This month’s book review is of the book The No Asshole Rule, Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving One That Isn’t by Robert I. Sutton, PhD. Now, the title may offend some, but please look past the word asshole and, if it does offend you, replace it with the word bully. Bully mildly covers the type of person that the author is describing and you will see why he uses the word asshole. I’m sure you will be able to relate the description to someone that you have worked with or have met and had to deal with somewhere in your life.
Mr. Sutton gives tips for surviving nasty people and work places and how to deal with them. He tells how to avoid taking a job in a company where there are more jerks than not. He gives advice on how to enforce the Rule in the workplace and to change the culture of the organization so that the behavior is not tolerated.
I smiled when I got to the part where he had a self-test to see if you qualify to be one of the jerks he is writing about in his book. I guess we all have a little dark side to us, but do we “go over to the dark side” (to borrow a phrase from Star Wars) more often than not?
At the end of the book he gives a great list of additional reading for those who want to learn more about dealing with nasty people.
As I read this book it seemed that he knew some of people that I worked with because he described them exactly. This was a very good book, I really learned a lot from it. Hopefully I won’t have to deal with another asshole, but they are out there….
Please let me know if you agree or disagree with my evaluation of this book. I’m sure that other readers would like to read your opinion too. Or just make a comment if you want to.
