Reviving Work Ethic: A Leader’s Guide to Ending Entitlement and Restoring Pride in the Emerging Workforce

In this leadership handbook, Chester (Getting Them to Give a Damn) takes the Generation Y workforce to task. Using the story of how a board game (Milton Bradley’s The Game of Life) changed to meet the standards and ideals of each generation, he exposes the decline of our work ethic over the past century. As Chester writes: “There was a time when achievement meant more than possessions, and when character (a person’s qualities) was valued more than achievement.” According to Chester, pride in one’s work is something that the current workforce sorely lacks. In separate chapters, Chester delineates seven qualities based on what he refers to as “Sandbox Values,” with each chapter offering a section on how to instill these values in employees. However, as he makes clear, these issues are deeply rooted in cultural values and psychological realities, so by the time a personnel manager comes face-to-face with a prospective or current employee, the dynamic can be hard to control. While first and secondhand accounts give readers a glimpse into the employer’s world, the book would have benefited from similar accounts from the employee’s perspective. (Jan.)