Our book for today is called Radical Candor: Be a Kickass Boss Without Losing Your Humanity by Kim Malone Scott. The book is a guide for those in charge of managing employees and presents a few principles to develop strong r
elationships with employees. Radical Candor teaches bosses how to become successful, find meaning in their job and create an environment where people can love their work and their colleagues. Kim Scott is the CEO of Candor Inc., and has been a CEO coach for many companies including Dropbox, Qualtrics and Twitter. She has received her MBA from Harvard Business School and has authored several books. Let’s take a look at some of the key takeaways from Radical Candor.
1) What Is Radical Candor and Why Is It Important?
Radical Candor is defined by Scott as simply caring personally and challenging directly. Caring personally is further explained by taking an active interest in the lives of your employees as humans and by acknowledging that personal life can play an impact on work life. Challenging directly means being able to effectively tell your employees that their work isn’t good enough. However rather than delivering a blunt message which may be taken negatively by your employees, using personal care allows for the criticism to be contextualized. The ultimate goal with Radical Candor is to create an environment where you can build trust and establish communication that helps you to achieve the goals you’re looking for. As a physiotherapist, it is crucial to build trust and rapport with patients, but why aren’t we focused more on developing relationships with our employers or colleagues? As a clinic owner, utilizing Radical Candor can help your employees to accept and act on your praise and criticism. They can further engage in the same behaviour with their peers and focus on getting results.
2) Criticize Both Wins and Losses
Scott remembers giving an excellent presentation at Google and receiving specific praise from her boss Sheryl Sandberg. However along with the praise came Sandberg’s question whether Scott had noticed that she kept saying “um” during the presentation. Scott recalls that Sandberg did an excellent job of delivering praise, but provided feedback on something to improve. As a manager in a clinic, it is important to recognize your superstar employees and to praise them when they meet their targeted goals. However, Scott highlights that it is also essential to provide immediate criticism, but to provide tangible ways that your employees can improve. Identify areas of strengths and where to improve, while offering solutions instead of simply bashing your employees. Ultimately, this will result in your employees gaining further respect for you and help your business to strive towards success.
We, at PT Business Corner, definitely enjoyed reading Radical Candor and would like to recommend this book for your reading pleasure!
