I have to admit, I’m a fan of Daniel Pink’s work. I have Free Agent Nation as well as an audio of a speech he gave a couple of years ago. So when I saw that he had a new book out titled The Adventures of Johnny Bunko: The Last Career Guide You’ll Ever Need I decided to investigate it.
The book is actually a summary of several ideas from Daniel Pink, but it is Manga. I’m not familiar with what Manga is so I looked it up on Wikipedia. It is literally translated to “whimsical pictures” and looks very much like a comic book. I guess in Japan this genre covers many different topics and audiences. I assume that in the US it is easy to overlook since it isn’t in our culture. I do have to applaud Mr. Pink for trying something cutting edge and involving a good artist like Rob Ten Pas. Mr. Pink’s readers really should be people graduating high school, in or finishing college, or those just breaking into the workforce, so something like this is worth the effort. It takes less than two hours to read.
The summary of the story is that Johnny has to work late for a job he doesn’t like. He gets hungry and goes to a Chinese establishment. While there he is persuaded to pick up some chop sticks – powerful chopsticks as it turns out. When he breaks them open a genie like character appears named Diana. She plays the role of explaining to Johnny what he needs to know for career success. Since there are six sets of chopsticks, there are six lessons. I will give you the first and the last, you have to read the book for the others:
- There is no plan
- .
- .
- .
- .
- Leave an imprint
All in all, I like the book. As I mentioned above, it is really for people graduating high school, in or finishing college, or those just breaking into the workforce. Perhaps the timing of the release is to coincide with high school graduations. I recommend picking it up and including it with a card when you are invited to a graduation event.
Working Thoughts 