Leadership and Motivation: The Fifty-Fifty Rule and the Eight Key Principles of Motivating Others (The John Adair Leadership Library)

It was an interesting read, but relied too heavily on historic theories of motivation, including Maslow's hierarchy of needs, Hertzberg's motivators and hygiene factors, McGregor's Theory X and Y, Fayol's principles on management (PLOC) and Hackham and Oldham's work on job enrichment and job enlargement. The first part of the book argued the pros and cons of each of these theorists, whilst the second part of the book examined the application of Maslow and Hertzberg, despite their shortcomings. This book gave me a futher understanding of process and content theories of motivations. However sadly, this book did not give what I consider constructive tools to provide leadership and motivation. The only value I got from the book was the author's analysis of the nature verses nurture influences debate and how these influences affect leadership and motivation by what he describes as the 50-50 rule. If you have no knowledge of the subject and motivational theories, you will quickly get lost in the jargon. If you have considerable knowledge of the subject, you might find it sparking long forgotten memories on theories of motivation.

I found that this book gets right to the point and is very helpful for folks that are new to leadership roles. it provides smile but effective guidance

This book provides good insight on becoming an effective leader. Will recommend to read.

A good book.A good motivatorA good practiceIt has the basics on what you need to be a good leader.

This book is about leadership and motivation, and how both promote or demote creativity. It defines a leader as someone who has personal qualities and technical knowledge that, under a given situation, permit him or her to perform successfully a requisite function. The leader motivates people to follow him/her because everyone involved stands to gain. Everyone wins because the strategic and operational levels of the group "work harmoniously together as the organization's leadership team" (p.33).Creativity activities, like innovations, depend on motivation, and hence the 50-50 rule. The rule states that "50% of motivation comes from within a person and 50% from his or her environment, especially from the leadership encountered there" (p.). From here the book describes two psychological theories of motivation: Maslow's theory and Herzberg's theory. Maslow's theory holds that motivation depends on physiological, safety, social, esteem, and self-actualization needs. The more basic (biological) the needs, the easier it is to motivate a person from without. The higher level the needs, such as self-actualization, the more motivation must come from within a person.For Herzberg creative efforts are like work. As with work motivation is determined by the satisfaction of people's higher needs. A safe working environment is often a stronger motivator than a high salary. Nice stuff.The last parts of the book outline eight principles on "how to motivate others", beginning with the enthusiasm of the motivator. I resist the temptation to describe all the principles for fear of spoiling your reading of the book. Suffice to say the book is impressive. It is well organized. Each chapter has a "Key Points" section. Chapters also start and end with a memorable quotation from motivational leaders of all kinds. A very good book, indeed!Amavilah, AuthorModeling Determinants of Income in Embedded Economies

Lots of books on Management make pretty dry reading - this was very readable. Although most of it is common sense it is full of useful information that can be applied in the work place. The John Adair Leadership Library: Leadership and Motivation: The Fifty-Fifty Rule and the Eight Key Principles of Motivating Others: 4The John Adair Leadership Library: Leadership and Motivation: The Fifty-Fifty Rule and the Eight Key Principles of Motivating Others: 4

This book is more of a research history into motivation rather than teaching you how to be a better motivator. A large proportion of the book goes into explaining how modern theory of motivation was developed and by who and when..and what they thought etc etc ...but harding goes into how to impliment them in real life.To be fair to the author, he does state, early in the book, that he makes no apologies that this book goes into detail but the people who developed the theory.Basically, if you want a book to quickly teach you how to improve your motivation skills then this is not it. If you are interested in how the theory of motivation was developed in the last few decades, then this might be it.

Excellent