I have heard about this book many times during my two decades of being a “manager” but got to read it only today.
“The One Minute Manager by Ken Blanchard & Spencer Johnson” is claimed by many as a classic book on management and as Wikipedia calls it as a “fad”. First thing that strikes you about the book is how compact it is at 108 pages.
The book is written in the format of a story where a young aspiring manager interested in learning the secrets of being an effective manager, goes in search of one and finds a legendary one near his place. The effective manager he finds is an “old man” who calls himself the “The One Minute Manager”. Interviewing the managers working for the “old man” the young man learns the 3 secrets – One Minute Goal Setting, One Minute Praising & One Minute Reprimand.
The first half where the young aspiring manager interviews the managers reporting to the One Minute Manager are (now) obvious, too simplistic and for me prescriptive which I dislike, but the second half of the book makes it a worthwhile read even today after 40 years of original publication.
