The full title of this book by Gabor Holch is
“Breaking the Circle: Vicious circles in business“.
In my review at Amazon.co.uk, I gave it a FOUR Stars rating, which means I consider it as good to very good.
Here it is.
An interesting book to help you get unstuck
I’m surprised that there aren’t more books about vicious circles to help to break the destructive forces that get people trapped.
I first became interested in understanding vicious circles when I was introduced to systems thinking by a book called The Fifth Discipline by Peter Senge.
In technical terms, vicious circles and their opposites, virtuous circles are caused by positive (or reinforcing) feedback loops. They are positive because they build momentum, either up or down and contrast with compensating feedback loops that work like the central heating thermostat and work towards reaching a target.
The book is interesting and easy to read. It explains how vicious circles occur and how difficult they are to identify and then break. The key problem is that you don’t recognise your own role in creating the adverse behaviour so you place the blame elsewhere.
The book introduces a five step process to break the circle but there’s really a sixth step and that’s identifying the logic in the system creating the vicious circle. While this is covered together with a linear way of working backwards from the problem and asking why, I’d have liked to see more explanation.
Later the book looks at a few generic vicious circles, explaining the logic and the potential actions that can be used to break the circle. These are very useful but I think more examples could have been helpful. An updated, longer version of the book could get my rare five star rating but at the moment, with some sadness, I rate it at the four star level.
This is a very useful book for any business owner or manager who feels trapped. Use the process and I think you’ll be on the way to getting more control. An updated, longer version of the book could get my rare five star rating but at the moment, with some sadness, I rate it at the four star level.
You should also search for other books on the topic of being stuck and how to get unstuck.
It is available to buy from Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com. It is also available to borrow under the Kindle Unlimited subscription at Amazon.co.uk.
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