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Whale
Done!
By Ken
Blanchard (editor), Jim Ballard, Thad Lacinak
FreePress, 2002 - 128 pages
Whale
Done is another parable style (story telling) book that has
(1) a singular theme, (2) is very easy to read and (3) is
overpriced. If you
buy this book you will find yourself delighted by the easy
read and may think you have found a gem but most parables are
simply overpriced information.
Let me elaborate further:
This
book, like other parables, are a great read for the following
reasons.
•
It is a quick read. I read it in about 2 - 3 hours and I am a
fairly slow reader.
• The book is able to illustrate one point extremely
effectively. For example, in this book they show how we tend
to associate negative or positive feelings to individuals or
situations and it affects our quality of life due to the way
that we interact with people.
• These are the kinds of books that employees will read
(great for training programs) as they are 100-200 pages in
length and easy to read so a massive investment of time and
energy isn't required by employees.
The
simple theme illustrated in this book is that both whales and
people perform better when you accentuate the positive.
It is tougher to actually implement such behavior but
it can be done and it can have a substantial impact on your
life if you learn the tools and key behaviors to look for and
modify in your life. The
problem with this parable is that they give the reader very
few tools to work with and actual exercises to implement.
As a result, it is difficult for 95% of the people who
read this to actually integrate this into their lives for the
long-term.
Psychologists
have been talking about this for decades in what they term
“neurolinguistic programming.”
People are attracted to what they have positive
experiences with and try to avoid painful or uncomfortable
situations. Pain=bad,
pleasure = good.
My
concluding thoughts: If you read this book try and seek out
some other resource that will help you form the concepts into
habits. Most
experts say that it takes 21 days of continual implementation
for something to begin forming a habit amongst people.
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