When Fish Fly: Lessons for Creating a Vital and Energized Workplace from the World Famous Pike Place Fish Market - Hardcover

Yokoyama, John; Michelli PhD, Joseph

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1401300618 ISBN 13: 9781401300616

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing, 2004

Synopsis

"You can energize your people and delight your customers by modeling the fabulous ideas that come from the World Famous Pike Place Fish Market." -- Ken Blanchard, co-author of The One Minute Manager

In this revealing business advice book, the magic of the World Famous Pike Place Fish Market proves a dynamic example of what a group of people can create when they are aligned and living a powerful vision. Here for the first time, owner John Yokoyama explains in his own words just how he transformed his business into a workplace that is renowned worldwide. When Fish Fly offers Yokoyama's cohesive strategy for achieving world famous results for owners, managers, and front-line workers alike. Once you understand the generative principles behind the World Famous Pike Place Fish Market you, too, can develop a culture that leads to excellent employee morale and legendary customer service.

About this title

About the Author

John Yokoyama is the owner of the World Famous Pike Place Fish Market. John's love of fish began as a child, fishing with his father on Puget Sound. He learned the retailing business by working at his dad's produce stand in the Pike Place Farmer's Market. At age twenty-five, he purchased the fish stand across from his dad's produce stand. He lives in Seattle.

Joseph Michelli, Ph.D., is a psychologist, organizational consultant, daily radio talk show host, professional speaker, and author of Humor, Play and Laughter. He presents and consults on the creation of dynamic and playful corporate cultures for companies around the world. He lives in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Reviews

By empowering his employees, helping them buy in to his business vision and encouraging an intense commitment to customer service, Yokoyama turned a struggling Seattle fish market—with many unhappy employees—into the World Famous Pike Place Fish Market. Now "it would be difficult to find any retail store in America that makes more money per square foot of retail space," Yokoyama writes; "we haven’t had a full-time employee leave within the past five years." In this volume, which liberally employs fishing metaphors, Yokoyama and Michelli (Humor, Play and Laughter) share lessons and concepts that apply to a wide variety of business ventures. They offer advice for instilling passion in employees, thinking outside the profit box and striving to reach out to the community and customers, solving problems effectively and with a view to improvement, and realizing as goals are achieved, that "the process never ends. The game is simply played at a higher level with time." Well-placed quotes from such luminaries as Nelson Mandela and Woodrow Wilson enhance the book’s inspirational, if idealistic, messages.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Yokoyama is the owner of Pike Place Fish in Seattle's Pike Place Market, a historic, open-air market located in the heart of Seattle, Washington. Crowds gather daily to see the crew of fishmongers throwing fish and interacting with customers, and also to purchase some of the freshest fish in the country. The stand wasn't always as successful as it is today, however. Yokoyama's attitudes were shaped from his childhood experience of being imprisoned in World War II Japanese-American internment camps, as well as by his overbearing father. Prone to outbursts of anger, his strict, closed-minded management style wasn't working. Through much personal work he became aware of the effects that negative dialog, both internal and external, were having on his crew. Once he made a conscious decision to take a personal interest in his employees and created a vision of becoming a "world famous" fish market, the business really took off. He now shares his powerful insights as a consultant on the creation of dynamic business cultures for corporations around the world. David Siegfried
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 1401300618
• ISBN 13: 9781401300616
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 176