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pinklemonrade's review against another edition
4.0
Don't be a taker. Be a giver. But also don't be a doormat. Give and take justtttt enough and you'll be more successful!
dmaurath's review against another edition
1.0
Note: I rarely give 1-Star reviews because I rarely finish 1-Star books. Some never get better despite my best hope.
Give yourself back 10 hours and Take my advice: Skip this book. Not only can be summarized with a simple aphorism, “Give, and you shall receive,” but it is also junk science styled up like Malcom Gladwell but not nearly as cleverly written.
By the end of the book, after far too many examples, in fact a whole book of examples, to prove the simple aphorism, the boundaries between Givers, Takers and Matchers become so unclear that you wonder what he was trying to achieve. Why provide so many examples that blur the boundaries? Teachers that care about ROI are Givers but isn’t that a Matcher? And Takers like Michael Jordan can enjoy wild success, not just Givers, and they’re Takers only because their intent is wrong? Is being a Taker that bad then? And how can we know someone’s intent anyways? Sure, the baseball executive converted to life as a Giver after a long time on the wrong path as a Taker, but he’s only a Giver because he claims his intent is good and there’s no other motive to the advice he gives others in the industry. This is a naïve view.
For a book that talks a lot about consulting, it seems to miss the common consulting idea of MECE: mutually exclusive, collectively exhaustive. This Giver, Taker, Matcher framework is none of these. The categories are proven to be fluid and changeable in his many examples, so not exclusive, and they are not exhaustive because they cannot be. These categories do not exist. Instead, there’s a continuum from Giving to Taking that is situationally-dependent. No clear boundaries for neat categories.
That is why this is junk science. There is no talk of reliability (the categories people fall into are predictable) or validity (the categories actually exist) of this framework. There is also a missed opportunity to explore the interesting intersection of philosophy and science that is altruism. Imagine if you are a Giver and it makes you feel good, then are you not getting something in return (feeling good, getting to think of yourself as someone special who gives) and thus a Matcher? Can there be any true Giver? Can there be any truly altruistic behaviors?
In the end, this book is based an assumption that the world is simple and people fall into neat little categories free of nuance but that of course is wrong. People are complex. Their motives are complex. Ignoring that complexity to sell your ideas sounds like something a Taker would do.
Give yourself back 10 hours and Take my advice: Skip this book. Not only can be summarized with a simple aphorism, “Give, and you shall receive,” but it is also junk science styled up like Malcom Gladwell but not nearly as cleverly written.
By the end of the book, after far too many examples, in fact a whole book of examples, to prove the simple aphorism, the boundaries between Givers, Takers and Matchers become so unclear that you wonder what he was trying to achieve. Why provide so many examples that blur the boundaries? Teachers that care about ROI are Givers but isn’t that a Matcher? And Takers like Michael Jordan can enjoy wild success, not just Givers, and they’re Takers only because their intent is wrong? Is being a Taker that bad then? And how can we know someone’s intent anyways? Sure, the baseball executive converted to life as a Giver after a long time on the wrong path as a Taker, but he’s only a Giver because he claims his intent is good and there’s no other motive to the advice he gives others in the industry. This is a naïve view.
For a book that talks a lot about consulting, it seems to miss the common consulting idea of MECE: mutually exclusive, collectively exhaustive. This Giver, Taker, Matcher framework is none of these. The categories are proven to be fluid and changeable in his many examples, so not exclusive, and they are not exhaustive because they cannot be. These categories do not exist. Instead, there’s a continuum from Giving to Taking that is situationally-dependent. No clear boundaries for neat categories.
That is why this is junk science. There is no talk of reliability (the categories people fall into are predictable) or validity (the categories actually exist) of this framework. There is also a missed opportunity to explore the interesting intersection of philosophy and science that is altruism. Imagine if you are a Giver and it makes you feel good, then are you not getting something in return (feeling good, getting to think of yourself as someone special who gives) and thus a Matcher? Can there be any true Giver? Can there be any truly altruistic behaviors?
In the end, this book is based an assumption that the world is simple and people fall into neat little categories free of nuance but that of course is wrong. People are complex. Their motives are complex. Ignoring that complexity to sell your ideas sounds like something a Taker would do.
mikeplewis's review against another edition
5.0
One of my favorite business books ever. I love the idea of identifying, embracing and celebrating Givers. As Simon Sinek says, “givers advance the world. Takers advance themselves and hold the world back.” This book has great examples and ideas on how to cultivate Givers. Please read!
zuomiriam's review against another edition
3.0
The premise of this book is sort of a paradigm shift for me; I've more or less assumed that takers/matchers assert themselves over givers in terms of success in the workplace, but Grant provides compelling evidence to suggest otherwise. I felt like some of the content was a bit repetitive (mostly in the second part of the book), but I think the idea is well executed and worth reading (or at least skimming).