The slightly misleading title is no doubt meant to trigger, or attract, potential readers and Bob Knight is a questionable role model, but I must say I'm intrigued by The Power of Negative Thinking. It's hardly a how-to guide of being an irritable downer, far from it. It's more like you're being shown the tools to analyze problems rationality. It's a warning to never stop self-assessing, to never allow yourself the lazy "it'll be okay" proclamation without the critical thought to back it up.

Power of Negative Thinking is Knight's controversial philosophy of leadership seen through the lens of his biography. ( )

The title is a little deceiving. Coach Knight gives us a little insight into what helped become a successful coach. It was less on negative thinking and more on planning. Good things hardly happen to people who do not plan for things to happen. Discipline and practice make you more likely to be successful. ( )

The title is a little deceiving. Coach Knight gives us a little insight into what helped become a successful coach. It was less on negative thinking and more on planning. Good things hardly happen to people who do not plan for things to happen. Discipline and practice make you more likely to be successful. ( )

This book offers an alternative to the many touting the benefits of optimism. Psychologists have shown that pessimists typically assess the reality of a situation. And the dangers of over optimism are clear; for example, the fable of the ant and the grasshopper. Too optimistic an outlook can cause a lack of sufficient preparation, rash decision making, and overlooking possibilities of preventing failure. This is Knight’s point. His coaching was based on emphasizing elimination of behavior and the plays that lead to losing rather than emphasizing those that lead to winning. He argues that his emphasis on the preparation that comes from visualizing negative outcomes has enabled his teams to beat teams with more talent. This attitude is consistent with his emphasis on defense. It is hard to argue with success. His many coaching accomplishments that placed him in the International Basketball Hall of Fame are listed in the back of the book.
I have always admired him as a coach and the way his teams have played. Yet it seems clear that emphasizing the negative and on eliminating mistakes can have negative consequences. Anyone who has watched basketball, or, for that matter, any sport, has seen players lose confidence or play tentatively from too much criticism. I would not want my sons to play basketball for him. But maybe these are not the players that Knight wants playing for him anyway.
Another drawback of an outlook that tolerates anything less than perfection, is the implicit assumption that the person thinks he knows what perfection is. Although none are mentioned in the book Knight’s many instances of boorish and confrontational behavior make it hard for me not to see him as a bully. An example in the book of not thinking negatively enough is his too slow recognition that he would not be able to interact well with a new administration. But he does not say anything about the incidents, confrontations with students and players and tantrums on the court that led to parting ways with Indiana University. Like many coaches Knight likes to think of himself as a “teacher”. But he has engaged in behavior, throwing a chair onto the court in protest of a referee’s call and yanking a player to the bench by the front of his jersey, that is certainly not appropriate for a teacher.
For basketball fans the book does offer some interesting comments on teams and players Knight has coached and important games that they won. But a little bit of the merits of negative thinking go a long way and the book goes far beyond that. Although Knight uses examples from history, business and basketball, I found the book tedious. Particularly annoying are Knight’s Nuggets that end each chapter. An example: “These are filter cigarettes – they’re safe, I hear.” “And you will meet the nicest people who smoke them in your cancer ward.” And the conclusion of the book is preceded by 10 pages of clichés that Knight likes in varying degrees.
I finished this book, but found myself looking forward to the end well before I got there. Although the idea might seem a fresh one, this book does not deliver on this impression. And we all know that for every aphorism advocating one behavior there is one advocating the opposite: “Absence makes the heart grow fonder” vs. “Out of sight, out of mind.”
Not a book that I would recommend. ( )

I have never been a basketball fan, so I went into reading The Power of Negative Thinking wondering if I would "get it." I knew who Bob Knight was (even as a non-basketball fan, how could you not?), but had no idea what to expect. I'm happy to report one need not be a basketball fan to thoroughly enjoy this lively, accessible, conversational-style look at the power of overcoming positivity with negative thinking.

There has been a backlash over the cult of positive thinking over the last few years, and with good reasons. Barbara Ehrenreich's Bright-Sided: How Positive Thinking Is Undermining America is one of the first books I read on the subject. And over the years, a great deal of research has come out warning about the dangers of unfettered optimism. But usually, optimists dismiss discussion of negative thinking as being depressing, pessimistic, or just giving up.

Knight starts his book with a very simple premise that overcomes this objection. Negative thinking is not about giving up or being a pessimist. Instead, it is about NEGATING everything that can get in the way of victory. Winning isn't about who wants it more. Winning is about who is most prepared. And being prepared is about honestly assessing strength, weaknesses, and developing a plan that negates mistakes and anything else that can get in the way. Or, as he sums it up:

"Having the will to win is not enough. Everyone has that. What matters is having the will to prepare to win."

Another point Knight makes is to not push people to do what they can't do, but push them to do what they can. It seems so logical, and yet we ignore this every day:

"My list of hollow platitudes includes the idea that You Can Do Anything You Really Want to Do. The truth is you can't. Chalk it up to the Divine Being's grand plan for making the whole world work because of interdependence, but the fact is each of us has more things that we cannot do well than we can. That's why society has doctors and plumbers and electricians and mechanics and every other Craiglist specialist."

The point is that whether you are pushing yourself, or running a team, you need to have a clear understanding not only of your strengths, but also an honest assessment of your weaknesses. The inability to do something is not a character flaw (as is not-so-subtly implied when you are told "If you really want to do it, you can"). The Negative Thinker recognizes the strengths and weaknesses in his team and, instead of pushing people to do what they can't do, pushes them to do what they can to best take advantage of their talents.

There is a lot of great information in this book of particular value to anyone in a leadership position, whether that is a sports coach or a business owner. In particular, when he discusses setting maximum, but realistic, expectations for those who answer to you. People will, in general, work to whatever level you will tolerate. Don't tolerate less than maximum results. But at the same time, make sure those expectations are based on the real abilities of the person and not an arbitrary, unreachable goal. He offers great examples from his own coaching experiences on how to work toward this.

I have two minor gripes with the book. First, at times Knight gets a little too conversational. He'll be on a discussion point, and then switch over to an odd little anecdote that bears little resemblance to the point he was making. Second, there are a lot of unnecessary filler quotes thrown at the end of each chapter which are just random adages and clichés. In fact, half of Chapter 11 is nothing but clichés and adages. It felt like they were trying to fluff up the word count. (My copy appears to be double spaced, but this may be because it is an advanced review copy and the final version may have more normal spacing between the sentences).

Overall, The Power of Negative Thinking is a fantastic look into the thought processes and work ethic of a man who knows that it takes more that Happy Fluffy Thoughts to win. ( )