The Dream Manager by Patrick Lencioni is an inspirational business novel that centers around how companies can help their employees achieve their dreams and career goals. The book follows the story of a dream manager hired by a large company to help their employees navigate a workplace environment where fruition of their professional and personal desires is discouraged. Throughout the novel, Lencioni outlines the key steps and principles necessary for companies to embrace and incorporate in order to effectively manage the dreams of their employees and increase overall productivity.
The novel opens with the introduction of a dream manager hired by one of the world’s largest companies, Bonte Corp. Bonte is a struggling organization that not only suffers from in-fighting between departments and an overall lack of direction, but their staff is disheartened and overly focused on their day to day tasks with no sign of improving the company’s growth and profitability. The dream manager, named Angelo, steps in and attempts to shift the company’s culture by implementing a system for giving employees permission to dream.
Angelo begins by forming “dream circles” in which each week, the employees take time out from their job duties to pursue their individual dreams. The dream circles are basically educational and positive feedback loops where employees are encouraged to share their personal goals and get advice from others on how to achieve their dreams. Angelo also creates a personal “dream coaching” initiative where he helps each employee, one on one, identify possible dream paths and craft individualized plans for achieving their dreams.
Through the implementation of the dream circles and dream coaching program, Bonte Corp begins to experience improvement across the board. Employees become inspired when they are given the opportunity to engage with their dreams in a safe, supportive environment. As their morale and attitudes begin to shift, Bonte’s performance improves. The company culture is no longer bogged down with negative attitudes, infighting, and outdated practices, but rather begins to focus on collective goal setting and personal growth.
The Dream Manager by Patrick Lencioni is a powerful novel that provides invaluable insight on how companies can tap into their employee’s potential and take ownership of their unique dreams. Through the story of Bonte Corp, Lencioni outlines how passion and enthusiasm can be reignited in the workplace when employees are given the freedom to pursue their dreams. More importantly, this novel unveils how an organization’s performance is inherently linked to the fulfillment of their staff’s dreams and how a company’s success is largely dependent on how well it manages those individual aspirations. If a company can find a way to create a safe and inspiring workspace for its staff to express their dreams, it can expect to exponentially increase production, profitability, and engagement among their employees.
