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Give and Take: A Revolutionary Approach to Success Paperback – 10 December 2013
Adam Grant (Author) Find all the books, read about the author, and more. See search results for this author |
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- Print length288 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherW&N
- Publication date10 December 2013
- Dimensions12.9 x 2.2 x 19.6 cm
- ISBN-109781780224725
- ISBN-13978-1780224725
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Product description
Review
Backed up by anecdotes of success across a range of industries and scenarios, as well as numerous academic studies, the arguments of Give and Take are grounded in ample research ... His writing style draws you in ... [I]t's an interesting take on game theory in a practical context, and the notion that givers can succeed is an inspirational one ― City A.M.
Give and Take just might be the most important book of this young century. As insightful and entertaining as Malcolm Gladwell at his best, this book has profound implications for how we manage our careers, deal with our friends and relatives, raise our children, and design our institutions. This gem is a joy to read, and it shatters the myth that greed is the path to success -- Robert Sutton, author of The No Asshole Rule and Good Boss, Bad Boss
Give and Take is a truly exhilarating book - the rare work that will shatter your assumptions about how the world works and keep your brain firing for weeks after you've turned the last page -- Daniel H. Pink, author of Drive and To Sell is Human
Give and Take is brimming with life-changing insights. As brilliant as it is wise, this is not just a book - it's a new and shining worldview. Adam Grant is one of the great social scientists of our time, and his extraordinary new book is sure to be a bestseller -- Susan Cain, author of Quiet
Give and Take cuts through the clutter of clichés in the marketplace and provides a refreshing new perspective on the art and science of success. Adam Grant has crafted a unique, 'must have' toolkit for accomplishing goals through collaboration and reciprocity -- William P. Lauder, Executive Chairman, The Estée Lauder Companies Inc.
Give and Take is a pleasure to read, extraordinarily informative, and will likely become one of the classic books on workplace leadership and management. It has changed the way I see my personal and professional relationships, and has encouraged me to be a more thoughtful friend and colleague -- Jeff Ashby, NASA space shuttle commander
With Give and Take, Adam Grant has marshaled compelling evidence for a revolutionary way of thinking about personal success in business and in life. Besides the fundamentally uplifting character of the case he makes, readers will be delighted by the truly engaging way he makes it. This is a must read -- Robert Cialdini, author of Influence
Give and Take is a brilliant, well-documented, and motivating debunking of 'good guys finish last'! I've noticed for years that generosity generates its own kind of equity, and Grant's fascinating research and engaging style have created not only a solid validation of that principle but also practical wisdom and techniques for utilizing it more effectively. This is a super manifesto for getting meaningful things done, sustainably -- David Allen, author of Getting Things Done
Packed with cutting-edge research, concrete examples, and deep insight, Give and Take offers extraordinarily thought-provoking - and often surprising - conclusions about how our interactions with others drive our success and happiness. This important and compulsively-readable book deserves to be a huge success -- Gretchen Rubin, author of The Happiness Project
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About the Author
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Product details
- ASIN : 1780224729
- Publisher : W&N; 1st edition (10 December 2013)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 288 pages
- ISBN-10 : 9781780224725
- ISBN-13 : 978-1780224725
- Dimensions : 12.9 x 2.2 x 19.6 cm
- Best Sellers Rank: 21,059 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- 184 in Job Satisfaction
- 415 in Entrepreneurship (Books)
- 1,056 in Self-Help for Success
- Customer Reviews:
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About the author

ADAM GRANT is an organizational psychologist at Wharton, where he has been the top-rated professor for seven straight years. A #1 New York Times bestselling author and one of TED’s most popular speakers, his books have sold millions of copies and been translated into 35 languages, his talks have been viewed over 25 million times, and his podcast WorkLife has topped the charts. His pioneering research has inspired people to rethink fundamental assumptions about motivation, generosity, and creativity. He has been recognized as one of the world’s 10 most influential management thinkers and Fortune’s 40 under 40, and has received distinguished scientific achievement awards from the American Psychological Association and the National Science Foundation. His work has been praised by J.J. Abrams, Richard Branson, Bill and Melinda Gates, Malcolm Gladwell, Daniel Kahneman, John Legend, and Malala Yousafzai. Adam received his B.A. from Harvard and his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan, and he is a former Junior Olympic springboard diver. He lives in Philadelphia with his wife and their three children.
Customer reviews
Top reviews from Australia
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Particularly love that this book gives hope to anyone who gives in a corporate setting.
Great advice on how to give thoughtfully and avoid door mat syndrome.
I also found how to spot a taker by their social media profile helpful.
It's so good we can acknowledge that not everyone is selling to maximise their own utility.
Well written and evidenced with research. An essential read.
The problem arises when you read the VC's blog, and he says: " in my 13 years in the venture business I had never once funded a company that hadn't been introduced to me by someone I knew and trusted."
So who do you believe? I'm believing the VC. Ventureblog.com 09/06/2013
One star for making stories up.
Top reviews from other countries

Grant’s idea is that, at work, most people operate as either takers, matchers, or givers. Takers want to get as much possible out of another person, matchers want to give and take in equal measure and givers don’t expect anything for their contribution. If you’re interested, you can take a quick quiz online to see which category you fall into: Give and Take Quiz
“As Samuel Johnson purportedly wrote, “The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.”
To explain these concepts, Grant uses a series of very detailed examples. As the majority of these examples are North American, I found the majority of them really hard to relate to. I’m not into American politics or sports and I don’t have a great interest in American business culture either (I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a full episode of The Simpsons!). I feel that the examples were much longer and much more detailed that necessary and that meant that by the time I got to the actual point, I wasn’t that interested. Something that we discussed at the book club was that, as well as being American, the majority of these examples are from privileged white heterosexual males. This book could have been a great opportunity to explore a whole range of examples and backgrounds, so it’s a disappointment that Grant chose not to.
When I reached the end of the book, there was a section which listed ‘Actions for Impact’, things you can do to apply the principles of the book to your life and work. Looking through the list, I noticed that my workplace already has the vast majority of these things in place, and I wonder if this could be partly why I couldn’t connect with the book so much. I’m thinking that perhaps I am already accustomed to some of these ways of working in my day to day life and therefore couldn’t find a way to connect.
I think the ideas in this book are good and it’s interesting to know that givers are ultimately more successful than takers, but I did find the book overall to be quite tedious and I probably wouldn’t recommend it for this reason. I can’t help but feel that the content of this book would have been better digested in a shorter format, such as an article or podcast.
Overall rating: Whilst I don’t think it’s revolutionary, I found the topic of “Give and Take” to be quite interesting and it sparked some really great discussion. The overall style wasn’t to my tastes though and I’d have preferred not to have had the lengthy, detailed examples that dragged this book out for me. I wouldn’t recommend it as a book, but won’t be ruling out the work of Adam Grant going forward, because I think the message is good, it’s the format that didn’t quite work – 2 stars for the book.

The book is full of stories of successful givers and tips on how to become a successful giver: look to sort out other people's problems and it will pay off (sometimes serendipitously), you will be better at HR decisions (you're not so determined to be right; you want what's best for other people and the organisation), you can be good at influencing (don't do this through a power play but through modesty - stammering can be helpful), and you can keep from burn-out through making sure you see the direct results of your giving and through 'chunking' it so it happens in big bursts and not through a drip feed of good actions. As to why some givers end up at the bottom of the heap, that's because they are 'selfless' rather than 'otherish' givers - that's to say, they don't set any boundaries and aren't good at asking for help for themselves. It's amazing just what people will do to help you - or others - if you ask them. And they'll be likely to go on helping once they start...
So far so good - and I certainly enjoyed reading this - it's persuasive and surprising.
If I felt less than 100% convinced, though, that's partly because Grant has so little to say about 'takers' (and yet he acknowledges they sometimes make the world go round - Michael Jordan is one example he quotes) - and on this, there are other books (Maccoby's book on narcissistic leaders, which points to the highs and lows of the taker in working life). It's also because he doesn't really go into what makes people 'takers' or 'givers' in the first place - is it a given or does it depend on what you learn in your family as you grow up about 'how we behave round here and what gets us what we want in this environment'?...Perhaps there will be a sequel..


