TOP DRAWER BOOK REVIEW
by
HL Carpenter

Tell Me How I’m Doing
by Richard L. Williams
ISBN 0-8144-0832-X
126 pages; hardcover; $19.95
AMACOM Books, New York, 2005

So everybody has an invisible bucket for collecting daily interactions with others, and the bucket gets holes and needs to be refilled ... Wait! That sounds familiar. Yes, you’ve dipped into these waters before. Tell Me How I’m Doing is another ‘bucket’ book, dealing with the importance of communication. Not just any communication, of course, but the proper kind, also known as feedback.

The book is written in story form, set in a fictional company, but based on actual workshops presented by the author. Despite the format, it’s a standard how-to text, ladling up the usual business book acronyms, a simple teaching method used to train marine mammals that works equally well with humans and a couple of make-believe managers who are far too willing to share their private lives.

You’ll also find basic language, basic ideas and one possibly useful assessment questionnaire designed to help you figure out your own style of giving feedback. You’ve read it all before. Tell Me How I’m Doing might be worth perusing if you need a quick, refreshing swim through the fundamentals of communication skills. Otherwise you’d be better off filling your bucket at some other trough.

Review originally published July 2005.