How to Make Collaboration Work: Powerful Ways to Build Consensus, Solve Problems, and Make Decisions

I recommend this book to anyone who wants to work things out with their family, co-workers, managers, or any relationship you may have that requires collaboration.

This book does exactly what the title says it does. It provides clear, well-organized and specific guidance to building collaboration in a whole range of situations and between individuals, within groups and across organizations. This book is likely to be useful whether you are a professional facilitator or simply someone who needs to get agreement with one or more others. Much of its advice is, of course, widely available elsewhere, but this is a good choice for a single reference. 

Just plain terrific. David Straus's second book is useful for anyone involved in groups, whether at work, at home, or in the community-- and isn't that all of us? He covers it all-- from very basic details such as how to arrange the furniture in your meeting room, to how to effect the most sophisticated interchanges between participants at the highest levels of authority. Whether you're in business, education, government,or consulting, you'll learn from Straus. He has worked with a wide range of clients, from Ford Motors and the E.P.A. to the City of Denver and the Boston public schools. Throughout the book, his warm personality, absolute candor, and wealth of anecdotes make his principles easy to understand and absorb. A really valuable book from a national leader in group empowerment.