Book Review: Leadership and Self-deception

I normally hate business books written in a fictional fable storytelling style. But for some reason I managed to read and enjoy this one - with one or two minor annoyances which we can cover later.

The book suggests that sometimes we cause our own problems, or at least make problem situations worse through our own attitudes and behaviours. We do this when we fail to view other people as people - instead viewing them as object, and view their needs and desires as less important than our own.

( amazon.co.uk | amazon.com )

Book Review: Zapp! The Lightning of Empowerment by William C. Byham & Jeff Cox

Joe has a problem: everyone wants more, and no-one wants to do more than the bare minimum. Joe can't figure out what to do. He says "do a better job!" and they don't, he says "if you don't do a better job you'll get sacked", they don't do a better job, they get demoralised, and worse - they don't get sacked. Oh woe, poor joe, oh no, he doesn't know what to do, whatever can joe do? Of course... Zapp!
[amazon.com][amazon.co.uk]

Book Review : Driving Down Cost by Andrew Wileman

A highly relevant book to read in these cost cutting times. Andrew Wileman evidently having seen it and done it - and now presenting useful advice on the art of cost cutting.

Before started reading I noted down what I expected to see advice about:

• becoming more effective,


• getting rid of underperforming staff now and quickly,


• driving out a bonus on sales culture,


• etc.

I did have the concern that I would see too much advice on short term unitary costs and ignoring end to end transaction costs - and after reading I think I still have the concern that Wileman didn't deal with that topic effectively.

All other topics get excellent coverage and worth a read. Andrew provides a lot of other useful advice that I did not initially think of.

( amazon.co.uk | amazon.com )

Book Review: The New Economics by W. Edwards Deming

This great little book acts as an introduction and summary to Deming's ideas:

• his 'system of profound knowledge'


• the purpose of management


• removal of numeric targets and incentives


• the Shewhart Cycle for learning and improvement


• Variation


• the Red Bead Game


• control charts

A highly recommended read because ....

( amazon.co.uk | amazon.com )

The best book on writing a CV: Pitch Yourself by Bill and Michael Faust(Book Review)

I promise, I shall make this my last post on CVs and recruitment for a while. (see notes, and more notes)

But I just wanted to mention the only useful book I read about CVs when researching the CV book market. When I read this book I gave up on writing a CV book because it pretty much covered the notes I had made (previous 2 blog posts) and gave useful information for building up an effective CV.

Pitch Yourself, by Bill Faust and Michael Faust.

( amazon.co.uk | amazon.com )

The basic summary: You have less than 30 seconds to impress. You're CV needs to answer the question "What can you offer me?". CV needs to provide evidence, create interest. Make your next employer buy you.

More notes on writing a CV that a hiring manager wants to read

So the last post described what I wanted.

Now some tips about how I read a CV. So make sure you write your CV to support my reading of it.

Contrary to some advice - I don't really mind how many pages the CV has. I care about the relevancy of the information and that it demonstrates to me what you will bring to the role.

I have a multi-pass approach to CVs:

• pass one: Is this CV even worth reading?


• pass two: Who is this person?


• pass three: Could they meet my needs?


• pass four: Are they lying?


• pass five: Do I want to speak to them?

How to write a CV that a hiring manager wants to read

This post started as notes for a book. "What would be better?" I thought "In this time of recession, than to prey on peoples fears of losing their job and write a book on how to write a CV." And then I did the research and read through about 15 books on how to write a CV and I could barely keep them apart. They all follow the same formula and cover the same stuff. So instead of adding to the dung heap category of 'how to write a CV' I thought I'd pull together my thoughts and explain what I look for in a CV. Hopefully other managers looking for this stuff as well.

First some don'ts - so if your CV does any of these... stop it, now, edit it, fix it: