Dan Pink's A Whole New Mind starts out well with three interesting chapters about our current predicament but what followed left me disappointed. I would give it 2-1/2 stars.
A Whole New Mind takes three well-argued and well-written chapters to convince you that right-brain talents and skills will be crucial for success in the years ahead. He does a great job in some respects in those chapters in outlining why (1) Asia will take away a great many US jobs, (2) good design matters and (3) left-brain skills aren't as valuable as they used to be. All true. But the rest of the book is 6 chapters of well-written but light-weight tips and resources. Given the weight and importance of the subject, I was expecting more.
Pink identifies what he calls six senses to develop: design, empathy, play, story, synthesis (Pink calls it symphony) and meaning. I agree these things should get more respect and it is more important than ever to develop them. I just wanted a lot more development. Pink says the six chapters are right-brain. Maybe. But I think most readers will feel a let down when they finish the book faster than they thought they would.
This might be the kind of book you should read in the bookstore. Read the first 3 chapters and skim the rest and you've got it. My response was to immediately order what I thought would almost certainly be a more substantive book, The World is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman. The last book I read that generally pertains to this subject, China, Inc., by Ted Fishman, was more informative -- I gave that one 4 stars.
I wanted to like A Whole New Mind and if you can lower your expectations a notch and just view it as a good read and not expect something monumental, you'll be fine.