Biblio

Sort by: Author Title [ Type  (Desc)] Year
Book
Brod, C. (1984).  Techno Stress: The Human Cost of the Computer Revolution.
"Unemployment ultimately eats away at self-esteem. We normally spend much of our time discussing work, socializing with our co-workers, and thinking about our jobs. We identify with the work we do. Status is earned according to what we do, how much we earn, and whether or not we supervise others, and, if so, how many. Our sense of worth, confidence, and security disappears when we lose our jobs." (p. 57)
Postman, N. (1993).  Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology.
"In the work of Frederick Taylor we have, I believe, the first clear statement that society is best served when human beings are placed at the disposal of their techniques and technology, that human beings are, in a sense, worth less than their machinery." (p. 52)
Yalom, I. D. (1995).  The theory and practice of group psychotherapy.
"In their classic research on three different styles of leadership, White and Lippit noted that a group is more likely to develop disruptive in-group and out-group factions under an authoritarian, restrictive style of leadership. Group members, unable to express their anger and frustration directly to the leader, release these feelings obliquely by binding together and mobbing or scapegoating one or more of the other members." (p. 330)
Ouchi, W. G. (1981).  Theory Z: How American Business Can Meet the Japanese Challenge.
"A Japanese company committed to lifetime employment will go to great lengths to build loyalty among its employees by ensuring fair and humane treatment. In the United States, by comparison, an alienated, disgruntled employee can be laid off during the next downsizing in the business cycle and thus represents only a short-term burden to the employer. The problem is purely one of incentives. People committed to long-term relationships with one another have strong commitments to behave responsibly and equitably towards one another." (p. 34)
James, J. (1997).  Thinking in the Future Tense.
"Psychologist Sheldon Kopp warned clients to plow the fields of their past if they wanted to be able to plant their own crops. Business consultant Peter Senge agreed: 'Structures of which we are unaware hold us prisoner. Once we can see them and name them they no longer have the same hold on us. This is as true for the organization as it is for the individual.'" (p. 41)
Epstein, M., & Lama D. (2003).  Thoughts without a Thinker : Psychotherapy from a Buddhist Perspective.
"The purpose of life is to be happy....
On its own no amount of technological development can lead to lasting happiness. What is almost always missing is a corresponding inner development." (p. ix, forward by the Dalai Lama)
Bolles, R. N. (1978).  The three boxes of life: and how to get out of them : an introduction to life/work planning.
"In a study prepared by professor M. Harvey Brenner of Johns Hopkins University for the Joint Congressional Economic Committee, every rise in the unemployment rate in this country has been followed by increases in 'seven indicators of social stress': homicide, suicide, deaths from cardiovascular and kidney disease, deaths from cirrhosis of the liver, total number of deaths, admissions to mental hospitals, and the number of people sent to jail for crimes." (p. 249)
Peters, T. J. (1987).  Thriving on Chaos.
"It's absurd! We don't want for evidence that the average worker is capable of moving mountains—if only we'll ask him or her to do so, and construct a supportive environment. So why don't we do it?...
I am frustrated to the point of rage—my files bulge with letters about the power of involvement. Sometimes it's planned, and I'll talk about that. Sometimes it's inadvertent. But the result is always the same: Truly involved people can do anything!" (p. 286)
Peters, T. J. (1987).  Thriving on Chaos: handbook for a management revolution.
"Today, there is an especially virulent form of corruption induced by overly rigid systems. This new corruption, in service to the 'system's imperative,' is non-responsiveness to constituent needs." (p. 606)
Gladwell, M. (2002).  The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference.
"The mistake we make in thinking of character as something unified and all-encompassing is very similar to a kind of blind spot in the way we process information. Psychologists call this tendency the Fundamental Attribution Error (FAE), which is a fancy way of saying that when it comes to interpreting other people's behavior, human beings invariably make the mistake of overestimating the importance of fundamental character traits and underestimating the importance of the situation and context. We will always reach for a 'dispositional' explanation for events, as opposed to a contextual explanation."
Petroski, H. (1994).  To Engineer is Human: The role of failure in successful design.
"There is a familiar image of the writer starting at a blank sheet of paper in his typewriter beside a wastebasket overflowing with crumpled false starts at his story. This image is true figuratively if not literally, and it represents the frustrations of the creative process in engineering as well as in art." (p. 75)
Davidow, W. H., & Uttal B. (1990).  Total Customer Service : The Ultimate Weapon.
"The hard truth is that there's little place for the traditional middle manager in companies that go all out to serve customers. The skills that most such managers have mastered—protecting their fiefdoms, proving their importance by forcing all information and communications to flow through their offices, meticulously enforcing bureaucratic controls—become serious liabilities. Yet no matter how flat the organization, no company can function without middle management.

The solution service leaders often take is to redefine the middle manager's job. Instead of acting like a boss, he is encouraged to behave like a helper." (p. 106)

Friedman, S. D. (2013).  Total Leadership: Be a Better Leader, Have a Richer Life. 284. Abstract
"If you approach your dialogues with a spirit of inquiry—if you want to learn, not argue—you will likely open up new pathways." (p. 109)
Hunter, R., & Waddell M. E. (2008).  Toy Box Leadership: Leadership Lessons from the Toys You Loved as a Child.
"Big business often treats people as disposable, when we should look at how to repurpose our people to better fit the future needs of the company and the employee." (p. 12)

(C)2014 CC-BY-NC 3.0, workcreatively.org