I picked up this book because it was mentioned in some Forbes article I saw on things great managers do. On reading it, I saw that a lot of the stuff is things one would think are common sense. A lot of managers like to make like what they do is some mysterious, mystical thing or just something certain gifted people can do. It is not. It is dealing with people, and having the talent to deal with them well. So much of the advice in the book may seem common sense if you have such talent (or if you have been exposed to so many bad bosses and managers you just know they should be doing the stuff in the book instead). I did take a few notes, and I may write something a bit longer in my blog later. But in the end, the very simple gist of the book is this: hire the best people for their talent (not skills or knowledge. Those are important, but talent is the thing you need to look for since you can't teach talent), then do the best to make sure those folk can show you what they can do and let those talents flourish. Sure, set expectations and motivate, but if you select the wrong people, the rest will not fall into place. There is more, but there is the gist.
