Familiar wisdom that strengthened by the author’s own story.
Dawson offers insights into entrepreneurship and personal growth via the stories of two well-known figures.
The author, an information technology professional and doctor of education, channels Malcolm Gladwell in this business book. Dawson employs anecdotes from the lives of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs and King David to inspire readers to meet present-day challenges. The author emphasizes the ways in which both men, one recent and one in biblical antiquity, found hidden opportunities amid obstacles. In the case of Jobs, Dawson recounts the CEO’s willingness to recalibrate his perspective on Microsoft. Rather than merely treating the Seattle-based software giant as a competitor, Jobs, and Apple, collaborated with their longtime rivals. In the case of David, Dawson focuses on the future king’s decision to fight Goliath at the proper time, pointing out that when David struck Goliath with a stone from his sling, he forewent conventional military means to defeat a rival who always fought within the standard dictates of battle. Avid readers of business books will note that this book follows a well-trodden path by using the lives of famous personages to frame advice. However, Dawson’s book is also a deeply personal account—a kind of bricolage of his own experiences, tips he’s received during his career, and reflections on two people whom he clearly admires. His own experiences drive home the book’s key lessons—emphasizing the necessity of working decisively in pursuit of one’s goals, rather than procrastinating and hoping for circumstances to change. He also writes of his own two-decade long odyssey to first complete a bachelor’s degree and then a doctorate, and he discusses how embracing one’s passions as an entrepreneur or creator can help to drive out self-doubt, which he sees as a silent, persistent enemy of progress.
Familiar wisdom that strengthened by the author’s own story.Pub Date: yesterday
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Sept. 4, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
Perhaps not magic but appealing nonetheless.
Want to get ahead in business? Consult a dictionary.
By Wharton School professor Berger’s account, much of the art of persuasion lies in the art of choosing the right word. Want to jump ahead of others waiting in line to use a photocopy machine, even if they’re grizzled New Yorkers? Throw a because into the equation (“Excuse me, I have five pages. May I use the Xerox machine, because I’m in a rush?”), and you’re likely to get your way. Want someone to do your copying for you? Then change your verbs to nouns: not “Can you help me?” but “Can you be a helper?” As Berger notes, there’s a subtle psychological shift at play when a person becomes not a mere instrument in helping but instead acquires an identity as a helper. It’s the little things, one supposes, and the author offers some interesting strategies that eager readers will want to try out. Instead of alienating a listener with the omniscient should, as in “You should do this,” try could instead: “Well, you could…” induces all concerned “to recognize that there might be other possibilities.” Berger’s counsel that one should use abstractions contradicts his admonition to use concrete language, and it doesn’t help matters to say that each is appropriate to a particular situation, while grammarians will wince at his suggestion that a nerve-calming exercise to “try talking to yourself in the third person (‘You can do it!’)” in fact invokes the second person. Still, there are plenty of useful insights, particularly for students of advertising and public speaking. It’s intriguing to note that appeals to God are less effective in securing a loan than a simple affirmative such as “I pay all bills…on time”), and it’s helpful to keep in mind that “the right words used at the right time can have immense power.”
Perhaps not magic but appealing nonetheless.Pub Date: March 7, 2023
ISBN: 9780063204935
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Harper Business
Review Posted Online: March 23, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2023
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
