Shortform Books

What Makes a Good Team Leader?

What makes a good team leader? How do you, as a leader, ensure that all of your team members perform up to standard? As a leader, you must accept your team’s successes and failures: It’s your responsibility to ensure every team member is performing at a high standard. But if you push your team too hard, you’ll destroy your team’s morale and hinder their performance. According to Jocko Willink and Leif Babin, the authors of The Dichotomy of Leadership, there are two instances in which leaders ask too much of their teams: 1) imposing too many rules and 2) making

Games People Play: Review and Critical Reception

What is Eric Berne’s Games People Play about? What is the key message to take away from the book? Games People Play is Berne’s 1964 classic about the many ways that we habitually relate to one another through “games.” These aren’t fun, harmless social games, though—they’re subtle, largely unconscious patterns that harm us and our relationships. Here’s our review of Games People Play: The Psychology of Human Relationships by Eric Berne.

The Zeigarnik Effect: 4 Ways to Unleash Your Creativity

What is the Zeigarnik effect? How can you leverage it to be more creative? Creative insights might seem random, but you actually can deliberately spark them by leveraging a peculiar neural phenomenon called the Zeigarnik effect. It’s when your brain continues to work on unsolved problems—even when you don’t realize it. Here are four ways to unleash your creativity using the Zeigarnik effect.

Success Is Luck, Not Hard Work or Know-How

Is financial success a matter of luck or know-how? What plays a bigger role? There are so many memoirs and self-help books out there by millionaires that teach readers how to follow in their footsteps—”they got rich by following these steps, and you can too!” However, what these books fail to account for is the role of chance in financial success. Here’s why success is luck, according to behavioral finance expert Morgan Housel.

The Problem With Deference to Authority

What is a culture of deference? Why is too much deference a bad thing? A culture of deference is characterized by high deference to authority. This is most evident in communication. People in highly hierarchical cultures tend to use mitigated speech or make indirect statements when speaking to authority. In its extreme, deference can be problematic because it downplays the significance of the message. Here is how a culture of deference can jeopardize communication.

Leadership and Delegation: How to Strike a Balance

Are you nervous about giving your subordinates too much autonomy? Why is delegation important in leadership? Because a leader can’t do everything herself, the best way to take responsibility for your team’s success is to endow other people with responsibility. However, if you delegate all your responsibilities and assume that someone else is solving every problem, you could be unknowingly steering your team toward disaster. That’s why it’s important to strike a balance between hands-on leadership and delegation. Here’s how to find the sweet spot between the two.

Games People Play: The Psychology of Mind Games

What is Eric Berne’s Games People Play about? Why does Berne mean by “games” in the context of social interaction? In his book Games People Play, Dr. Eric Berne says that mind games go back to childhood. Children learn mind games from their parents and then use them later in life. There are often patterns associated with these games that are so deeply ingrained that the player often doesn’t realize what they’re doing. Here’s a brief overview of Games People Play: The Psychology of Human Relationships by Dr. Eric Berne.

You Can’t Make Financial Predictions Based on the Past

Do you look to history when trying to make financial decisions? Why is trying to make financial predictions based on past events a terrible idea? In his book The Psychology of Money, Morgan Housel says that many people will study past events in order to make financial predictions. However, Housel explains, this strategy doesn’t work because history is a series of unpredictable events, and studying it will not help you predict the future of finances. Here’s why you can’t use the past to make financial predictions.