This book was previously titled, Be Excellent at Anything.
The Way We're Working Isn't Working is one of those rare books with
the power to profoundly transform the way we work and live.
Demand is exceeding our capacity. The ethic of "more, bigger, faster"
exacts a series of silent but pernicious costs at work, undermining our
energy, focus, creativity, and passion. Nearly 75 percent of employees
around the world feel disengaged at work every day. The Way We're
Working Isn't Working offers a groundbreaking approach to reenergizing
our lives so we're both more satisfied and more productive--on the job
and off.
By integrating multidisciplinary findings from the science of high
performance, Tony Schwartz, coauthor of the #1 bestselling The Power
of Full Engagement, makes a persuasive case that we're neglecting the
four core needs that energize great performance: sustainability
(physical); security (emotional); self-expression (mental); and
significance (spiritual). Rather than running like computers at high
speeds for long periods, we're at our best when we pulse rhythmically
between expending and regularly renewing energy across each of our four
needs.
Organizations undermine sustainable high performance by forever seeking
to get more out of their people. Instead they should seek systematically
to meet their four core needs so they're freed, fueled, and inspired to
bring the best of themselves to work every day.
Drawing on extensive work with an extra-ordinary range of organizations,
among them Google, Ford, Sony, Ernst & Young, Shell, IBM, the Los
Angeles Police Department, and the Cleveland Clinic, Schwartz creates a
road map for a new way of working. At the individual level, he explains
how we can build specific rituals into our daily schedules to balance
intense effort with regular renewal; offset emotionally draining
experiences with practices that fuel resilience; move between a narrow
focus on urgent demands and more strategic, creative thinking; and
balance a short-term focus on immediate results with a values-driven
commitment to serving the greater good. At the organizational level, he
outlines new policies, practices, and cultural messages that Schwartz's
client companies have adopted.
The Way We're Working Isn't Working offers individuals, leaders, and
organizations a highly practical, proven set of strategies to better
manage the relentlessly rising demands we all face in an increasingly
complex world.
