City Slackers
Author: Steve McKevitt
Price: £9.99
Publisher: Cyanbooks
Pages: 192
ISBN: 1904879721
Original and engaging, City Slackers is a streetwise and useful guide to surviving in a contemporary organisation. Indeed, this is a book for slackers and non-slackers alike. It will appeal to those who wish to emulate the work-avoidance techniques it observes, but it will provide equally valuable intelligence for hard-working individuals keen to gain the upper hand on slackers and free-riders on the eternal office battlefield. In essence, this analysis of slacking raises it to almost art-form status.
The book is written in a manner that weaves in and out of an amalgam of autobiographical tales, business statistics and figures, a survey of the corporate terrain, and fads and fashions in modern Britain. There is a lack of clear narrative flow or explicit link between the 10 chapters. Instead, they come across as standalone cameos on different aspects of the topic of slacking.
This book will prove of practical value to many readers. However, it is no guidebook. It is a reflection and cogitation on informed indolence and task avoidance. Muse over the situations and events in this text, and the office and your colleagues may never appear the same again.
In its own idiosyncratic and insightful way, this is an inspiring text. It quietly, but firmly, shouts ‘Look around you – see what is going on, don’t be deceived and always remember the office charlatan’s saying that ‘bull***t (all too often) baffles brains’. Modestly priced, this book is worth the sometimes uncomfortable experiential journey ofits message.
Useful? 3 out of 5
Well-written? 3 out of 5
Practical? 3 out of 5
Inspirational? 4 out of 5
Value for money? 5 out of 5
Overall 3 out of 5
Reviewed by Peter Stokes, principal lecturer, Lancashire Business School, University of Central Lancashire
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