‘Saying what you mean’ sounds simple and yet is a difficult skill to master. We all have our share of running around the bush before we come close to uttering the meat of what we want. In personal relationships, the filters are usually far less clogged for your words to not get stuck. However, the same can’t be said for your professional relationships. And that’s why it is essential to develop radical candor to say what you mean to get what you want.
If you’re managing a team or if you are in a position where you provide feedback, then this book is a good guide.
Kim Scott, the author, provides a guide to people managers on leading consciously by developing relationships that are based on solid foundations.
This two-part book dives into explaining how you can use your humanity to be more effective in being a better boss. To help you be more aware of issues that are way more common than you might presume. Essentially, there’s nothing unique about a problem that you’re facing as a people manager.
The first part also focuses on introducing the quadrant of radical candor. Alongside ruinous empathy, obnoxious aggression, and manipulative insincerity, how can you reach being radically candid? If there’s one thing to take away from this book for me, then it’s this.
The second part of the book lists out tools and methods for building relationships, figuring out how to guide people on your team by welcoming criticism and feedback, and even how to hire the best fits and fire those that might not.
This part is action-oriented and gives a step-by-step approach towards 1x1s, organizing meetings, and rich examples of what has helped those who tried these approaches.
On the whole, the book is laced with real-life examples from the authors’ life from her tenures at Twitter, Dropbox, Google, Apple, and her Juice software. She does a great job in keeping the examples relatable, and her advice appears realistic. Most of the techniques outlined by her are simple and yet appear effective.
Radical Candor is an illuminating read and is a guide I’ll definitely refer to from now onwards.