How to Work with Just about Anyone - by Lucy Gill (Paperback)

About the Book

In a book destined to transform workplaces across the country, a management professional shares proven techniques for curbing the irritating habits, subtle subterfuges, and outrageous behavior practiced by "impossible" people at every level.

Book Synopsis

THREE SIMPLE STEPS FOR TRANSFORMING YOUR WORKPLACE
Every office has them: the ever-complaining colleague...the co-worker who is constantly late for meetings...the boss who either blows up at you or blows you off...or the one person who drives everyone else totally crazy.
The problem is, the conventional methods -- like repeated warnings, threats, and heartfelt discussions -- for dealing with this negative behavior often don't seem to work. Drawing on a wealth of professional experience as well as forty years of research, Lucy Gill exposes the futility of these common practices and replaces them with a three-step strategy for creating a productive, conflict-free workplace:
1. Get to the heart of the matter by focusing on what the real problem is.
2. Determine what problem-solving methods to avoid so that you don't perpetuate the conflict.
3. Choose a different and even surprising approach that will solve the problem and keep it solved.
Whether you're just starting out in your career or you already have an office along the executive corridor, How to Work with Just About Anyone provides the key to success, satisfaction, and sanity in the workplace.

Review Quotes

Keith Irwin managing partner, Tanner-Irwin Management consultants This book is a barnburner: with concise, clear examples, simple steps, and no clutter or jargon. Don't let this book get buried on your "self-help" shelf.

Paul Watzlawick emeritus clinical professor, Stanford University; member of the Mental Research Institute, Palo Alto, CA Anyone who's ever worked with a frustrating person should read this book. Step by step, Lucy Gill shows how to get even "impossible" people to change.

Dr. Richard Fisch director and principal investigator of the Brief Therapy Center at MRI, in Palo Alto, CA This book is a little gem. It's deceptive in its simplicity. Lucy Gill has managed to translate very new thinking about complicated problems into language that allows the reader to apply the concepts practically in the business world, and be light-years ahead.

Jim Kouzes coauthor, The Leadership Challenge; and Chairman, The Tom Peters Group/Learning Systems Delivers on its promise. You'll wish you followed Lucy Gill's three-step process years ago!

Robert M. Bramson, Ph.D. author of the bestselling Coping with Difficult People The methods in this book are unique. It is not a book about how to improve yourself of get along better with others. It is about how to get all those difficult people in your life to be more cooperative. I have used Lucy Gill's model with my clients and it works.

Roland Chazal industrial vice-president, Perrier Vittel, France With humor and subtlety, Lucy Gill offers a practical method for addressing difficult problems and for successfully getting people to change, and gives you the tools and the confidence to find solutions. Using her methods, we effectively and efficiently resolved very tough conflicts in our company.

Steven Brown former president of 800-Software Lucy Gill worked as a consultant in my company and produced great results. She used her methods very productively for us, and I am glad she has written How to Work with Just About anyone. Her humorous and conversational style is like having her in my office again, kicking ideas around. This is a great book.

About the Author

Lucy Gill is an internationally known authority on the prevention and management of difficult and nonproductive behavior, and is a Research Affiliate at the Mental Research Institute of Palo Alto -- the only management consultant to be accorded that status. Her clients include Bank of America, Varian, Rockwell International, TRW, Sun Microsystems, and a number of Silicon Valley start-up companies. She lives in Coulterville, California.