I do not think there are many people that will find this book useful. Most people will be in one of two camps:
1.) If you think about communication at all, probably nothing in this book will be new to you.
2.) If the information in this book *is* news to you, then its style will not be helpful to you.
The book is intentionally short and takes a very imperative tone. I read the whole thing in under 30 minutes. The problem is, with nuanced topics like communication, when you distill them down that far, you end up with recommendations like - I am not making these up, they are taken directly from the book:
"Be tolerant of different viewpoints"
"Contain the outbursts"
"Show respect"
Those are particularly egregious examples, but my point remains, as I read this book every page just felt blindingly obvious.
That would be fine, if the book were evocative and resonated. Plenty of books in this genre tell us what we already know but do so in an emotional way so that it really sticks, or speaks to us anew. Patrick Lencioni's "Five Dysfunctions of a Team" is a great example - the whole book is an evocative 'fable', a story, with well-developed characters that bring his points to life.
By contrast, Talk Less, Say More distills even the stories down. Here's an example, verbatim:
"Sharon learned the hard way that firing off an e-mail was not the right way to thank the vice president who interviewed her. The vice president chose another equally qualified applicant, in part because the other applicant took the time to send a handwritten thank-you note. Sharon lost the job by not noticing that the vice president valued a personal approach. If she'd scanned his desk during the interview, she would have noticed many handwritten notes."
That's not evocative at all. All of the stories are just like that - very matter-of-fact with no interesting characters or anything memorable. There's nothing emotional to any of them.
In fact, I found nothing emotionally compelling about the entire book, and that's why I say that if this information *is* new to you, I doubt you'll be able to meaningfully use it. Dieken provides checklists at the end of each section for what points you should work on, but if you have the self-awareness to fill out those checklists, then by definition you don't need them.
I'm sure when Ms. Dieken works personally with clients, they benefit immensely because she's able to observe them and give personalized feedback, but the value isn't just in the words she's saying but her demeanor, her engagement, her personal connection: all the things she talks dispassionately about in this book.
Some people might find this an entertaining read, but it's hard to imagine anyone reading this book and actually using it to become a better communicator.
