With a New Preface by the Authors - Primal Leadership

I've read a number of leadership books, and Primal Leadership is among the best I've picked up. Goleman and crew outline a well balanced understanding of the different facets of leadership and the important skill of reading and capitalizing on the emotional state of the organization which one leads. This book is filled with numerous stories and cases where the principles advocated for are illustrated quite nicely.

This book is worth your time if you are seeking to develop your own leadership capabilities.

Outlines what the authors consider descriptions or certain emotions on the workplace (both good and bad). In my opinion didn't offer much in the way of tutoring. If you want info, that use can perhaps incorporate into yourself, this would be a good book, if you want advice not so much. Almost seemed like at add for the authors consultant company at times.

I have many audio books, and sometimes travel a lot and alone. So, it is good time to get a good subject like PRIMAL LEADERSHIP and listen that. It is a positive approach on leadership, I consider most of the comments really true. For the young guys that want to be leaders in the future, I recommend that!

Great book! This book allows one to truly develop their ability to lead by understanding emotional intelligence and why it is necessary for a leader to cultivate. Reading this book will certainly not be a waste of time.

Inspiring book for managers. Fully agree with most of ideas described by Goleman.
Unfortunately these ideas are not shared by major part of managers in practice, although their true value is obvious.

Goleman takes into account the "human" element of leadership in a way that opens the topic of leadership to anyone who deals with another person in any relationship...will become a seminal work in the field of leadership study!

Some leaders are good at their field, however some lack of the Emotional Intelligence. This book is excellent reference for leaders who want to improve the people management. A company is make up of people, people is one of the foundational elements of a company.

This book is not your average leadership book. If you want action books and dynamic goal-setting how-to's, this is not for you. Once you have your ducks in a row, this book helps with implementation by connecting you emotionally with your staff. It works in either a downward or upward direction. The book has novel ideas, but the downside is that because three authors contributed to the book, transitions from chapter to chapter, and other places, are awkward and clumsy. The book's theme is also repetitive almost ad nauseam. Most of the examples lack enough detail to really reach through. If you want this to work for you, get in, get out as quickly as you can and rely on trial and error.

Excellent approach to understanding leadership styles and when to apply each.
Highly recommended to explain how leaders can achieve resonance in organizations leading to improved and sustained high performance.

Boring topic that I am required to read and study for a promotional exam. If you can't sleep read this, you'll be out in a few minutes. If you wanna get promoted at work and this is required reading then buy it and plow through it to pass your test.

Very Good product especially if like me, there is not enough hours in a day to cover all you have to do. I listen to the CD in my car and it worked out well. I am using it as resource material for my MBA and I definitely will continue to use it even afterward. It took me a little time to get use to listening and focusing on the audio CD, but after a few days I became more comfortable with it.

Received book in timely fashion and great condition - great price. Book is full of great tips to help make good leaders and I was looking for specifics in the workplace.. so very helpful! Thanks so much!

Admittedly it took me a while to finish (mostly due to my distractions) but it was well worth the time. I loved the recognition of personal and organizational change and our responsibility for both. While we all fell just a small cog in a large machine, the book allows you to appreciate the impact you can have on individuals and the entire organization.

"Primal Leadership" is the latest best-seller in the "emotional intelligence" business book series that has become a franchise for psychologist and former New York Times writer Daniel Goleman.
It might be accurately subtitled: "Three Ph.D.s Cite Tons of Research to Convince Business Executives (Yet Again) that Feelings Matter to People at Work."
The research underlying the authors' assertions about the importance of improving one's emotional control and quality of interpersonal relationships is chronicled in end notes that run 34 pages in relatively small point type.
If you aren't an end note reader, you may not notice that the otherwise credible trio of Goleman, Boyatzis and McKee often give no credit whatsoever in the book's very readable main narrative to the scientists whose work they unabashedly appropriate or reference only in passing. This is especially surprising and disappointing given Dr. Boyatzis's own substantial and distinguished history of contributions to the academic and practical literature.
The "Primal Leadership" authors' well-documented case boils down to this: 1) People respond to their leaders either positively or negatively. And therefore, 2) Leaders need to work on developing an effective leadership style by A. Knowing themselves, B. Controlling their emotional impulses, C. Relating better to others, D. Influencing others to further the organization's work.
Hard to argue with that, even without a truckload of citations.
Now the critical question: Will reading this book give you the tools to improve your own "emotional intelligence"?
In a word, an emphatic and disappointing, no.
You may find yourself jumping up and down screaming, "Yes! Yes! Yes!," to the book's persuasive demand for better leaders, but you're inevitably left whimpering, "Now what?"
For example, the authors tell us we need to "reconfigure" our brains but offer scant help in defining a useful process for accomplishing that. In fact, that is the recurring fatal flaw for this occasionally impressive work--calling for action but specifying little but tired, overly-familiar generalities.
Its recommendations should be familiar to anyone who has ever taken the most basic leadership course (or heard even a mediocre professional speaker at a conference in the past 30 years):
1. Picture your ideal self.
2. Assess your current self.
3. Develop a learning agenda.
4. Experiment with new practices.
5. Develop supportive relationships.
To flesh out these familiar themes, "Primal Leadership" offers vague approaches such as "stealth learning"--code, apparently, for accidental learning by, uh, living.
And it points to old standbys such as using mental rehearsal and actual practice to break old habits. On what should you focus your mental and physical rehearsals?
Well, the authors advise paying attention to your 360-degree feedback, and perhaps finding a mentor or hiring a coach to find out.
Hardly the stuff that one needs reams of doctorate-level research to conclude.
The same is true of the advice offered for "building emotionally intelligent organizations." The authors suggest creating "process norms" and ground rules for teams, and holding honest conversations about the culture that people work in.
Does any of that strike you as new or even particularly insightful? Okay, how about this one. The authors urge: Have a vision.
A busy executive simply won't find much here for undertaking the self-improvement for which Dr. Goleman and his colleagues incessantly lobby. In fact, you could capture all the book's useful advice in a one-page outline. But it will take you many hours to tease it out of the lengthy prose. And once you have, it won't impress you as new or novel.
In the final analysis, this sizeable and serious-sounding book is neither scholarly nor practical. It is a resounding success in making a compelling case for action but then fails just as miserably in offering nothing but the vaguest and most uninspired plan for action.
Strip away the research citations and Daniel Goleman and his erstwhile colleagues have delivered the same old plea for better leaders with the same old solutions for creating them--all dressed up in a new best-seller.
So, unfortunately, for the intended business manager reader this well-documented work amounts to intellectual cherries jubilee: tantalizing, sophisticated, carefully prepared, but devoid of useful nutrients.