Book Review: Who Moved My Cheese?

My Ratings: 7.0/10.0

About the Author

Dr. Spencer Johnson is one of the world’s most influential thinkers and widely read #1 bestselling authors. More than 48 million copies of Dr. Johnson’s books are in print worldwide in forty seven languages.

Dr. Spencer Johnson’s education includes a psychology degree from the University of Southern California, an M.D. from the Royal College of Surgeons and medical clerkships at Harvard Medical School and the Mayo Clinic.

Some of his memorable works in Self Help/Success genres include:

• Who Moved my Cheese?
• The One Minute Manager (co-authored with Kenneth Blanchard)
• Yes or No: The Guide to Better Decisions
• The Present: The Secret to Enjoying your Work and Life now

About the Book: It’s all about Change Management

 There are three things you cannot miss in your life: Death, Taxes and….. Change. Change is permanent: be it in your career, relationships or your family life, you will definitely face change. The book is all about how to face tough situations in your life and change accordingly.

The book is all about life of four central characters: two mice (Scurry and Sniff) and two human (Hem and Haw). They have a source of cheese in the maze and every day they follow the routine of going into the maze to enjoy their cheese. Cheese in this context can be anything we dream of. They were not noticing that their supply of cheese was coming down. One fine day, when they reached the location, they found it empty.

This is where the story splits into two. The two mice accepted the situation and moved further into the maze looking for other sources of cheese. The humans who built their whole life around cheese felt cheated and were blaming the situation as fraud. The story captures the moments in your life when you would have lost a job or a relationship and felt this is the end of life. Past looks more comfortable and what future holds is nothing but only fear. The rest of the story forms the masterpiece of Dr. Johnson’s work. After waiting for long, Haw decides to go search for cheese on his own and summarises his overall experience as “Handwritings on the Wall”. These messages form the greatest takeaway from the story.

The Handwritings on the Wall can be summarised as such:

Change Happens

They Keep Moving the Cheese

Anticipate Change

Get Ready for the Cheese to Move

Monitor Change

Smell the Cheese Often, so you know when it is getting old

Adapt to Change Quickly

The Quicker you let go of Old Cheese, The Sooner you can enjoy new Cheese

Change

Move with the Cheese

Enjoy Change

Savour the Adventure and Enjoy the Taste of New Cheese

Be Ready to Change Quickly and Enjoy Again

They keep moving the Cheese

Overall the book is a very short and precise story with very high learning outcome. People who do not have time to spend read the book can view the entire book as an animation at the below mentioned youtube link: