Reviews for Fish! Tales: Real-Life Stories to Help You Transform Your Workplace and Your Life

The average rating for Fish! Tales: Real-Life Stories to Help You Transform Your Workplace and Your Life based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2011-11-01 00:00:00 Justin Jackson This book is a lot better than its predecessor. I think the reason is that the 3 authors of the first book decided to hire an experienced writer: Philip Strand who wrote the bulk of the book and did interviews with the companies that are using - and more importantly experienced success in using - the Fish! philosophy. Fish! Tales concretizes the theories presented in the first book. Fish! philosophy is composed of four common-sense beliefs. I would like to group these beliefs into two: intrinsic or those that have to be done by the employee to himself and extrinsic or those that to be done by the employee to the customer: INTRINSIC: Play and Choose Your Attitude. To understand play, one has to change the paradigm that work and play are two separate things. The book mentioned that we were all brought up with our teachers telling us: "Stop playing and let's get serious". This gave us an idea from the time that we were kids that playing is not serious. Well, hello there. Lundin and his cohorts are now telling us that we can play and be serious at the same time. That we can use the energy that we generate in playing to be more creative, imaginative and productive. The fishmongers at Seattle's Pike Place Fish Market play with the customers by throwing fishes in the air but the book presents a lot of other ways of playing and it can be as simple as designing your correspondence or email with fish symbols or giving away small plastic fish toys to people who did good things to you at work. Choosing your attitude is very similar to Steven Covey's first habit: be proactive or to IM's (interaction management): I'm OK, You're OK. They are all based on the idea of man having the option or control on how we react to situations. When a bad thing happens to us and there is nothing we can do about it, would we let it ruin our day? This book says no, we should not. Rather, we can focus ourselves on what we learned from it or if possible, transform it into a positive experience and then move on. EXTRINSIC: Make Their Day and Be There. "Their" in Make Their Day means the customers, internal or external. Simply put, this means attending to the requirements of one's customer and going beyond to delight the customer. I liked the part where the car salesman had to go to a nearby Starbucks when he heard that his prospective customer prefers cappucino instead of the coffee from their office coffee dispenser. I will try to use this the next time I buy a new car ha ha. This part made me really think of the instances when I was "delighted" by an organization's or store's customer service. I have been on this earth for 47 years and I cannot think of more than a handful when I was delighted as a customer. I'd like to capture those that I was able to remember:1. A week after the sports-related knee injury operation in 2009, St. Luke's Hospital Q.C. called me up and a gentle and sincere-sounding voice asked me how I was doing with my recuperation. This really suprised me because I was there on my bed and bored and the call really surprised me because I have not heard of that practice from anyone including the time when my daughter was hospitalized or when my wife gave birth to my daughter. 2. Toyota Service Department calls me a week after they serviced my car regardless whether it is a major or minor tuneup. It gives me the chance to feedback if there is something not working properly after their service. I am not promoting Toyota service in anyway, I am just happy that they do this which was not a practice in the other car brands when I used to drive a Nissan, a Mitsubishi or a Honda. 3. A Vietnamese restaurant at SM Megamall. It was my our first time there and they gave us two tall glasses of free iced tea! The iced tea did not taste better than most iced teas I've tasted but we did not ask for it. The manager only said that he thought that it was the first time he saw me and my wife so he said he was giving the iced tea for free hoping that we would come back. Then we chatted and he practically transformed the usual care-to-try-a-new-resto? practice that my wife and I sometimes do into one quite unforgettable experience. When we go to SM Mega, we normally dine there now.See? I cannot even think of others. Fast service, nice smiles, warm greetings, fast billing, reasonable prices, big discounts, quality food, goods, etc. Many stores think that they are good customer service but for me, they are expected. What could be delightful need not be costly to the company like a phone call or just free iced teas! However, my favorite Fish! philosophy belief is being there. This is very hard to do. When an internal customer comes to your desk, you have to stop working and pay full attention to him or her. Or you can politely say that you are just busy and you will go to his or her place later. There are many other ways to do this and they are all in the book but they are all hard to do especially if I am busy and have deadlines to meet. But this is my favorite because the book has really good stories including the behavior of the health professionals at Missouri Baptist Medical Center. Imagine if the medical secretary can really pay attention to the patients or if a doctor is really patient in explaining your condition. I have met doctors who are unkind and those who are very caring and thorough and I thought it would be nice if all doctors belong to the latter. Most of our waking time is spent at work and we can have a fun time while delivering our work's requirements, then why not?

Review # 2 was written on 2010-08-24 00:00:00 Patrick Hennessy Exactly as the title indicates, the book contains 4 stories of how eating fish makes you healthier, stronger and able to concentrate… (just kidding :-D). The book talks about how the FISH! Philosophy transformed the lives of people at 4 organisations and made them more satisfied, which boosted morale and contributed to the satisfaction of customers. It also contains some short stories, which the authors call "small bites"! (I like the name) The first story talks about how play was implemented in a call centre for the purpose transforming how employees feel about the place. A call center is normally associated with boredom as all what agents have to do is wait for calls and answer them in almost an automatic way. "Let your smile be heard" means that the tone of your voice tells a lot about how you are feeling. By implementing play (and the other fish principles) the company was able to attract employees work in weekends and increase the retention level. Remember that PLAY is "not just an activity. It is a state of mind that brings new energy and sparks creativity". The second story talks about how important it is to "make their day"." Their" includes those around you: your colleagues, the customers, members of your family, and anyone else you are dealing with. In a Rochester Ford car dealer, the salesperson is not around to get the highest commission; they are there to make your day by understanding what you want and offering you the suitable options. No more negotiation is needed; you get what you need at its real price! Remember that "the world becomes a better place the moment you act on an intention to serve another". The third story talks about how being there for others makes a difference. In a hospital, patients need all the attention they can get. Not only patients need the full attention of nurses, but also your colleagues who need your help in accomplishing their tasks. Teams are more powerful than individuals, yet they require the members to be there for each other and for the team. Remember that "you can multi-task with 'stuff', but you have to be there for 'people'". The fourth story talks about the power of choice. It is simple; you choose what you want to be: be the best, be the greatest. That is how Tile Technology Roofing Company transformed itself; by teaching employees how to choose their attitude. Installing tiles in a roof is not an easy job, yet the workers know that what they do makes a difference to their clients and that in order to be able to accomplish an excellence work their attitude makes a difference. "The attitude you are having right now is the one you are choosing. Is it the one you want?"