We Got Fired!: And It's the Best Thing That Ever Happened to Us

Perhaps a more accurate title for this upbeat volume would be:""We Got Hired and You Can Too!"" Every one of Mackay's interviews with the now famously successful (Michael Bloomberg, Muhammad Ali, Billie Jean King, Jessie Ventura, Bernie Marcus, etc.) ends with the subject richer for the experience of having been fired--both literally and figuratively. Mackay--a syndicated business advice columnist and author of the 1988 bestseller Swim with the Sharks without Being Eaten Alive--seems to anticipate an audience of downsized managers for this book, but his advice is useful to anyone in the throes of work-related rejection, regardless of their corporate ranking. The combination of interviews and short essays could also serve to introduce workforce newbies to the realities of business life: one essay points out that""If You are Under Thirty, the Likelihood that You Will Be Fired in the Next Twenty Years is 90 Percent."" Mackay concludes each chapter with collections of quotable life slogans, such as""Your company may give you the boot, but don't boot the networks that company has opened for you."" He also dishes out helpful suggestions for making the most of an exit, along with tips from Donald Trump on how not to get fired in the first place. And though Mackay's glowing descriptions of his interviewees can border on pandering and his repeated references to his friendship with Larry King can grow trying, these tales of rejection and redemption form a neat package of inspiration for those in need of an encouraging word and the gentle reminder that terminations simply lead to new beginnings.