Jeffery Harvey

FINALLY...I get through this book. I must say, content-wise, the book was great. From a readability standpoint, though, I had a very tough time with it. I consider myself an advanced reader, but the book felt intellectually forced. A word to the author, when writing about a subject that forces you to list name after name of foreign language origins, keep your writing style simpler. The names were difficult for me to follow and the sentence structure didn't help me internalize the actual point that was being made.

That being said, as a textbook for a homeland security course, I would highlight recommend this one. Very informative. Very thorough. I read this one to inform my work and it did just that. In today's society, we are over-exposed to al Qaeda and under-exposed to the historical terrorist movements. I also enjoyed the book's presentation of the different types of terrorism: nationalist-separatist, social revolutionary, and religious extremist.

Defoe does what Defoe does best. The poems in this book range from the deep to the whimsical, which is what I'be come to expect and love about Mark's work. I always feel like he can take the most common of events and turn them into mysterious, wonderful benchmarks against which to remember one's life. My personal favorite from this collection is “Lack of an Antecedent”...it is a perfect blend of the taboo feelings many of us have when sitting next to soldier on his or her way home - pride, pity, wonder, disgust, this list could go on for a while. And even as we're harboring these feelings, we know that the majority of them are not directed at or caused by that soldier...it's our way of transferring our own deep instincts about war, peace, and the governments that make us choose between them. Ever want to know how that sounds in metaphor? Pick up “The Rock and the Pebble”.

Though this book was enjoyable, it was one of the toughest things I've read in quite some time...imagine reading a 300-page newspaper article. Its primary theme, though, is one to which we should all serve notice. Excessive secrecy - in government, business, etc.- will threaten our way of life here in America. From my career-based knowledge of the intelligence failures preceding 9/11 to some serious but ultimately trivial things that are happening in my extended family, covering up the truth brings heartache, creates an even greater web of lies to keep a secret suppressed, and so on. Needless to say, this book resonated with me.

Gup presents a number of examples of secrecy and information classification gone awry. What is most disturbing are those cases related to homeland security. What could be more important in a time when we send our sons and daughters abroad to fight a war to protect the very homeland that supports our way of life? I see this personally when I am forced to classify (albeit the “light” classification of FOUO) an after-action report of an emergency exercise. Does the public not have a right to know what strengths their emergency responders have? Does the public not have a right to know of their community's vulnerabilities so it can prepare itself?

In short, pick this book up to learn how you can open the doors of government, the press, big business, and so on. It is paramount. It is our responsibility as Americans. It is patriotic.

J.

What a book to read for someone who makes their living in the homeland security industry. “Incendiary” follows a widow following her husband's and son's death from a terrorist attack on London. Not only is it an insightful statement on an individual's grief for her family and nation, but it is also a poignant statement on that nation's grief. In many ways, we can look at the narrator's descent into madness as understandable, given her extreme losses. England, however, is made out like a just-chastised dog, tail between the legs and sulking in the corner. How does the country react? By growing mean and incapable of trusting others.

But enough about that...“Incendiary” forces the reader to face questions that all of us should face in a post-9/11 world (though many of us can't bear the thought of doing so). Where is the line between civil liberties and security? Where is the appropriate threshold whereupon secrecy becomes necessary? Does force or resilience most-effectively deter terrorists?

Perhaps the book's greatest success is how it explores what happens to “regular” folks in the aftermath of national tragedies. Too often we read about how our politicians are affected, how the families of the NYC firefighters were affected. The New York Times lists Guliani's and Bush's accounts as “best sellers”. As mentioned, homeland security is a daily reality for me and I am afforded the opportunity to talk with a number of people about their emotions and their ideas about how to fight terrorism. One would be surprised at how many people teeter on madness when they really let themselves feel terrorism.

The book explores a number of relevant social issues without being “preachy”. It dissects how class stratification has manifested itself in modern, western civilizations. It touches on ethics in law enforcement and intelligence gathering. It ends with a scathing statement as to how our media can steal what little sanity many have left. Chris Cleave's genius lies in not naming the narrator; she is us.

Thomas Hoover's The Zen Experience is a solid introduction to Zen as a spiritual practice. Candidly, it was much more history than I expected. The book focuses solely on Zen's beginnings and its evolution through China and into Japan. There is no discussion of the practice of Zen. As such, I am glad I have it as a resource for a baseline as I choose other selections on Zen.

Concise read about the core tenets of crisis leadership. Dr. Klann breaks crisis leadership down into three principals: communication, clarity of vision/values, and caring. He further organizes his discussion according to three of the phases of incident management (preparedness, response, and recovery). Dr. Klann's efforts to distill the elements of crisis leadership to a small number of succinct elements are both effective and serve to make a complex phenomenon accessible. Further, the brief, direct style of the text is appropriate given the crisis context.

The title of this book suggests that successful crisis leadership in the military will be a strong theme, and it is via the U.S. Army. Dr. Klann does a nice job of using military lessons learned and translating those to the civilian context. The book focuses on corporate America (as opposed to crisis leadership in the community disaster context). I continue to look for more discussions set in a non-military context because I strongly feel that while the military is an excellent example of leading in crises, the community sector offers a number of excellent examples as well. Dr. Klann, however, does not hold the military over the reader's head. He skillfully includes examples from well-known military campaigns and quickly relates those the business world. From my perspective, that was much appreciated.

This book was written in the latter half of the 90s and it shows. Much of what the authors discuss has proven true. One of the most striking things about it is the support many of the authors throw toward outsourcing certain company activities overseas. Talk about the proverbial egg on the face!

In all seriousness, though, this was an interesting book. I really enjoyed the fact that the chapters were short AND thought-provoking. A lot of real practical advice here.

Pretty good read on servant leadership.

Based on Robert Greenleaf's servant leader concept, this text refers to a number of other management and leadership books to exemplify the basic good of giving oneself to one's team. Smith does a good job of highlighting the tough aspects of being a leader, hence the title of the book. For me personally, some chapters served as a stark reminder of what I need to be doing in my own leadership role.

There were times, though, when this book fell into the same trap as many other leadership and management texts: it can be contradictory to itself. Good leadership and management is so situational that it is tough to avoid this trap. Further, there were a number of grammatical errors that distract a reader like myself. I am certainly not perfect with grammar, but an overuse of contractions and words like “ain't” got in the way of my enjoyment of some chapters.

All-in-all, this is a solid, quick read for the aspiring leader and a suitable refresher for the seasoned leader.

As I begin my own journey into doctoral education, this was a very interesting read about the current state of doctoral education. Organized around Carnegie Mellon University's Carnegie Initiative on the Doctorate (CID), the author puts forth the CID's thoughts on the evolution of how doctoral coursework and the dissertation are presented. How much time do doctoral programs spend talking about their purpose? What is the purpose of doctoral education?

Written as a pseudo-textbook, it presents data and findings from a series of workshops facilitated by the CID. Program experimentation with such things as portfolios, cross-departmental research, etc. are all presented and ultimately advocated for pushing the doctorate into the future.

I appreciate the notion that the doctorate is not just for those wanting to perform research in academe. While that is a worthy pursuit, the benefits of PhD holders in private industry are numerous. Together with PhDs in higher education, these individuals can truly push the boundaries of what it means to be a scholar.

Russ-Eft and Preskill provide a fairly thorough look at performing systematic evaluations. I read this book as part of a strategic leadership curriculum, but I can see its applicability on a variety of other fronts: general organizational development, professional development, and a host of traditional research projects.

This book is a textbook in every way, down to the slow moving, dense writing that characterizes our college years. The authors do a good job of breaking up the text with tables and other figures. The chapters usually average about 15-17 pages; plan on setting aside at least an hour for each to allow the text to sink in.

This is a book that will be on my “active” shelf for years to come because of its applicability to my work endeavors. I have no intention of memorizing its wisdom since it will be on that shelf!

Anyway, for the topic at hand, it is a very good book. I dropped the stars to three only because it is incredibly dry.

J.

Exploring Leadership: Individual, Organizational & Societal Perspectives is an excellent overview of the state of leadership research and its role in scholarship, business and organizations, etc. I read this text approximately four years after the completion of my masters degree in strategic leadership and just prior to the start of my doctoral studies in executive leadership.

This text is not written like a traditional textbook, though it does present the research behind the factual information discussed. It is written as more a non-fiction essay about leadership. Its accessibility is its strength.

For anyone interested in brushing up on their leadership studies knowledge (or for those who are looking to build a little leadership studies knowledge), this text is a good start.

I read this text for a Leadership Research and Design Logic post-graduate course. Previously, though I had done action research projects and completed a number of what could be considered case studies as part of my job, I had not actively explored formal research design. In that sense, this book was enormously helpful. The writing was accessible. There were times, in the latter sections, when references to earlier concepts hindered comprehension. Ultimately, though, this is a good introductory text for those wishing to learn a little more about basic research design.

Solid book with tips for reducing stress. It is a quick read, with most chapters taking about five minutes. I see this more as an organizational efficiency book with a number of tricks worth trying.

Prior to reading a word in this text, it was described to me as “dense”. What a perfect description! As the primary text for the starting course of a doctoral program, the text was overwhelming at first. At no point in time did this become a fun read and, even though I had to force myself through it, once finished, it is a go-to reference for an introduction to many leadership theories.

Written as a sort of anthology of leadership studies, the book is divided into independently-written chapters on the state of leadership studies. Most chapters are actually short essays on a particular style of leadership, presenting its genesis in scholarship as well as current directions in its research. There are other chapters that talk about leadership as a scholastic discipline and set it against a backdrop of business administration, psychology, and organizational studies. The authors of each chapter were skillfully chosen by the editors at SAGE, for when you dig into contemporary research on your own, you will find that the authors are key players in the actual research.

Though not for the faint of heart, The SAGE Handbook of Leadership is an excellent overview of leadership studies, leadership theories, and a handy resource to have at one's disposal.

This book turned out to be a suitable introduction to a pragmatic view on strategy. While not going so far as to be a book about ‘strategy-as-practice', the text does lean strongly toward the view that strategy is fluid and should be based on the actions of an organization and the people that comprise it. The contrasts of eastern views (i.e., those of, for example, Confucius) and western views (i.e., those of Aristotle and others) was interesting. Most helpful are Nonaka & Zhu's real-world examples; they helped to solidify the concepts and also made a good portion of each chapter fun and easy to read. I found myself skimming some chapter-introductory material to more quickly get to the example, at which time I would slow down and enjoy the writing.

I read this text for a post-graduate course. As someone with a degree in writing, the book was only moderately helpful, though I can imagine that it would be helpful for those with less background in writing. There is a worksheet the guide the critical analysis of a work that I have found repeatedly helpful. As I move forward with my post-graduate education, I envision using it again and again.

What a pleasant surprise from a free Kindle Buffet book!

One Lane Bridge, written by Don Reid of the country-music artist The Statler Brothers, tells the story of J.D. Wickman and a series of mystical moments that both change his life and remind him that we are all part of a much bigger whole. One evening, while taking a drive to de-stress, Wickman crosses a one-lane bridge and has a little car trouble. He stops and gets help from a poor family and, after they help him get back on the road, decides he wants to pay it forward by taking them some groceries the next day. Only they aren't there. The bridge, the house, the family...all gone. Through a series of remarkable twists and turns, J.D. finds out that he is somehow transported back to 1942 and he spends the remainder of the novel trying to discover why.

Taken from a literary angle, One Lane Bridge is a well-told story. Reid's characters are believable and he does a great job of making his reader feel empathy toward them. Reid weaves themes of family and duty into the narrative. Though initially off-putting for me as a reader, Reid does a skillful job of making one feel Wickman's frustration with his family and friends (while no one believes his story about the bridge and they subsequently try to get him medical and psychological help). The novel does a good job of being contemporary without being overly nostalgic or folksy.

Very tough text to read. Nooteboom's ideas are interesting and applicable to the modern organization, but they are not presented in a way that is easily-digestible. This text is rated three stars because of the quality of the material, certainly not the writing or organization.

Having to read this for an organizational dynamics course, my initial impression was that the book would not be useful and barely applicable to real organizations. As it progressed, however, Nooteboom's notion of dynamic capabilities (to build off of Teece's and others' earlier work) proved interesting. It was the introduction of cognitive distance, though, and further the notion of optimal cognitive distance that I really found useful (and was the ‘saving grace' for the book, in my opinion). Broadening an organization's capabilities through strategic alliances so as to stretch cognitive distance (the range of concepts, actions, capabilities, etc. an organization can effectively cover) was particularly poignant for me as a small business owner.

I read this for a Leadership Research and Design Logic post-graduate course. The writing was accessible. There were times when the book took direct aim at validity and supported actions that I would have intuitively considered threats to research validity (particularly internal validity). Upon reflection, though, it seems perfectly logical that the researcher should be allowed to let on-going research influence the original research questions. The researcher, though, MUST be forthcoming in subsequent write-ups as to why such influence was present. In qualitative research, evidence as to the evolution of research questions could form the primary helpful-ness of the study.

This text serves as a suitable introduction to qualitative research. Maxwell's examples and activities are quite helpful at strengthening comprehension of the book's content. It should not be read lightly, though, as there are passages that feel incomplete or, as I noted earlier, some counter-intuitive for the novice researcher.

David Day and colleagues embark on the development of a theory of leader development in this text. They make a compelling case as to the need for a theory. Further, they go on to do a thorough job of linking leader development with adult learning theory.

Perhaps most interesting is the distinction made between leader development and leader-SHIP development. According to Day, et al., leader development focuses on the development of human capital while leadership development builds social capital in an organization. This concept is compelling, somewhat provocative, and entirely under-developed in this text. In reading other scholarly articles by Day (from as far back as 2001), he has been toying with this concept and it is somewhat disappointing to see that An Integrative Approach to Leader Development does not serve as a summary/hypothesis to his thoughts on leadership development as studied through more than a decade of research. This comment is not meant to suggest that the leadership development topic should supplant the leader development work in this text; however, an additional section of the book (perhaps prior to laying out Day's theory of leader development) would have been a substantial addition from both a content and an enjoyment perspective.

This text was required reading for a doctoral-level course on leader development. For that, it served its purpose well and was a meaningful addition to the course curriculum. Day, Harrison, and Halpin succeeded in effectively communicating their ideas and did not lose themselves in scholarly verbosity as is so often the case in research-based texts. Day, et al.'s use of the US Army as a sort of practical example also proved helpful, though questions as to how these concepts could be expeditiously applied in private sector business settings could be raised.

In conclusion, this text is a solid entry to the leader development literature and provides a helpful basis for students of leadership (in general) and leader development (in particular).

For me, a very dry read. It was informative, though. I can appreciate a down-to-earth view on accounting. Though I knew what a balance sheet was, for example, I was not aware of the logic behind it (nor how to derive it without the help of a software such as Quickbooks). I am glad I read the book, though in all honesty I cannot say I enjoyed it.

I read this text as part of a qualitative research course. It provided an adequate overview to qualitative research. I found the early chapters that defined the different types of qualitative study (e.g., phenomenology, ethnographic studies, grounded theory, etc.) much more informative than later chapters. The course for which this text was used was condensed into an eight-week timeframe, which was too brief to develop a more fond appreciation of the text.

While the Guest, et al. text provides was helpful (overall) and certainly applicable to the course in which I used it, I would much prefer texts by Joseph Maxwell (Qualitative Research Design: An Interactive Approach) and David de Vaus (Research Design in Social Research) as introductory texts for qualitative research.

I'm Not Dead, Am I?: A Paranormal Family Living in Rural New YorkFirst off, this was an enjoyable read. Berardi does a nice job of presenting both the seriousness of the health situation as well as the humor (that we can all see well after we live through our own traumatic events). She presents her family at a vulnerable time yet does not paint them as whiny or victimized, righteous or superior. They are a family, with all its beauties and blemishes.The paranormal element of this book was actually quite minimal. In today's ghost-crazed world (disclaimer, which is why I selected the book from the Buffet), my guess would have been multiple encounters with multiple deceased individuals, some famous, some family, some average Joes and the memoir to overtly claim divine, spiritual intervention in the healing of the mother character. Fortunately, the spirits that do appear in the novel are more of the comforting type that try to help the family get through the crisis. To my recollection, the claim that a spirit “healed” the mother character is not made once.Berardi's writing style is not colloquial, but quite conversational. The entire book reads like something the author would tell the reader over coffee. There are even a number of tangents in the book that follow the author's train of thought. While I found these jarring (e.g., biting political commentary in the middle of a touching chapter about the mother's transition to a nursing home to complete her recovery), they were brief enough so as not to completely disrupt the flow of the narrative. In truth, such ebb and flow may have been intentional given the book as a memoir.The second half of the book seemed to me to be more about the Nicole character (the daughter that is the medium) than the mother's health crisis. This point in the narrative related how and to whom Nicole gives readings and gives a number of stories about people to whom she's read and spirits that she has encountered. While interesting and, in some cases, touching, I found this shift in the narrative to be more troublesome than the frequent asides. The first and second halves of the book felt like (and perhaps should have been) two separate books. I can say that I would read both.In short, this book did not turn me off of the Kindle Buffet app. Though I am not typically a fan of memoirs, this one was a pleasant read and one I would recommend for someone looking for a light, weekend-morning book.

Designing Resilience: Preparing for Extreme Events is an excellent text for introducing students to the notion of resilience and how it differs from traditional conceptualizations of disaster preparedness. An edited text, the variety of authors approach resilience from numerous angles, which indirectly explains why ‘resilience' has been notoriously difficult to define.

Particularly insightful are Comfort's chapter regarding the input and synthesis of information and the resulting “bow-tie architecture” she presents; Demchak's chapter on the Atrium model; and Boin's chapter analyzing resilience and leadership. The collection, synthesis, and subsequent dissemination of information becomes critical in disaster events and serves as the foundation of resilience. All of these (and the remaining) chapters hint at the level of collaboration and partnership that are needed to design truly resilient systems.

The editors conclude the book with a call for future study, which is the trend in texts such as this. However, in this case, the future study that is noted would push the resilience agenda in an extremely positive direction. Studies should continue working toward a definition of resilience, for usage in both scholarly and practitioner arenas. Further, it would be most beneficial to see this text in the hands of practitioners so that the unique perspectives of both academia and technical practice contribute to our burgeoning understanding of resilience.

Remler's text was not a ‘fun' read, but it certainly was an informative one. She and her colleagues did an admirable job of distilling the finer points of quantitative research (generally) and statistics (more specifically) down to a level where they could be understood by the student at the introductory (to research) level. The text includes numerous real world examples, which helped with comprehension. Further, Remler and Van Ryzin were careful to highlight the importance of practical significance throughout. For those that are interested in both the scholarship and practice-based ramifications of research, such inclusion was refreshing.

Though Remler was diligent in recognizing the benefits and contributions of qualitative research, the text was a bit light on qualitative measures (to be considered a summary book on research methods. Rather, I would rather it be called what it is - an introduction to quantitative research. The text covers numerous quantitative methods, types of studies, etc. and includes basic introductory language on certain statistical calculations.