Blanchard, 4th Secret of the One Minute Manager

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Kenneth Blanchard and Martha McBride, The 4th Secret of the One Minute Manager: A Powerful Way to Make Things Better. William Morrow, 2008.

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LifeandLeadership.com Summary

This book provides inspiration and guidance to help a leader realize he/she has made a wrong decision and offer a meaningful apology. Identical content is found in One Minute Apology (2004).  It is part of the popular One-Minute Manager series (see original volume).

One-Minute Manager is part of Blanchard’s model of Situational Leadership. It is the base of most of Blanchard’s works, all of which express Empowering Leadership. Blanchard has also written extensively on the subject of Servant Leadership.

From the Publisher

With The One Minute Manager Ken Blanchard and coauthor Spencer Johnson forever changed the way we approach management by introducing their Three Secrets: One Minute Goals, One Minute Praisings and One Minute Reprimands. The book became an international bestseller and remains a timeless classic. Blanchard, along with coauthor Margret McBride, presents the 4th Secret, a concept that, when implemented properly, is one of the most powerful actions for improving company and employee morale. This is a book that can extend well beyond the business realm and repair relationships that we thought were broken forever.

Using Blanchard’s signature breezy style, The 4th Secret of the One Minute Manager tells the story of a bright young man, Matt Hawkins, who wants to help his mentor, the company president, face and deal with some crucial mistakes. For advice, Matt turns to family friend Jack Peterson, known by everyone as the One Minute Manager. What begins as a beautiful country weekend turns into an enlightening few days when Matt discovers how to take action effectively when we have done something wrong. Through this engaging parable, Blanchard and McBride teach readers step-by-step how to accept responsibility for their errors and deal with the cause of the damage while maintaining a genuine sense of integrity.

Destined to join Ken Blanchard’s other groundbreaking classics, The 4th Secret of the One Minute Manager offers businesspeople – and just about anyone else – a cogent and clearheaded way of approaching one of life’s most perplexing dilemmas: how to accept that we have made a wrong decision and how to correct it by making a meaningful apology. The techniques described in this simple but profound story will have significant results at work and at home.

About the Author

Ken Blanchard is an international bestselling author and motivational speaker whose books, including The One Minute Manager®, The One Minute Entrepreneur, and Leading at a Higher Level, have sold more than eighteen million copies in thirty languages. He lives in San Diego, California.


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