Summary Of The Book Part of the popular One Minute Manager Library, The One Minute Manager Meets The Monkey shows executives how to avoid picking up other people’s problems. The book calls these problems Monkeys. Managers who have a tendency to pick up other people’s monkeys never get anything useful done on time. This is because they have to spend too much time shuffling and managing all the monkeys clambering on their backs, with never any time to do much constructive work. When a manager's staff member comes to them with a problem, they bring their monkey with them. If the manager is not careful and says something like needing a little more time to think about the situation, the problem, or the monkey, climb on to the manager's back leaving the subordinate free. In this way, a manager can accumulate so many monkeys, it will distract him from his own job. The monkeys have a tendency to leap with abandon from one person to the other. The person who leaves himself open as a target will invite too many monkeys. Most of them will not be his own. The book shows how managers can get out of this situation. Instead of taking on other people’s responsibilities, they should provide advice and delegate the problems to the appropriate person. They should send the monkeys back with their proper owners, and take measures for insurance against risks. The manager should follow up the problems, to check on the status and the progress made. They should concentrate on being good at delegating and supervising projects, rather than taking on everything on themselves. The One Minute Manager Meets The Monkey is a good resource for those executives who have a tendency to take on too much responsibility on themselves, instead of assigning the tasks to the appropriate people. It teaches the art of delegation and hands-off management. It shows managers that they should only intervene when the situation calls for it.
About The Authors Kenneth Hartley Blanchard is a management expert and writer. His other books include The One Minute Manager: The Quickest Way to Increase Your Own Prosperity, Mission Possible: Becoming A World-Class Organization While There's Still Time, The One Minute Manager Builds High Performing Teams, and Who Killed Change?: Solving the Mystery of Leading People Through Change. Kenneth Blanchard earned a degree in Government and Philosophy from Cornell University. He then completed his postgraduate degree in Sociology and Counselling from Colgate University. He earned his Doctorate in Education Administration and Leadership from Cornell University. He has co-authored numerous books on management and leadership. William Oncken Jr. was an author, trainer and speaker. Monkey Business: Are You Controlling Events or Are Events Controlling You?, and Managing Management Time: Who's Got the Monkey? are some of his other books. Oncken Jr. was born in 1912 in Buffalo, New York. He held a degree in Physics and worked on the Manhattan Project. He spoke at many universities and also wrote articles for many periodicals. He passed away in the year 1988.
Kenneth Hartley Blanchard (born May 6, 1939) is an American author. His extensive writing career includes over 60 published books, most of which are co-authored books. His most successful book, The One Minute Manager, has sold over 13 million copies and been translated into many languages.(citation needed) Blanchard is also the Chief Spiritual Officer of The Ken Blanchard Companies, an international management training and consulting firm that he and his wife, Marjorie Blanchard, co-founded in 1979 in San Diego, California. Blanchard is known for the quote "None of us is as smart as all of us."
