FIXED is a stimulating new book by Amy E. Herman, a self-described "leadership consultant who has crisscrossed the globe for eighteen years teaching professional development courses to everyone from Silicon Valley executives to Navy Seals." She decided to explore creativity and the work of artists "from conceptualization to actualization, while facing obstacles from deadlines to a death of resources including money, materials, and motivation" in order to craft a text outlining the problem-solving process. Herman's book is divided into three sections (Prep, Draft and Exhibit) which encourages the use of open eyes, open minds, and the universal language of art. In just the first few pages, she uses portraits of three US Presidents to memorably illustrate the meaning of bias. Next, she discusses the importance of self-awareness, noting studies from the Hay Group (only 4% of executives were considered truly self-aware) and the University of Kansas (that our desire for similarity and selective truth-seeking is a hardwired psychological default). Herman's emphasis on visual intelligence will be of interest across disciplines. I am looking forward to spending more time with her text and the many exercises she advocates.

Fixed was the last book I read in 2021. It would be an excellent read if you made any New Year's resolutions about improving workplace or personal relationships. If perception, situational awareness, and problem-solving are part of your job or as a volunteer, then you will want to pick up this book as well.

Amy Herman was the guest speaker at a professional development seminar I attended at work this past fall. She is an awesome speaker. It was one of the most entertaining professional development seminars I've attended. It's actually more of a workshop as there is a lot of audience participation. If you ever get to opportunity to hear her speak do it.

If you don't have the opportunity to hear her in person, then Fixed is a great alternative. I recognized some of the artwork and even the same phrasing in the book from what I saw and heard during the presentation.

The book is all about changing the way you think about and see a situation. We often get boxed in by how we do things and in doing so we miss things or make incorrect assumptions. Herman uses works of art to help the reader see their own biases and hopefully teach us to expand our thinking so that we might arrive at different solutions for problems and improve our relationships.

In the book, Herman walks the reader through a series of steps and asks a lot of questions to get the reader thinking and to practice articulating our thoughts. I would recommend having a notebook with you when you read this book so that you can do the exercises. These questions aren't always easy to answer and you might uncover biases that you didn't realize you had. Herman uses artwork to allow a safe place to explore touchy subjects like race, gender, politics, history, etc. She uses art in the same way many of us bookworms use books - they are a safe way to explore subjects that are difficult to talk about.

If you have a professional development type book club, this would be an awesome book for discussion. If you need to flip your thinking, then this is the book to read.

Just a note about the ebook: There are a lot of full-color pictures of artwork in this book and to get the most out of the book you will need to be able to view the images. You will not want to read it on a black & white eReader like the Kindle Paperwhite. I read a digital ARC on my Chromebook tablet using Adobe Digital Editions. I say that because I had trouble with some of the images loading. The problem I experienced may have been because it was an ARC or that my tablet wasn't powerful enough (some images would only partially load but if I swiped to the next page and then came back the full image would be there).


My review will be published at Girl Who Reads on Sunday, Jan. 9 - https://www.girl-who-reads.com/2022/01/Fixed-by-Amy-Herman.html