Five Dysfunctions of a Team


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Hardcover
240 pages
ISBN 9780787960759 Published April 2002
Jossey-Bass
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Five Dysfunctions of a Team
A Leadership Fable
By Patrick M Lencioni 

Related Blog Posts
Jack Covert Selects - Getting Naked
Posted March 11, 2010 9:14 a.m. by 800-ceo-read

Getting Naked: A Business Fable About Shedding The Three Fears That Sabotage Client Loyalty by Pat Lencioni, Jossey-Bass, 220 pages, $24.95, Hardcover, February 2010, ISBN 9780787976392

For over ten years, Pat Lencioni has helped define the genre of the business fable. He is most famous for The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, which I thought so highly of that I included it in our collection of The 100 Best Business Books of All Time. When Lencioni’s newest book came across my desk I was curious about the title, but also cautious: the title is eye-catching and memorable, but how was Lencioni going to pull this one off?

I needn’t have worried. What makes Lencioni’s fables so compelling is his skill at creating a real world populated by characters you believe in. Then into that world, Lencioni presents a common problem that you can relate to and a series of problem-solving decisions that you can then apply to your own experience. Time and again, Lencioni succeeds at teaching through storytelling and Getting Naked is no different.

Getting Naked is about vulnerability and transparency. Nakedness in this case is a counterintuitive approach to presenting yourself to a client or customer. Instead of going into a sales call loaded for bear with a PowerPoint presentation and all sorts of hype about who you are, you should go into the meeting naked, asking questions, being open, and nearly giving your expertise away. Every meeting should be about the client, not about you.

Lencioni’s story is about a big consulting firm that buys a little, but very successful, boutique consulting company. The executive responsible for the incorporation of the merger discovers that the small consulting firm has little or no sales costs, because most of the small firms clients are referrals from existing clients. The reason? Outstanding service derived from shedding the three big fears that drive customers away: fear of losing the client, fear of being embarrassed, and fear of being inferior. The executive then brings all he has learned back to the big consulting firm—and to you.

Besides being an outstanding storyteller, Pat Lencioni speaks a language that works perfectly for training. In fact, Getting Naked will be read by my staff and will be the basis of a new training program—that’s how valuable I think this book is.



Reviewing Reviews
Posted Sept. 26, 2008 6:30 a.m. by dylan
In Uncategorized - 800 CEO Read Blog

Heather Green has written a wonderful review of Jeff Howe's Crowdsourcing: Why the Power of the Crowd is Driving the Future of Business for the September 29 issue of BusinessWeek. After observing that "Books about the crowd are becoming a crowd unto themselves," Green writes:

What sets Howe's book apart is his focus on business, an examination of different crowdsourcing models, and a deep dive into academic research to explain why people work together. It's a welcome and well-written corporate playbook for confusing times...

In his most recent article for Portfolio, "In Praise of Big Brother," Roger Lowenstein casts a somewhat leery eye at Stephen Baker's The Numerati. He begins:

Stephen Baker envisions a world in which our email and blog postings, our credit-card and grocery purchases, our pulse rates and facial expressions, and even our physical movements (handily tracked by our cell phones) will be fed to a new Brahmin class of math geeks devoted to sending us customized shopping choices, targeted political ads, real-time medical alerts, and the names of potential dating partners, not to mention (lest we be shirking on the job or hiding an illness) alerts to our bosses and insurance companies.

While that sounds awfully scary to me, the author is of the mind that this technology will one day empower us. Regardless of how you feel about these issues, the book does seem very informative and worth a read. Lowenstein describes Baker a "charming writer," and ends the review by calling the book "eye-popping and chilling."

David K. Hurst reveiws four books in the Autumn issue of strategy + business's Books in Brief. The first, Richard Bookstaber's Demon of Our Own Design, was awarded the top spot in the Finance & Economics category of our first annual book awards. The other three books are Stall Points: Most Companies Stop Growing--Yours Doesn't Have To by Matthew Olson and Derek Van Bever, Michael O'Leary: A Life In Full Flight by Alan Ruddock, and Tad Waddington's Lasting Contribution: How to Think, Plan, and Act to Accomplish Meaningful Work.

Fortune's Jia Lynn Yang has picked "eight volumes [that] belong in everyone's briefcase." Of course, Fortune doesn't make this list available online, but the chosen titles are:

Birth of a Salesman: The Transformation of Selling in America by Walter A. Friedman

Presenting to Win: The Art of Telling Your Story by Jerry Weissman

Hug Your Customers: The Proven Way to Personalize Sales and Achieve Astounding Results by Jack Mitchell

Selling to Big Companies by Jill Konrath

The New Strategic Selling: The Unique Sales System Proven Successful by the World's Best Companies by Robert B. Miller & Stephen E. Heiman

Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In by Roger Fisher & William Ury

Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini

How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie

Rich Karlgaard has written an update to his "Books to Get Rich By" for Forbes. (You can find the original list of 53 books here.) The lists are broken up into six categories: History and Heroes, How Capitalism Works Today, Instructional Tips, Management Secrets, Food for the Soul, and Useful Entertainment. While the list is too long to list all of the titles, I have listed the entire "Management Secrets" section below.

Only the Paranoid Survive: How to Exploit the Crisis Points That Challenge Every Company by Andrew S. Grove

Killing Sacred Cows: Overcoming the Financial Myths That Are Destroying Your Property by Garret B. Gunderson

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey

The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable by Patrick Lencioni

Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In by Roger Fisher, William Ury & Bruce Patton

What Got You Here Won't Get You There: How Successful People Become Even More Successful by Marshall Goldsmith

Never Eat Alone: And Other Secrets to Success, One Relationship at a Time by Keith Ferrazzi

The Speed of Trust: The One Thing That Changes Everything by Stephen M.R. Covey with Rebecca M. Merrill

Did you notice that Stephen Covey picked up an initial sometime between 7 Habits and Speed of Trust? (edit: As the brilliant Seth Godin has pointed out in the comment section, Stephen M.R. Covey is the eldest son of Stephen R. Covey. I had not known this previously. Don't let it be said business books aren't a family business.) Notable titles from other sections are John Kao's Innovation Nation and Fareed Zakaria's Post American World from "How Capitalism Works Today," Dan Pink's Adventures of Johnny Bunko from "Instructional Tipps," Randy Pausch's Last Lecture form "Food for the Soul," and Michael Lewis's Blind Side from "Useful Entertainment."



Bunches of Business Book Recommendations
Posted Aug. 25, 2008 4:00 a.m. by todd-sattersten
In Lists - 800 CEO Read Blog

There has been quite a run in the blogosphere in the last two weeks with people recommending business books.

Josh Kauffman may have started this tidal wave with his updated 2008 version of The Personal MBA. His list is 77 books long with the mantra "skip b-school and the $100,000 loan: you can get a world-class business education simply by reading these books."

BusinessPundit followed with their 25 Best Business Books Ever post, placing Adam Smith at #25 and In Search of Excellence at the top spot.

For The Best Business Book of 2008 (so Far), Marketing & Strategy Innovation Blog directs people to The Opposable Mind, Presentation Zen, Rain Making, Groundswell, Senior Leadership Teams and Brain Rules.

And then people started finding old lists to highlight. A "Business Book" hit on tweetscan directed me to a October 2007 post at Newly Corporate titled "15 Books For Rogue Professionals and How To Read Them At No Cost." Their no-cost solution is the library, and they recommend everything from Carnegie to Chris Anderson to China Inc.

This led me to another tweetscan hit where Melissa Woo, inspired by this post, spent the morning tweeting her favorites. As a fellow Milwaukeean, I thought I would list all of her favorites.



Books Available in Spanish
Posted July 25, 2008 9:29 a.m. by delicious
In Foreign Titles - 800 CEO Read Blog

Here are some titles available now in Spanish. If ordering these books, or any titles in another language, take care to note that availability of these books can change without notice due to publishing need, copyrights, popularity, etc.

Menos es Mas: It's All Too Much by Peter Walsh - Veteran "organizational consultant" TV show host and author Walsh (How to Organize 'Just About' Everything) has more ideas in his latest book on clutter management then the spare closet has junk, and, even better, it's organized, in depth and entirely user-friendly!

Senales: The Three Signs of a Miserable Job by Patrick Lencioni - A consultant, speaker and best selling author (Five Dysfunctions of a Team) pinpoints the reasons behind and way around what many consider a constant of the human condition: job dissatisfaction.

No Es Por el Care: It's Not About the Coffee by Howard Behar - During his many years as a senior executive at Starbucks, Behar heled establish the Starbucks culture, which stresses the importance of people over profits.

El Secreto de Vender: The Art of Selling by Gerardo Mendoza - We live in a world where demand exceeds supply, markets are competitive and money dilutes in a growing number of goods and services. The goal is already know to everybody: SELL!



Best Books To Make Best Workplaces
Posted Oct. 8, 2007 2:36 a.m. by todd-sattersten
In Lists - 800 CEO Read Blog

Last week, The Wall Street Journal announced their Top Small Workplaces 2007 winners.

The Journal asked the folks who run those places what books they would recommend to others trying to create first-class workplaces. Here the alphabetical list of their selections. Click through on the link above to read the winners' comments:






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