March Read/6

Title: How to Be the Employee Your Company Can’t Live Without: 18 Ways to Become Indispensable

Author: Shepard, Glenn

Subjects: Career Development; Self-Realization; Vocational Guidance

Call Number: 650.1 S547H 2006

ISBN: 9780471751809

Number of Pages: 160 P

Book Description:

            This practical, actionable guide explains what today’s managers are really looking for in employees, what they place the highest value on, and how employees can surpass expectations to gain raises and promotions (from the back cover of the book).

There are eighteen ways covered in this book:

-First, understand why you need to be indispensable

-Learn what you boss wants from you

-Be low maintenance

-Answer the questions your boss didn’t ask

-Understand the economic realities of employing people

-Act like you own the place

-Treat your job like it’s your lifelong career, even if it’s only a stepping stone

-Become the most reliable person in your company

-Learn the right way to make mistakes

-Broaden your circle of influence

-Adopt the work ethic your grandparents had

-Be a professional at whatever you do

-Check your ego at the door

-Take charge of your own destiny

-Don’t confuse education with knowledge

-Avoid learned helplessness

-Become a problem solver

-Avoid the four career killers: 1) Confusing activity with productivity, 2) Giving ultimatums, 3) Breaking the chain of command, 4) Failing to have a sense of duty

My Read:

            My first impression of this book as I turned the pages was that it’s another book not only about career development but also a book of self development and self-actualization. And I was right as I looked up at the subjects this book is categorized.

            If you are great at home you will be great at work and vice versa. Those 18 ways the author lists and states are similar to self training; they tell you how to be a reliable person your employer and coworkers can depend on. A person has to acquire the skills of problem solving to deal with daily tasks and challenges.

Unknown fear is a learned habit as a person grows over the year. The author’s advice is: Choose to spend your life as a victim, feeling sorry for yourself, or believing you’re powerless leads to helplessness. You can’t be a highly valued employee if you’re helpless Seize opportunities whenever they present themselves and never complain that there are no opportunities out there. Just look more closely. You have the power to control your destiny (p131).

“Failing to take responsibility for your own happiness is the surest way to be unhappy because it leads to a victim mentality.” (p105) “We all have the option of being happy but happiness isn’t an entitlement or a result of any event. It’s a choice.” (p105) I personally believe and agree the author’s point and concept about a choice. Or should we say “attitude?” When a person blames others and points fingers s/he simply gives up on herself.

“You must adopt a strong work ethic if you are to become a highly valued employee.” (p84) “Working hard is necessary to survive and it’s the only way we can achieve most of life’s biggest goals. Working hard with a goal in mind is called focus.” (p86) It’s my personal experience that when I was focused on meeting a goal the time flied as fast as a flying bullet. When a person is able to engross herself at certain task the condition and status of mind is called flow; not only the time flied fast and smoothly the spirit and energy of the person are flowing smoothly as if they are flow of a river.          The task becomes the person and the person the flow of the task.

But there is one thing one has to keep in mind: “People have a strange habit of discouraging others anytime they try to improve themselves.” (p89) This concept makes sense to me. For…

“Another good choice professionals make is who they hang out with at work. The people you surround yourself with will have a huge impact on who you become.” (p100) This provocative say reflects well on the idiom: Birds of a feather flock together. One had better to surround oneself with other highly valued employees (p100).

“You are people bound by a paycheck. Even if you have developed personal friendships with coworkers, friendship officially begins when the workday end.” (p96) This is a highly professional advice I have acquired through this book. There are plenty of reasons why a person calls herself a “professional.” One of my best friends is an expert keeping professional at all time; she supervises more than a hundred of teachers and ten times more of students. Not only is she my best friend she is also my big boss. Whenever we discuss school businesses she is able to put aside personal feelings and emotions and focus on achieving common goals. Being fair and righteous are my image of her.

I appreciate the ideas of hard working, keeping one’s ego at bay, and befriended with people who are positive and supportive. Instead of waiting for someone to positively influence me, I choose to take charge of my own options. I encourage myself to take a risk or challenge into an opportunity, a chance for self-actualization and helping other to have a better life.

The famous author in Taiwan, Dr. 楊定一(Yang) said he does the following four things everyday: Appreciate(show your gratitude), repent(reflection), aspire(look forward to the future), and feedback(to be a giver).

I strongly believe that a highly valued employee is a happy person. And her positive influence and impact, not matter what position she is in, reflect who she is and what she can do at work and in life.

Reference:

Shepard, Glenn. How to Be the Employee Your Company Can't Live Without:18 Ways to Become Indispensable. New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, 2006. Print.

-Be careful the environment you choose for it will shape you; be careful the friends you choose for you will become like them.-W. Clement Stone

-The best employees don’t necessarily have to be the brightest or smartest. They need to have a positive attitude and leave their personal problems at home.-Laura Toddie

-Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.-Benjamin Franklin

-It is a thousand times better to have common sense without education than to have education without common sense.-Robert Green Ingersoll

-Education’s purpose is to replace an empty mind with an open one.-Malcolm Forbes

-The last freedom is choosing your attitude.-Victor Frankl

-Life is 10 percent what happens to me and 90 percent how I react to it.-John Maxwell

-In the end, all business operations can be reduced to three words: people, product, and profits. Unless you’ve got a good team, you can’t do much with the other two.-Lee Iacocca

-Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.-Thomas Edison

-Number one quality of a good employee: They need to be problem solvers, not problem creators.-Mike Anderson

-Our best employees are those who try to think of solutions when they are presented with problems.-Sandra Vaughn

-We are continually faced by great opportunities brilliantly disguised as insoluble problems.-Lee Iacocca

-If you take care of your company, your company will take care of you.-Robert Young Jr.

-One of the qualities of a good employee is not worrying about what’s in it for them.-Betty Mallen

-What makes a good employee? It’s never about them and what you can do for them. They are always asking what they can do for you. It’s never I, it’s WE.-Bonnie Kelly

-The most important single ingredient in the formula of success is knowing how to get along with people.-Theodore Roosevelt

-Remember not only to say the right thing in the right place, but far more difficult still, to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.-Benjamin Franklin

-The greatest mistake we make is living in constant fear that we will make one.-John Maxwell

-The biggest mistake that you can make is to believe that you’re working for somebody else. Job security is gone. The driving force of a career must come from the individual. Remember: Jobs are owned by the company, you own your career.-Earl Nightingale