As a manager of 20 years, I can definitely say if you’ve read or attended any good leadership anything, this book is not really going to appeal to you. If you are a new leader looking to get your feet wet with a good taste of a basic leadership foundation then you will enjoy this book. If you’re tired of straight forward leadership fundamentals, you might enjoy a change of pace with a good storyline sprinkled with leadership learning. It’s very basic and would be good for any up and coming leader, or a nice read if you aren’t.

An ok read, but not very impactful or memorable. What would've helped bring in the learnings was if the authors added the lessons with the fable. I believe in Iceberg, they did that -- urgency, coalition, etc. -- per chapter rather than in the recap.

Litter and Rathgeber craft a cute but long winded tale about two Meerkat communities, one of which runs on management and one on leadership. Guess what? To survive the colonies need both. How desperately they need each style depends on crisis and the rate of change.

The story clearly illustrates the need for both, but...I think most readers would get the point from a story a third the length of this one and would be happier with more information on facilitating the needed discussions around identifying the adjustments and changes their specific organizations require—and how to get there.

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This is a leadership and management book written as a fable of Meerkats building a community that faces trouble putting in measures to mitigate the issues that arise as a result of challenges and changes.

John and Holger tell the story of this Meerkat community in such a way that the reader can see opportunities for innovation, changes and improvement.

This book helps leader approach alternative ways to leverage the capabilities of their team in order to yield measurable outputs.

Rating: 4/5

Favourite Quote: “To understand how we can get better outcomes, we need to more clearly understand how organisations rise, whey they often eventually struggle no matter their past success, and why they can fall.”

Interviewed author for strategy+business: http://www.strategy-business.com/blog/John-Kotters-Required-Reading

some challenges can be overcome by melding different practises together.