適合經理人的五本非商業書籍
Year-end is the time for a clear-out of the business books I haven’t read and those I never finished.
又到了新舊更替時節，我常常在這時清理沒讀過和沒讀完的商業類書籍。We get sent dozens of business books to review, but I have got through very few over the years. Clayton Christensen’s The Innovator’s Dilemma has stayed with me. Confronting Mistakes: Lessons from the Aviation Industry when Dealing with Error by Jan Hagen, which I am reading at the moment, may do so too.
這些年有人給我們送來了幾十本商業類書籍供我們品評，然而我只讀完了其中很少一部分。但克萊頓•克里斯坦森(Clayton Christensen)的《創新者的窘境》(The Innovator’s Dilemma)一直伴隨着我。而我正在閱讀的揚•哈根(Jan Hagen)的《直面錯誤：航空業處理錯誤的經驗教訓》(Confronting Mistakes: Lessons from the Aviation Industry when Dealing with Error)也可能享受同樣待遇。Many other management books are overenthusiastic, lacking in nuance or too impressed by current fads to stand the test of time.
至於許多其他管理類書籍，要麼感情色彩太過強烈缺乏韻味，要麼受當下流行觀念影響太大，無法經受住時間的考驗。
I think the best books for business are non-business books, and the best of those provide at least one important management insight. You probably have your own. These are mine:
我認爲，對商業人士最有益的書籍是那些與商業無關的書籍。其中的佼佼者至少能夠爲管理提供一個方面的重大啓迪。對此，也許你擁有自己的最佳書單，以下則是我的書單：The Complete Plain Words by Sir Ernest Gowers. This guide to how “to get an idea as exactly as possible out of one mind into another” will mark its 60th anniversary next year.
歐內斯特•高爾斯爵士(Sir Ernest Gowers)的《簡明寫作技巧大全》(The Complete Plain Words)。2014年，這本有關如何“將思想盡可能準確地從一個頭腦傳遞到另一個頭腦中”的指南將迎來出版60週年紀念日。I bought mine from a second-hand book sale in the English harbour town of Dartmouth, but it is still in print. As a guide to clear communication it has probably not been bettered. The purpose of writing, Sir Ernest said, is to affect people in the way that you wish them to be affected.
我手頭這本是我在英國海港城市達特茅斯(Dartmouth)的一次二手書交易活動中購買的，不過它目前仍在發行。作爲一本關於準確溝通的指南，它可能無出其右了。在這本書中，歐內斯特爵士表示，寫作的目的是以你期望的方式影響人們。“It is wise,” he said, “not to begin to write until you are quite certain what you want to say. That sounds elementary, but the elementary things are often the most likely to be neglected.”
他表示：“一個明智的做法是，在還沒確定想說什麼之前，不要動筆開始寫作。這一點聽起來非常基本，然而最基本的事實往往是最容易被忽略的。”The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn. This book explains how scientists develop paradigms – theories that explain the world. When anomalies appear, believers in the paradigm try to ignore them or explain them away. Eventually, if sufficient anomalies emerge, a rival paradigm attracts enough adherents to replace the previous one.
托馬斯•庫恩(Thomas Kuhn)的《科學革命的結構》(The Structure of Scientific Revolutions)。這本書解釋了科學家建立範式（指解釋世界的理論體系）的過程。當異常現象出現時，相信範式的人們要麼試圖忽略這些現象，要麼通過解釋它們來使之顯得不異常。最後，如果出現了足夠多的異常現象，與之前範式相競爭的範式就會吸引足夠多的支持者，從而取代前者。Business does not work quite like this: if anything, people are too credulous about the latest fashion. But Kuhn helps explain the fierce attachment people develop to ways of doing things.
在商業領域則不是這樣。如果說有什麼類似之處的話，那就是人們對於最新的流行觀點過於輕信。不過，庫恩的書有助於解釋人們做事方式的強烈慣性。How to talk them around can be learnt from my next choice.
至於如何說服他們，則可以從我介紹的下一本書裏學到。Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela. No sooner had Mandela died than the emails arrived: would I be interested in this or that business expert’s view on the leadership lessons to be learnt from South Africa’s departed president?
納爾遜•曼德拉(Nelson Mandela)的《漫漫自由路》(Long Walk to Freedom)。曼德拉逝世沒多久，我就收到了許多電子郵件：關於從這位南非已故總統身上能學到什麼領導力方面的經驗教訓，我對這位或那位商界專家的看法是否感興趣？No, I would not. No manager is Mandela. Even Mandela wasn’t always Mandela. He tolerated corruption and incompetence in his ministers and was, very occasionally, silly – he proposed lowering the voting age to 14.
不，不感興趣。任何經理人都不是曼德拉本人。就算曼德拉也並不總是曼德拉。他也得忍受部長們的腐敗和無能。在極少數情形中，他也曾作出過愚蠢的舉動——比如他曾提議將選舉年齡降至14歲。The Mandela lesson managers can learn is that the way to get people to follow you is to tell them, in detail and in good faith, what they have told you. If people feel you have listened and taken their opinions seriously, they are more likely to agree to do something different.
從曼德拉身上，經理人能學到的是，要讓人們聽從你，辦法就是把他們對你說過的話詳盡而誠懇地告訴他們。如果人們感覺你始終在傾聽他們，並且在認真對待他們的觀點，他們更有可能同意做些不同的事。And if two parties do the same to each other, they have a good chance of reaching a mutually satisfactory agreement. When he was taken from prison to meet FW de Klerk, Mandela congratulated him on becoming president. “From the first, I noticed that Mr de Klerk listened to what I had to say. This was a novel experience,” Mandela wrote.
而如果兩個黨派間也相互採取同樣的策略，他們就有極大的可能性達成雙方都滿意的協議。當曼德拉出獄會見弗雷德裏克•威廉•德克勒克(FW de Klerk)時，他祝賀後者當選南非總統。曼德拉寫道：“從一開始，我就注意到德克勒克樂於傾聽我要說的話。這是一種全新的體驗。”Blind Watchers of the Sky by Rocky Kolb. This is not just a marvellous history of how we developed our understanding of the universe. It also shows how peculiar some of astronomy’s pioneers were. There was Tycho Brahe, who lost his nose in a duel with a cousin over which, legend had it, was the better mathematician; and Johannes Kepler, who described himself as someone who “barks at wrongdoers” and “has a doglike horror of baths”.
洛基•科爾布(Rocky Kolb)的《天空的盲目觀察者》(Blind Watchers of the Sky)。這不僅僅是一本有關我們如何建立對宇宙理解的精彩至極的歷史書。它還展示出部分天文學方面的先鋒人物有多麼古怪。比如第谷•布拉赫(Tycho Brahe)在與一位表弟的決鬥中失去了他的鼻子，決鬥的原因據說是他們在爭誰是更好的數學家。而約翰尼斯•開普勒(Johannes Kepler)則稱自己會“衝着有不良行爲的人們咆哮”，而且“像狗一樣害怕洗澡”。As a manager, you need to put up with the occasional eccentric and protect them from the human resources department. They may be annoying but, every now and then, they may tell the truth no one else dares to utter.
作爲經理人，你需要忍受偶爾出現的怪人，並保護他們不受人力資源部門的傷害。他們也許會很煩人，但是他們會時不時說出其他人不敢說出的真理。Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. Everyone I have recommended this wise book to has raved about it and bought copies for their friends and family.
維克多•弗蘭克爾(Viktor Frankl)的《活出生命的意義》(Man's Search for Meaning)。對於這本充滿了智慧的書，所有我推薦過的人都予以盛讚，並且也爲他們的家人和朋友購買了此書。A Viennese psychiatrist and Auschwitz survivor, Frankl taught that one could find meaning in the most unpromising places.
弗蘭克爾是一名維也納臨牀心理學家，他還是一名奧斯維辛集中營(Auschwitz)的倖存者。他在這本書裏告訴我們，人即使在最無望的境地下也能找到生存意義。You should be able to find meaning in your work, and your central role, as a manager, is to help the people who work for you find meaning in theirs. That meaning might come from making the world better, or it might mean earning enough to provide for others. Frankl said that everyone had to find their own meaning. But if work doesn’t provide it, he was clear that you should, if you can, go and do something else.
你應該具有從工作中找到意義的能力。而作爲經理人，你的核心角色是幫助爲你工作的人們找到他們工作的意義。這種意義可以是讓世界更美好，也可以是賺足夠多的錢以便扶助他人。弗蘭克爾表示，每個人都必須找到自己的人生意義。然而，如果工作不能帶來意義，他的意思很明顯——你就該在可能的情況下轉身離開，做做其他的事。
