REVIEW: Manga for Success: Leading Meeting and Teams (nonfiction book) by Masumi Tani, artwork by Enmo Takenawa

Leading Meetings and Teams is nonfiction. I bought my copy new.

Review:

As is the case with all the "Manga for Success" volumes, this alternates textual sections with manga sections depicting the concepts in the text in action. In this volume, the manga scenario is that Shigeo is a young employee who's been sent from a construction materials manufacturer to one of the local agencies of the manufacturer. He's supposed to get opinions from them about developing new building materials. Unfortunately, no one has much to say - they're focused on their own current projects and concerns.

While on a train, Shigeo meets Mayumi, a facilitation instructor. She gives him advice on how to run more effective meetings. She recommends he use a whiteboard and put the desired topics and outputs down on it. The board allows him to record what people in the meeting are saying, checking his understanding of their comments, and overall help people feel heard. She gives him several general tips on conversation/meeting facilitation, and he starts to make actual progress in his work. 

As things move forward, Shigeo finds himself having to put a team together to plan a construction materials expo. Mayumi teaches him about social styles theory, giving him ideas about how to approach various individuals at the agency. In the more text-heavy portions, the author provides tips for how best to interact with people who have different communication styles. 

There's also info about project leadership, SWOT analysis, figuring out your own style of leadership (including strengths and weaknesses), and a few other specific concerns/questions one might have about facilitating meetings and conversations and leading teams.

This wasn't a bad volume at all, but it did occasionally feel more scattered than some of the others. Aspects of it felt like what you might get if you mixed the Business Problem-Solving and Strategy volume with the Resilience, Confidence, and Positive Thinking volume and The Psychology of Personal Growth and Better Relationships. Also, if you're not a fan of using whiteboards or a similar giant writing surface during meetings, you're out of luck here - the author loves them, and a lot of her advice relies heavily on using them.