversification. But he doesn't give you the information you need to do that well. See John Bogle's Common Sense on Mutual Funds for help with that issue.

Finally, he recommends people you can implement that strategy with. Be skeptical of any author who presents "trustworthy" people for you to work with. There are many, many ways this advice can represent conflicts of interest, overt or sub rosa.

If a salesman told you you could have "fail-safe" results and only need to spend 30 minutes a year to do so, would you believe her or him? Where else should you be skeptical about the specifics of advice you receive.

Think through how to "emotion-reduce" and "risk-reduce" your investing!

I strongly recommend Clayton Christensen's "The Innovator's Dilemma" as required preparatory reading. Without that background, readers may not fully understand the critical importance and significance of the problems that Watts is describing.

"The Slingshot Syndrome" presents powerful and thought-provoking analysis and ideas, and I strongly recommend it. It is unfortunate, therefore, that the book's presentation leaves much to be desired, and I personally found that shortcoming very distracting. The book would have benefitted greatly from the involvement of a ghostwriter or collaborator. The work has a disorganized feel and the material is repetitious. The author tries to illustrate his points with a couple of lengthy fictional stories, and although it seems like a good idea it frankly doesn't work. The stories have a corny flavor and the illustrative intent is too diffuse.

Much of the prose is lumpy and awkward, and much of the rest pedestrian at best. Indeed, the copy-edit process seems to have been skipped entirely, allowing frequent malapropisms ranging from the common (for example, "principal" for "principle," "council" for "counsel") through the creative (such as "precedence" for "precedents") to the almost comical (such as "duel" for "dual," "roll" for "role").

However, presentation problems aside, the book is well worth the effort.

This is not a book that calls for underlining and highlighting, but it definitely has value as a basis for reflecting on various aspects of collaboration, and the failure of collaboration, within enterprises.

The book is written strictly from the perspective of people and perceptions. It does not have a technical or a financial side and this was disappointing. It would have been more useful to have a book that fully integrated human, technical, and financial success stories and failure stories to present an integrated picture of collaborative work principles in a global economy using the Internet as the backbone for collaborative work.

The book is well-written, the figures are useful, and I recommend it to anyone who wants to sit quietly on an airplane and think about the authors' subtitle: why links between business units often fail, and how to make them work.