Where Have All the Leaders Gone? by Lee Iacocca Summary and Reviews
|
List Price: Our Price: $9.06 You Save: $5.94 (40%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $8.62 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of Where Have All the Leaders Gone?
Book Review: Practical Common Sense.
Summary: 5 Stars
I think Lee highlights what many have been feeling for sometime that traditional human values are changing rapidly and that leadership and debate in a politically correct world are the first casualties.
If this book is not a wakeup call to Americans and even Europeans to sit up and listen then I am afraid we will have to wait for the final wake up call when America finally looses it place in the markets to the Far East.
Lee I guess, is asking us to think about what sort of society do we really want for ourselves? A free market does not mean free for all.
I think Lee is giving voice not to prejudice and some socialist idea but to common sense about the type of world we should be creating and the prospect that unless something is done soon in the USA it will inevitably become a 3rd world country. He calls for people to start electing leaders not spin-doctors who make a virtue out of ignorance.
Lee uses very colourful analogies to press home his points. His distain for the level of leadership provided by the so called best in the USA is palpable and justified.
It is a call to arms for leadership, common sense and possibility.
Book Review: US leadership is in trouble
Summary: 4 Stars
US leadership is in trouble. That is the resounding conclusion from Lee Iacocca. Lee presents the reasons why and what should be done about it in straightforward language from the perspective of a prominent businessman. The merits and also weaknesses of this book are simplification. The merit is that Lee certainly identifies important weaknesses and makes also important recommendations. The weakness is that many issues have more causes and that solutions require more innovation. Several of the problems are not unique to the US but are faced by other prosperous countries as well.
Lee identifies problems with leadership in government, in business, in the attitude of parents and of Americans in general. About the government Lee writes that they do not seem to have priorities and in addition lack plans to solve high priority issues. True, but the more fundamental problem is the shift in government thinking of wanting to be the leader of the world rather than one of the leaders. None of the great presidents of the US in the past had the ambition to lead the world.
Lee correctly identifies dissatisfaction in the middle class with a stagnant income level and explosively growing rich upper class. Increase in inequality is a problem in many countries. It is hard to find practical solutions. He is right that changes in taxes in the US aggravated the inequality. One of the effective ways to reduce the increase in inequality is increasing education levels for all, especially lower income groups and healthcare for all. Lee on education points out that parents do not stimulate their children to learn with a high priority. Also that teachers are vastly underpaid.
On the problems of the US automotive industry Lee assigns most of the blame to the US government. Others point to the IT industry in the US that has maintained its global leadership position, Microsoft, Apple, IBM, Google, and Yahoo. Another reason is lack of innovation in production, in social relations, and lack of interest in customer preferences. Management made unaffordable commitments to unions to maintain short term quarterly profits.
The book is a wake up call. On government Zbigniew Brezinski presents important complementary information in "Second Chance", "The Crisis of American Superpower".