Reviews (2)

Reputations do matter!
This book is exactly what I needed. The chapter on the Harvard reputation building will now form part of the research for my MBA dissertation. Fombrun clearly sets out perceptual mapping and the real value that companies can gain from reputation building.

The book is technically just right, not too light with just the right amount of researched data to back up statements made.

I highly recommend it to any company trying to decide what else it could do to boost sales.

Invaluable for PR Counselors
Fombrun's REPUTATION is an invaluable tool that can help PR counselors better explain the importance of actively managing the client's internal and external images.

The hardline examples from famous American businesses are very impactful; the messages are impossible to miss.

In fact, when one client said he thought Reputation Management was unnecessary, because his sales were doing well, I asked him:

"What is it you know that the Fortune 500 companies obviously don't? They're apparently wasting millions of dollars every year on PR."

Enough said. ... Read more

Book Description

THE HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW PAPERBACK SERIES is designed to bring today's managers and professionals the fundamental information they need to stay competitive in a fast-moving world.Here are the landmark ideas that have established the Harvard Business Review as required reading for ambitious business people in organizations around the globe.

These eight articles examine all aspects of the work of modern nonprofit organizations.The thoughtful essays cover important topics such as earning the public trust and learning from the success of venture capitalists. ... Read more

Reviews (3)

Very good, but not great
I really enjoyed the book for the most part. There are some great topics discussed. I especially enjoyed the chapter on nonprofit/corporation alliances. The downside: I thought the two chapters regarding Boards were lacking. Overall, it's definately worth checking out.

To much money for the lack of versatility
The book is great. But, the E-book has a lot of inconveniences comparing vs. a regular book, such as:

1.- You are unable to print the file (Make a hard copy) 2.- You only can read it from the equipment you downloaded (If there is a way to use it in others, it's very hard to find Believe me !) 3.- You must read it only at the monitor 4.- If you don't like it. (At this time) you can't return the item. (Amazon Policies). 5.- It cost the same as a normal book.

Harvard Business Review on Nonprofits
The book is solid and accurate review of some crucial questions nonprofits are dealing with today. Anybody interested in topics as leadership, financial matters, founding, strategic alliances, entrepreneurship, excellence in performance and establishing trust in the field of the non-profit business, will benefit from reading a particular chapter or the whole book. Different authors, all experts in their fields, with practical axperience participate to a wide focus of the topics in question. What is missing in my opinion is maybe an article dealing with internal marketing - the nonprofits are mostly services and in this field a performance is inevitably linked to people performing the service. ... Read more

Amazon.com

"Metanational" is the term that Jose Santos, Peter Williamson, and YvesL. Doz--management and technology professors at the international INSEADgraduate school of business--coined to describe a new type of globalcorporation. It refers, they explain in From Global to Metanational, to"a company that builds a new kind of competitive advantage by discovering,accessing, mobilizing, and leveraging knowledge from many locations around theworld." And as they unveil and dissect the concept, it becomes apparent that itmay indeed be an apt description for those worldwide enterprises most likely tosucceed in our rapidly changing times. Based on interviews with 36 companiesfrom America, Asia, and Europe (including long-established firms like 3M andToyota and newcomers like Acer and Shiseido), the authors describe innovativeways to efficiently tap into "pockets of technology, market intelligence and ...specialist knowledge scattered around the world," rather than relying solely oninput from a home nation or a few select locales. They explore how trailblazersare identifying this information wherever they find it, parlaying it into newproducts, services and processes, and merging the result with all sales,distribution, and marketing efforts. Anyone involved in multinational businessshould find this both provocative and potentially useful. --HowardRothman ... Read more

Reviews (5)

The new small world
I was delighted to grab a better understanding on global competitiveness and the new productive opportunities provided by the Metanationals.

You don't know about it yet?? God, your business is under great danger...

nothing new here
Just a recap of ideas about globalization. They didn't even coin the term metanational, they probably read Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy (Red Mars, Green Mars, Blue Mars) and stole it from him. Furthermore, the book doesn't even begin to deal with the issue of democracy in global corporations. These so-called "virtual states" are feudal by design, and fundamentally backwards. They may make money for their CEOs and boardmembers, and "stimulate the economy" (which really means helping other CEOs and boards make money), but where does all that money come from? Ultimately globalization just centralizes power and money, putting us back in the dark ages.

Finding knowledge in unlikely places
What does a large company need to concentrate on for sustained success in a globalized world? Doz and his colleagues claim that it is to become metanational and to become good at innovating from a platform of bringing together knowledge from many different parts of the world. Metanationals differ from globalized companies in that they recognise that new ideas, products or directions may originate somewhere other than the corporate centre.

The focus of the authors is on innovation and they argue that this requires that the organization becomes good at :
• identifying where good ideas and special competencies are;
• mobilizing the often scattered capabilities and opportunities (they use the term 'becoming a magnet' for such capabilities); and
• optimising the size and configuration of operations for efficiency, flexibility and financial discipline.

This is a book that makes an important point about success in a globalized world, but presents one factor in success as if it was the whole. As with a number of books, I had an uncomfortable feeling that the content of a very good article was expanded into an only moderately good book.

The core message is important and useful. Organizations that operate on a global scale need to move beyond the extension of a unitary culture into new localities and recognise that new knowledge is found in unlikely places. They need to become excellent at recognising that knowledge, becoming an attractor for it, mobilizing it to provide a superior stream of innovations and operationalizing production, distribution and marketing into diverse markets.

The weakness is that the book is written at a fairly high conceptual level - for all the detailed example - that fails to get to grips with how to manage multiple cultures or the detail of innovation, or the issues of governance across countries. It also has surprisingly little on the major changes that are occurring in world consumer markets.

The book also falls into the 'one size fits all' trap. Issues of being effective globally are very different for a consumer fashion business, a high tech product or service industry and a major commodity business, but this is not recognised explicitly in the book.

Must reading for international business
This is one of the most refreshing books about managing multinationals that I have read. It goes one step beyond the idea of a transnational, proposing a new model of how a company can succeed by prospecting the world for new knowledge about technologies and customer behaviour and using this to innovate. It won't be easy to implement, but the last three chapters provide a good starting point about how to make it happen. I was convinced that if we didn't try and build a metanational we would simply be left behind.

Nostalgia for Globalization
The first two chapters tell you the picture and that is it. The kernel is summarized in a table at page 83 (end of chapter 3). Make a copy of this page, file it for later reference, and you are done. At best, this book reviews the vaunted wisdom of globalization, which many companies have been living at and dealing for years. At worst, it recites the squabbles between the global platform (the standardization) and regional initiatives (the deviations and the sensing ends). No specific solution or action is advised for the first & most obvious problem - how to transcend the intracompany transaction, which more than often bogs down companies attempting to quickly profit from the global learning. ... Read more

Book Description

THE HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW PAPERBACK SERIES is designed to bring today's managers and professionals the fundamental information they need to stay competitive in a fast-moving world.Here are the landmark ideas that have established the Harvard Business Review as required reading for ambitious business people in organizations around the globe.

Harvard Business Review on Managing Uncertainty presents leading-edge ideas to help managers make strategic decisions in an increasingly uncertain world.Includes the landmark piece "Competing for the Future" by Gary Hamel and C.K. Prahalad. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

An useful survey on strategies under uncertainty
Why shoudn't we read the original books on the subject, the uncertainty ? If we are managers under pressure and without sufficient time, a similar collection is really useful. Of course, some auctors should be considered in total(Hamel & Prahalad), but this book offers a good insight on the matter. And some explications about companies strategies (competition based on the innovation rythm, for instance, in the last article) ... Read more

Amazon.com

There was a time, not too long ago, when employees were encouraged to check their emotions at the corporate door. The workplace was considered a strictly professional environment, in which personal emotions had no place. Management theorists finally woke up to the realization that this practice didn't, in the long run, actually benefit the company. In Peak Performance, Jon Katzenbach expands on this realization. He asserts that today's companies will get the best work from their employees and beat the competition only when they actively seek out, cultivate, and sustain the energy generated by their employees' emotional commitment to work.

Though many companies pay lip service to the notion of employee fulfillment, most do not actually focus critical attention on this vital component of corporate success. Those that do, Katzenbach contends, consistently attain higher levels of workforce performance than their competitors. While these companies share some characteristics in their employee management ideals, they do not follow identical methods of achieving and sustaining the emotional commitment of their employees. In the course of conducting extensive research into the high-performing workforces of more than 20 companies, Katzenbach has identified five distinct paths that, he believes, achieve a balance between enterprise performance and employee fulfillment: Mission, Values, and Pride; Process and Metrics; Entrepreneurial Spirit; Individual Achievement; and Recognition and Celebration.

To define the leadership philosophy and illustrate the defining characteristics of each path, Katzenbach uses case studies and extensive interviews with the employees of such enterprises as The Home Depot, Southwest Airlines, the U.S. Marine Corps, Avon, the Silicon Valley underwriter Hambrecht & Quist, McKinsey & Co., and Marriott International. He explores the different ways of aligning the workforce energy that is generated and demonstrates the necessity of enforcing disciplined behavior. The result is a book of evidence for company leaders interested in getting the best and the most from their workforce; it is not an altruistic plug in support of the happy worker but rather a pragmatic exposition of the best conditions for achieving peak performance. --S. Ketchum ... Read more

Reviews (3)

Achieving and Then Sustaining an Emotional Balance
In the Preface, Katzenbach explains that "The central topic of this book -- energized workforces that deliver higher (peak) performance -- can be defined as any group of employees whose emotional commitment enables them to make or deliver products or services that constitute a sustainable competitive advantage for their employer. By peak performance [italics] we mean the norm, better than expected, better than the competition, and better than similar workforces in other places." These clarifications are important, especially the reference to "sustainable", because Katzenbach is not talking about the "hot groups" which Lipmen-Blumen and Leavitt analyze nor the types of groups which Bennis examines in Organizing Genius [italics].

In Chapter 1, Katzenbach suggests four criteria by which to identify "higher-performing workforces. They are: More than one-third of the workers consistently exceed the expectations of their leaders and customers, the average worker outperforms the average competitive worker, a strong emotional commitment to higher standards and aspirations is manifest throughout the entire workforce, and finally, the collective performance of that workforce or of critical segments (typically at the front line) creates the core of the organization's competitive advantage...and is extremely difficult to copy.

Katzenbach organizes his material within three Parts: Maintaining the Critical Balance, Exploring the Five Balanced Paths [Mission, Values, and Pride; Process and Metrics; Entrepreneurial Spirit; Individual Achivement; and Recognition and Celebration], and Applying the Lessons Learned. He then provides an Appendix in which he skillfully summarizes key points about 27 "Participant Companies and Organizations" and "Outside-In Cases" which include The Home Depot, McKinsey & Company, NASA, Southwest Airlines, Toyota, the U.S. Marine Corps, and the U.S. Navy Seals.

It would be a mistake to assume, however, that Katzenbach has only larger organizations in mind. On the contrary. If anything, the "critical balance" between enterprise performance and employee fulfillment is even more important in small-to-midsize organizations than it is in organizations such as those previously listed because, in a smaller organization, an individual worker can have greater impact...be it positive or negative. For Katzenbach, having an appropriate "critical balance" will enable any organization to "stay the course and successfully climb" any "mountain" it may encounter because it has "an emotionally committed, peak-performance workforce."

Characteristics of the Five Balanced Paths
"This book is concerned with energizing people for performance and the different successful paths to that end". Jon R. Katzenbach writes, "It describes how each path concentrates management attention on worker fulfillment to harness the emotions of many people in sustaining a higher-performing workforce. This is a different challenge than simply motivating people to meet demanding financial performance objectives. The latter is what most companies do, and it implies setting unambiguous goals, establishing clear measures, and holding people individually accountable for results (consequence management). Logical, rational motivation is certainly a good thing, but it is no match for engaged, emotional commitment...Energizing people for performance elevates the game significantly, to the point that many employees go well beyond leaders' expectations, individual accountabilities, financial resuts, and short-term market objectives. This book describes how to unleash the full individual and collectve potential of people to achieve and sustain higher levels of performance than the workers themselves thought possible, than management or customers expected, and than competitors can realistically achieve. Unleashing the full potential of people is undeniably a tall order; few institutions have managed to do it consistently. This book explores the approaches of those who apparently have gone far beyond any conventional notions of managing solely to meet ambitious financial objectives. It looks at how such institutions tap into worker fulfillment to develop the extra quotient of emotional commitment that deeply energizes many people to perform well beyond conventional norms".

In this context, Jon R. Katzenbach introduces five paths (balanced paths) that explain all the higher-performing workforce situations. As argued by Katzenbach, "each path constitutes a clearly different approach for energizing a workforce for higher performance. Certainly, there are overlaps and similarities among the paths, but the primary focus and value proposition of each is quite distinct". Hence, throughout this invaluable study, he explores these five paths as the overarching concept or framework for this book. And he defines (1) top management philosophy, and (2) characteristics of the five balanced paths as follows:

I- Mission, Values, and Pride:

(1). Employees will feel truly proud of what this enterprise stands for, what their specific work group can accomplish, and what they can contribute, both collectively and individually; their pride will be continually reinforced with external and internal recognition.

(2). a. Noble purpose

b. Rich history

c. Strong values

d. Group cohesion

II- Process and Metrics:

(1). Employees who consistently meet and exceed their metrics and adhere to the critical process requirements will be recognized and respected by their peers and conspicuously recognized and rewarded by management.

(2). a. Clear measures and standards

b. Focused processes

c. Performance transparency

d. Collaborative and collective effort

III- Entrepreneurial Spirit:

(1). Employees will be rewarded directly in proportion to what they create and the personal risk they incur; those rewards have virtually unlimited upside financial and ownership potential.

(2). a. High earning opportunity

b. Strong ownership interests

c. Personel risk

IV- Individual Achievement:

(1). Employees will be recognized and rewarded directly in proportion to their personal accomplishments. They will be paid and advanced based on those contributions, and they will work alongside talented individuals in the field.

(2). a. Lots of opportunity

b. Individuals given freedom to act

c. Focus on individual performance

d. Performance-based advancement

e. Healty competitiveness

V- Recognition and Celebration:

(1). Employees will be recognized, rewarded, and celebrated in dozens of ways-by supervisors and colleagues as well as top management-for their collective and individual contributions. As a result, they will work in an environment alive with enthusiasm, excitement, and fun and wherein formal compensation is of secondary importance.

(2). a. Widespread recognition/reward

b. Lots of specific events

c. Visible high energy

d. Social interaction and fun

Strongly recommended.

Another Hit From Jon Katzenbach
Using exciting companies such as The Home Depot, Southwest Airlines and Marriott, Dr. Katzenbach weaves a strong case balancing care of the workforce with top-notch organizational performance. His formula includes a number of possible tracks to follow. Any one, or a combination of the alternatives, can surely add value to your organization.

The book is a primer for line leaders and human resource executives showing how companies can have their cake and eat it to. He builds a powerful argument suggesting that strong companies can be built on a compelling story that satisfies both the workforce and the bottom line.

I strongly recommend this book to those seeking the "secret sauce" of workforce alignment. It is clearly another Jon Katzenbach winner! ... Read more

Book Description

The Harvard Business Review Paperback Series is designed to bring today's managers and professionals the fundamental information they need to stay competitive in a fast-moving world. From the preeminent thinkers whose work has defined an entire field to the rising stars who will redefine the way we think about business, here are the leading minds and landmark ideas that have established the Harvard Business Review as required reading for ambitious businesspeople in organizations around the globe.

This dynamic collection of articles features the latest theories on change management and real-world stories of successful turnaround efforts. With compelling first person stories about successful turnarounds, readers will learn how to address their own organizations' needs from such diverse figures as Rich Teerlink, Gary Hamel, and Bill Parcells. ... Read more

Book Description

The Harvard Business Review Paperback Series brings managers and professionals the fundamental information they need to stay competitive in a fast-moving world. Gathered in a highly accessible format are the leading minds and landmark ideas that have established the Harvard Business Review as required reading for forward-thinking businesspeople worldwide.

In the rapidly changing world of business, close calls and near misses are not uncommon. Obtaining the managerial skills and tools to effectively manage or avoid these crises is critical to the survival and success of your organization. Harvard Business Review on Crisis Management highlights leading ideas on how to deal with difficult situations, crises, and other sensitive topics in a business environment. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Excellent!
Great book. Good case studies. Solid crisis management examples

A useful tool
Acquiring required skills and tools to effectively manage or mitigate crises is essential to the success of modern organizations. 'Harvard Business Review on Crisis Management' is a collection eight essays presenting new ideas and concepts on how to manage, mitigate crises and other related key issues in a rapidly changing business environment.

Some of the essays in this collection are written by leading management consultants and CEOs. Topics covered include; 'strategic approaches to product recalls', 'leadership', 'what happens when an executive defects' and how companies can develop better media policies and plans as part of crisis management and preparedness.

My favorite is Norman R Augustine's essay titled 'Managing the Crisis You Tried to Prevent'. In this well researched essay, Augustine describes six stages of a crisis drawing lessons from several well-known crises. The important issue emerging is that "almost every crisis contains within itself' the seeds of failures as well as the "roots of failure." Drawing quotations from Shakespeare and Oscar Wilde, the author provides very useful insights into understanding, managing and preventing a crisis.

This book is a useful tool for executives and managers who need to upgrade their knowledge or gain access to leading experts on topics related to crisis management. ... Read more

Book Description

In the midst of a changing economy, most executives continue to use a strategy toolkit designed for yesterday's more stable marketplace. As a result, strategies emerge that neither manage the risks nor take advantage of the opportunities that arise in highly uncertain times.

Now, McKinsey & Company consultant Hugh Courtney argues that managers must move beyond the outdated "all-or-nothing" view of strategy in which future events are either certain or uncertain. Instead, he suggests a simple-yet powerful-alternative: Understand the level of uncertainty you are facing in a given situation, and you will make better, more informed strategic choices.

Based on an international review of the key strategy problems faced by over one hundred leading companies, Courtney reveals how executives can develop 20/20 foresight-a view of the future that separates what can be known from what can't.While executives with 20/20 foresight can rarely develop perfect forecasts of the future, says Courtney, they can isolate the "residual uncertainty" they face and use this insight to create competitive advantage in today's turbulent markets.

Unveiling a revolutionary framework for diagnosing to which of the four levels of residual uncertainty a specific strategy choice corresponds, 20/20 Foresight shows how readers can leverage this knowledge to answer three key strategic questions: 1) Shape or adapt to uncertainty? 2) Make strategic commitments now or later? and 3) Follow a focused or diversified strategy?

20/20 Foresight also:

* shows strategists how to tailor every aspect of the decision-making process-from formulation to implementation-to the level of uncertainty faced,
* describes the strategic-planning processes readers can use to monitor, update, and revise strategies as necessary in volatile markets, and
* includes a toolkit for identifying, developing, and testing new strategy options-complete with guidelines for applying the right tool to the right situation at the right time.

A comprehensive approach to strategy development under all possible levels of uncertainty and across all kinds of industries, this is the essential guide for making tough strategic choices in a changing world. ... Read more

Reviews (11)

Measuring Degrees of Probability Amidst Uncertainty
Courtney and his McKinsey associates decided to launch within their firm the Strategy Theory Initiative (STI), a multi-year research effort whose objective was to identify, develop, and disseminate what they learned about a "better approach" to the immensely challenging complicated design/implementation process. (While reading the Preface to this book, I was reminded of one version of a Hebrew aphorism, "Man plans and then God howls with laughter.") The material is carefully organized within seven chapters. In the first, Courtney shares what he and his research associates learned about crafting strategy in an uncertain world; in the next chapter, we are introduced to what are called "The Four Levels of Residual Uncertainty." (All by itself, this chapter is well worth far more than the cost of the book.) Then on to address five separate but related questions:

• Should we shape or adapt?

• Should we begin the process now or later?

• Should we focus or diversify?

• Which new tools and frameworks are needed?

• Which new strategic-planning and decision-making processes are needed?

Of course, Courtney fully realizes that the revelations of the STI research can only guide and inform appropriate answers to questions such as these. He agrees with Mike Hammer that searching for a "silver bullet" is a fool's errand, noting that "there [is] no easy one-size-fits-all solution that could be translated from theory into practice. Business strategists needed new theory [and, in italics] new practices if they wanted to make better strategy choices."

At the height of the Cold War, I recall someone noting that Russian historians could predict the past with absolute certainty. This book's title does not suggest that if you read this book, you can see the future. ("Man plans and then God laughs.") Rather, instead of burying uncertainties in meaningless base case forecasts or avoiding rigorous analysis of uncertainties altogether, Courtney suggests that we "embrace uncertainty, explore it,, slice it, dice it, get to know it." If we do this well? "[You] will reach a wonderful goal: 20/20 foresight." The best available information serves as the basis of the most reliable forecasts which, in turn, improve the chances of devising the soundest strategies.

After summarizing the appropriate toolkit for each level of residual uncertainty (see figures 6-1 through 6-4), and having also suggested various tools and frameworks needed to develop 20/20 foresight, Courtney offers five additional tools in the Appendix: The Uncertainty Toolkit. He briefly but brilliantly explains how to use scenario planning, game theory, decision analysis, system dynamics models, and management "flight simulators." Although this book will obviously be of substantial value to senior-level executives in larger organizations, I think it will be invaluable to others such as CEOs and other decision-makers in small companies. The challenge for all of them is to "tailor strategy to the level of uncertainty," whatever the nature and extent of their competitive marketplace may be. Here in a single volume is about all they need to begin the process. Another thought: This book would be an excellent choice as the basis of a one-day or (preferably) two-day offsite executive "retreat" for strategic planning. Reading it in advance would be required. The first two chapters would be excellent for assisting situation analysis, then on to the next five chapters which could serve as the core of the agenda. (I also recommend that Hammer's The Agenda be consulted, at least by the person who leads the group discussion. And, by the way, that person should NOT be the CEO.) The session would conclude with a review of the consensus achieved, followed by a discussion of how to communicate and collaborate effectively while using various tools, including the five recommended in the Appendix.

Courtney would be the first to point out that, over time, other sources of information and guidance may become necessary. For that reason, he includes clusters of annotated "Recommended Readings" to assist his reader's selection process. Thoughtfully, he adds to their number with other suggestions within his extensive notes.

For at least some individual executives and some organizations, this may well prove to be for them the most valuable business book published during the first decade of the 21st century.

To those who share my high regard for it, I specifically want to recommend (again) Hammer's book as well as Jim O'Toole's Leading Change, Jason Jennings' Less Is More: How Great Companies Use Productivity As a Competitive Advantage, Peter Schwartz' The Art of the Long View: Paths to Strategic Insight for Yourself and Your Company, and finally, Carla O'Dell's If Only We Knew What We Know: The Transfer of Internal Knowledge and Best Practice.

Concise Tools & Framework Guideline
The book provides a concise guideline on business strategy tools & framework, based on 4 levels of 'residual uncertainty'. Courtney repeatedly mentioned the non-dynamic nature of Michael Porter's competitive strategy framework, thus the need of utilizing various 'new' tools (such as Real-Option, Simulation). I find that Porter's work on competitive advantage, value chain, clusters, do incorporate the 'dynamic nature' of the present business world. What Courtney nicely provides is a systematic way to select the relevant 'tool' in the business decision process. But a through understanding and analysis based on 'classic' strategy framework (such as Porter's) is critical in order to achieve business success.

Nothing impressive
The book provides no exciting findings for strategic decision makers. The only idea this book has is to distinguish uncertainties into four levels and it uses this four-level frame in its following discussions. And even the four-level classification is cliche. You can skip contents after chapter 3 without regretting anything.

Nothing impressive
This book provides bascially no new ideas for strategic decision makers. The only idea it has is to distinguish uncertainties into four levels and this book uses the four-level frame in all its following discussions. If you want to read it, maybe you can stop before chapter three and you won't miss any precious insight by skipping the rest of it.

Impressive, systematic approach to handling uncertainty
This book may be one of the most interesting pieces of work to come out of McKinsey. Hugh Courtney recognizes that traditional strategy approaches do not work well in conditions of significant uncertainty. Traditional tools such as Porter's Five Forces, market research, SWOT analysis, and NPV valuation models work only in "level 1 uncertainty". Courtney rightly critiques those who see uncertainty in binary terms, instead outlining four levels of uncertainty each of which require different strategic approaches. Level 2 uncertainty (several distinct possible futures), in addition to the traditional tools, can be tackled with scenario planning, game theory, and decision-tree real-options valuation (ROV) techniques. Companies dealing with level 3 uncertainty face a range of futures and need to use additional tools such as system dynamics models in addition to those of level 2. Companies facing confusing level 4 uncertainty, where there is true ambiguity, can use analogies and reference cases and "management flight simulators" to help make sense of deep uncertainty. In a sharp break with the usual approach, the growing number of companies facing level 4 uncertainty need to think backwards from hypothetical futures to what you would have to believe about the future to support a particular strategy. In addition to the levels of uncertainty framework, Courtney outlines the alternatives of "shape or adapt" to uncertainty, make strategic commitments now or later, and follow a focused or a diversified strategy. The details of this book may be familiar in many ways, but the overall framework potentially could be highly enlightening for planners who want to use the right tools for the job. ... Read more

Amazon.com

Building relationships with customers has been a buzz phrase in many business circles for years. Now John Hagel and Arthur Armstrong declare that's not enough. They make a strong case that business success in the very near future will depend on using the Internet to build not just relationships, but communities. The payoff, they maintain, will be phenomenal customer loyalty and high profits. But, they warn, this race will definitely go to the swift. Here's a cyberspace book that could make your business future. Not everyone agrees with Hagel and Armstrong, but with stakes so high they deserves a serious reading. ... Read more

Reviews (60)

A forerunner on how to create profitable on-line communities
Notwithstanding the many new books on on-line communities, I still keep this book on my bookshelf as a useful reminder of the conceptual framework around which many new businesses - failed or otherwise - were subseqently developed.

It has been nearly six years since I attended a seminar organized by the consulting company McKinsey at which the two authors (both McKinsey consultants)presented their book and what seemed, at that time, to be its somewhat radical proposition about profitably developing self-organizing on-line communities around the passionate interests of their memberships.

As I become more familiar with Amazon and how it is organizing the community through which you are reading this and other reviews, I am reminded about the fundamental concepts that Hagel and Armstrong laid out in their book regarding the economics of virtual communities. Amazon attracts member-generated content which is a key part of its business model which uses the passionate interests of its own customer base to increase its business value. Many doubted the vailidity of this proposition when this book came out, but the evidence does appear to increasingly support it.

Arguably, many might now say that this book is dated, on-line businesses having mushroomed and failed since this book appeared, yielding new lessons that this book could not have foreseen. Many of its claims now seem overhyped.

While this and other criticims may all be well and true, I suspect that this book will come to be regarded in future business histories of the on-line business as one of the seminal pieces of strategic business thinking in the late 1990s. I shall keep it for posterity, if not profitability. In any case, there must now be enough second-hand copies for you not to have to make the investment at the full original cost!

Worth the time reading with practical application
According to Hagel and Armstrong, virtual communities that combine content and communication can expand market opportunities, and those who form these online communities will experience commercial success. Throughout the book, the authors stressed that those organizations who wait will lose out. However, the emphasis of the book is not about making money; rather it's about forming communities, collecting information on members' preferences, interests, etc., and using that information to meet their needs.

In my opinion, two of the most useful components of the book are a listing of personnel required for the implementation and maintenance of an online community, and steps needed to help managers get started in organizing a virtual community. The book is certainly worth reading, whether you are developing websites for business, education, recreation, etc. Hagel and Armstrong present valid reasons and practical suggestions for developing online communities that will help members connect, as well as seek and find.

Virtual Communities = Real Prosperity
Hagel has co-authored two especially important books (with Arthur G. Armstrong III and Marc Singer, respectively), the other being Net Worth "which builds on a number of the themes originally developed" in this volume. As Hagel and Armstrong point out, Net.Gain "systematically [analyzes] the economic drivers for value creation that exist on networks. It [uses] one particular business model -- the virtual community -- to illustrate the unique capabilities of digital networks and how these might be harnessed to create a substantial business with very attractive economics." The material is carefully organized within three Parts: The Real Value of Virtual Communities, Building a Virtual Community, and Positioning to Win the Broader Game. Hagel and Armstrong also provide a "Management Agenda", followed by excellent suggestions for further reading.

In the Preface, Hagel and Armstrong acknowledge three inevitable limitations in writing Net.Gain: "The first arises from the profound uncertainties associated with evolving electronic networks and the myriad business models emerging in the primordial brew known as cycberspace....Second, the need to be concise has led us to make some generalizations about the likely evolution of virtual communities and the key principles for success....Third, we do not expect virtual communities to be the only 'form of life' on public networks. Indeed, many other commercial and non-commercial formats (including dictionaries, market spaces, 'web'zines,' corporate sites and game areas) will thrive on these networks as well." Working within these limitations, Hagel and Armstrong succeed admirably when describing the power and potential of the virtual community concept. Also, when explaining (a) how to target the kind of community to start-up; (b) the principles of a successful entry strategy, emphasizing the need to generate, engage, and lock in traffic over time; (c) characteristics of community organizations; and (d) criteria by which to select the right technology. Then in Part Three, Hagel and Armstrong shift their attention to explaining the fundamental ways in which the emergence and spread of virtual communities will alter traditional business.

My strong recommendation is that this book be read first, then Net Worth. My further recommendation is that both books be used to formulate the agenda for a workshop or what is generally referred to as an "executive retreat" (preferably for two days and located offsite) with all participants required to read both books in advance. In their Epilogue, Hagel and Armstrong suggest that "the most radical potential impact of the virtual community may well be its impact on the way individuals manage their lives and companies manage themselves. Communities will serve to connect, much like the postage system and telephone before them. But they will go several steps further than the telephone or fax, as they help the individual to seek out and find. Souls in search of relationship, colleagues in search of teamwork,, customers in search of products, suppliers in search of markets: the virtual community might have a place for them after all." Those who share my high regard for Hagel's two books (co-authored with Armstrong and Singer, respectively) are urged to check out Peter Senge's The Fifth Discipline as well as O'Dell and Grayson's If Only We Knew What We Know. Both can also help with the planning and implementing of the off-site workshop recommended earlier.

Good Ideas that can hold in 10 pages
Excellent ideas on Internet marketing and business strategies but did not need to write a book, ten pages would have been enough. Read a well condensed summary is less time consuming for the same amount of great information provided by the author.

Straight Line Depreciation, from Five Stars to Two.
This book was probably five stars when it was published - in 1997. However, too much has changed since then, obviously through no fault of the authors. I knew I was in trouble when the authors raved about Motley Fool and asked "can online trading be far behind?" Save your money. ... Read more

Book Description

American companies may tout their equal opportunity initiatives, but with 95% of all executive-level positions in the US held by white males, most of these programs clearly fall far short of their goals when it comes to diversifying upper management.Yet, even in the face of such overwhelming odds, some minority executives do break through to the highest leadership ranks.What can we learn from these success stories?In one of the first in-depth studies to focus on minorities who have made it to the top, Breaking Through examines the crucial connection between corporate culture and the advancement of people of color.The often surprising conclusions drawn by authors Thomas and Gabarro represent important milestones both for the study of organizational practice and for minorities planning their own course of professional achievement.

Breaking Through profiles minority executives at three different firms who encountered-and conquered-barriers throughout their careers.It then contrasts their successes with the experiences of white executives who've reached upper management, and with white and minority middle managers coming to grips with stalled careers at the same companies.From the compelling stories a distinct pattern emerges in the way minorities advance.The message is clear and startling: the path that leads minorities to the top is fundamentally different than the route followed by their white peers.Here are the determining factors--both individual and organizational--that correspond to the advancement of minority executives to the highest levels.

Breaking Through is an unflinching look at the very real obstacles that await minorities in a workforce whose leadership is still predominantly white.Pathways to success do exist for minorities, say Thomas and Gabarro, and breakthroughs can happen-if individuals and organizations understand the roles they play in creating the opportunities that enable minority executives to reach the top. ... Read more

Reviews (4)

This is destined to be a classic management text
This is destined to become one of the classic management texts. I found the authors treatement of the subject matter to be insightful and well thought out. This is a must for any person of color who is wondering why it's taking them so long to move into the executive level. As a trainer I will be using this as one of my texts, and I plan on sending a number of copies to my friends.

Enjoyed it
I just finished reading Breaking Through and learned quite a bit. Recommend it to you. I wish the subject of leadership, and how to properly use it to get results on the job, was addressed more. I recommend you also get a copy of another book that addresses this issue and is very applicable to the subject of minorities as leaders: "The Leader's Guide: 15 Essential Skills." It's at Amazon too.

A Must Read!
Breaking Through is a multifaceted book that speaks to a spectrum of audiences: the business leader committed to creating a diverse workplace; the human resource professional charged with designing and implementing diversity initiatives; the minority professional aspiring to break through.

This book sheds light on the complex career dynamics presented to minority professionals in corporate America. As an aspiring minority professional, I took away valuable strategies, as well as pitfalls, for achieving my career goals.

The book is a balance of compelling empirical evidence and real-life examples. The depth of analysis makes for an engaging and enlightening reading experience.

Breaking Through will serve as a personal professional reference guide and I am sure that it will become an invaluable resource throughout my career.

This book is wonderful
Few books have the ability to relate the importance of the information contained within to both professional and layman alike. That is, however, exactly what this book accomplishes. It shows you the how the achievements of minorities trying to attain status at the corporate level are linked to career decisions and mentoring relationships. This is accomplished by examining the characteristics of several minority executives at different companies who have managed to break through the glass ceiling. It also teaches several approaches for acheiving racial diversity throughout a company. It examines three large corporations who have accomplished this feat, by tracing their diversity efforts throughout the past few decades. This book is a must read for anyone interested in the processes by which businesses accomplish diversification throughout all levels of the company. ... Read more

Amazon.com

Philip Evans and Thomas S. Wurster think that the Internet can blow away practically any business, and in Blown to Bits, they examine how the new economy is "deconstructing" industries such as newspapers, auto retailing, and banking while creating new opportunities for others. They write that the "glue that holds today's value chains and supply chains together" is melting, and that even "the most stable of industries, the most focused of business models and the strongest of brands can be blown to bits by new information technology."

Evans and Wurster, both executives of the Boston Consulting Group, argue that the Internet demands new business strategies because it provides companies tremendous "reach" for customers without sacrificing "richness," or the quality of the information about products and services. The book shows how some businesses--Microsoft and Intuit in personal finance, Dell Computer in retailing, and the Automotive Network Exchange in manufacturing supply--are thriving amid a rapid expansion of connectivity and the widespread acceptance of new technical standards on the World Wide Web. Clearly written and tough-minded, Blown to Bits is required reading for business leaders, entrepreneurs, strategists, and others concerned about the new economics of the information age. --Dan Ring ... Read more

Reviews (64)

Good discussion of eCommerce Dynamics
Blown to bits provides a good review of the fundamental issue in eCommerce, what are you going to be when you go virtual. The premise, that you compete on reach or richeness, provides a way of distinguishing the various paths through eC as well as the impact of eCommerce on business models and market structures. Overall, the book is worth the read, however, the authors rely too heavily on the richness/reach framework so it shows some wear-n-tear latter on in the book. This is a strategy/economics type work, so if you are looking for implementation guidance this is not the book for you. If you are looking for something that will help explain what eCommerce may be doing to your company and markets its as good as anything out there and better than most.

Interesting Insight into the New Economics of Information
Richness or reach? The trade-off used to be simple but absolute: your business strategy either could be focus on "rich" information-customized products and services tailored to a niche audience-or could reach out to a larger market, but with watered-down information that sacrificed richness in favour of a broad, general appeal. Much of business strategy as we know it today rests on this fundamental dilemma.

Now, say Evans and Wurster, the new economics of information is eliminating the trade off between richness and reach, blowing apart the foundations of traditional business strategy. Blown to Bits reveals how the spread of connectivity and common standards is redefining the information channels that link businesses with their customers, suppliers, and employees. Increasingly, your customers will have rich access to a universe of alternatives, your suppliers will exploit direct access to your customers, and your competitors will pick off the most profitable parts of your value chain. Your competitive advantage is up for grabs.

To prepare corporate executives and entrepreneurs alike for a fundamental change in business competition, Evans and Wurster expand and illuminate groundbreaking concepts first explored in their award-winning Harvard Business Review article "Strategy and the New Economics of Information", and present a practical guide for applying them.

Examples span the spectrum of industries-from financial services to health care, from consumer to industrial goods, and from media to retailing. Blown to Bits shows how to build new strategies that reflect a world in which richness and reach go hand in hand and how to make the most of the new forces shaping competitive advantage.

Philip Evans is a Senior Vice President of The Boston Consulting Group. Thomas S. Wurster is a Vice President of The Boston Consulting Group in Los Angeles. The authors are co-leaders of The Boston Consulting Group's Media and Convergence Practice.

Reviewed by Azlan Adnan. Formerly Business Development Manager with KPMG, Azlan is currently Managing Partner of Azlan & Koh Knowledge and Professional Management Group, an education and management consulting practice based in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysian Borneo. He holds a Master's degree in International Business and Management from the Westminster Business School in London.

Internet Hype
The authors must be embarrassed. But they are probably too busy on their next bogus book full of more mananagement consulting buzzspeak and claptrap.
"Blown to Bits"?--perhaps they were referring to the bursting of the Internet bubble??

Blown to Bits
BLOWN TO BITS
How the new Economics of Information transforms Strategy
Authored by Philip Evans & Thomas S. Wurster

By Mike Jones
Management Information Systems
05/27/03

This book is about how the new age of technology dealing with the way information has changed the business environment forever. It starts out with the example of Encyclopedia Britanica and how they were leaders in their field in the late eighties and early nineties. Though they were very pricey the sales force targeted families with young children and the parents had to have this source of valuable information for their children. Sales were very high and there was no competition for the Encyclopedia icon. Everything was great until the computer age took hold and all of a sudden you could get that same information on a little round disk known as a CD-ROM for a fraction of the cost. That disk was even being given away with the purchase of a microcomputer that people could use for other things as well. This goes to show us that even the strongest business can be blind sided when they least expect it. Moral to be learned here is that "even the most venerable can be the most vulnerable".
All businesses are information businesses and the information is the main glue that holds any business together. The business of information is different than the business of things. When something is sold, the seller no longer owns it but when a piece of information is sold, the seller still has access to that information and can sell it again. Although the two are different they are still very much linked together as all things consist of some kind of information.
One of the most fundamental issues of the information business in the beginning was the dilemma of Richness and Reach. It was nearly impossible to have both Richness and Reach in information but the rise of the computer industry and the Internet has changed that forever. There are six aspects that come into play when talking about Richness of information and they are Bandwidth, interactivity, reliability, security, currency and the degree to which the information can be customized. This has all changed with the computer. This change is melting the informational glue, as we know it. It "deconstructs" value chains, supply chains, franchises and organizations. The definition of deconstruction is the reformulation of traditional business structures. The newspaper industry and retail banking is just a couple of businesses that have been deconstructed. You used to have to go to the bank to do your banking and newspapers were either delivered or you had to go get them. Now both can be done via the personal computer at nearly no cost and in a fraction of the time. Deconstruction does a lot of damage at first and hits where a company can least afford it and if a company is willing to accept the change it can make it through tough times.
Intermediaries exist because of the trade off between richness and reach. The deconstruction of the old intermediaries is known as disinter mediation and the creation of the new intermediaries is known as navigation. Disinter mediation used to be about substituting reach for richness but now it is about transforming them both. This will happen where a company can least afford it. The new navigators compete against each other on richness, reach and affiliation. The key is reach but reach is clutter without navigation. We need navigation to find what we want. Navigators are not consumer oriented even though consumers use them. They are supplier oriented because the supplier needs to get their product to the consumer. Reach has developed faster than navigation but we are slowly catching up.
Navigators affiliate mostly with suppliers but are starting to lean toward affiliating themselves with the consumer. This is surprising that this is only happening now and hasn't happened in the past. Navigation is worth more than the supplier business due to the need for navigation because without navigation the products and services would not get to the consumer.
Adding richness is the most powerful way to put off deconstruction due to the fact that if your giving people what they want you will stay in business. You need to be giving them something they don't already have which makes the consumer your biggest competitor. Richness goes up as reach increases. As richness and reach escalate so does the competitive advantage and intensity at all levels of the supply chain.
In closing I would like to say one thing and that is business has changed forever with the desktop workstations and microcomputers and the Internet. People are touching out to one another unlike they have ever done before. Networks are connected to networks all over the world. A message can get across the globe with the touch of a keyboard. Business is ever changing and will continue to change for a long time to come. We will either keep up and make the changes necessary or we will be left behind and fail. As it said in the book "The winner is not the player who understands the endgame. There is no endgame. The winner is the player who sees just one or two moves further ahead than the competitors".

How information economy is going to blow your business?
It is common sense to say that industrial age businesses will have to change to enter in the new Information economy, but the reasons to change are not often clearly explained. Philip Evans and Thomas S. Wurster are giving some sound answers in their book: "Blown to Bits".

In fact industrial age businesses are historically built on two compromises: Information bound with things and a trade-off between richness and reach. Information is embedded in things to reach through physical channels the final consumer, who have some difficulties to get complete unbiased information on things he buys. On the other hand, physical constraints and costs are creating a need to find balance between richness (depth and detail of information) and reach (access and connection). A salesman is able to bring richness to chosen customers when advertising is reaching more people with less richness in information. The management of Information non-transparency and asymmetry is often the base for a competitive advantage.

What is happening if Information can travel separately from things and if it is possible to offer richness and reach at a same time? In that case the industrial age compromises are blowing up and competitive advantages based on asymmetric Information are disappearing putting many businesses in danger. This is what is happening with the development of computers networks using common standards to communicate in the Internet world where geography and time constraints are disappearing. Information can be unbundled from things and richness, at zero marginal cost, can be supplied with extended reach. The competition battlefield is moving from profitable cross-linked activities constituting a typical industrial age organization to individual profitable activities: "blown to bits." To compete there is no need to attack on all fronts for destabilizing a traditional company. Just concentrate on the more profitable activities-classified ads for newspapers, best customers for banks-makes it possible to "deconstruct" a business. Offering richness and reach together-deeper information on a larger range of products than retailers-makes it is possible to "desintermediate".

It's real hard time for traditional organizations, which have no other alternative than to "deconstruct" and "desintermediate" themselves their own business, before somebody else is doing it. But this task is not easy against the "navigators" as Yahoo!, Intuit, but also Amazon. These one are helping consumers to find their way in the Internet marketspace. They supply reach, richness and create a link with consumers by affiliation. They concentrate more on consumers' needs than on suppliers' one and have the objective to gain a critical mass giving them an added value. Traditional companies, often too closed to their physical offer, have lower reach than "navigators" and have difficulties to gain affiliation from customers who are suspecting them to promote their own products before liberating an impartial Information. However, they can build on a slight advantage in product richness, when products are changing rapidly.

To really compete, traditional companies need to go out from their own boundaries, and collaborate with their suppliers, but also with their competitors when needed. Supply chains and organizations are "deconstructed" as value chains are. Hierarchically leadership becomes obsolete to give place to a new leadership creating a culture and shaping a strategy, which will be the "glue" for a new corporation, a purposeful community.

"Blown to Bits" gives many other keys as enhancing "brands as experience", creating "new intermediaries" towards a fascinating "New Economy" and I can only recommend to every executive to read this book to make sure to be aboard the train going to our common digital future. ... Read more

Amazon.com's Best of 2001

If you like to keep on top of what's going on in the world but find it difficult to get through more than a section or two of the Sunday New York Times, take heart. Were you to actually plow through the whole thing, even just once, you'd be taking in more factual information than was gathered in all the written material available to a reader in the 15th century. And that's just a Sunday paper; what about all the e-mail, voice mail, meetings, Web pages (2 billion or so of them), and publications (more than 60,000 new books and 18,000 magazines published annually in the U.S. alone) vying for your attention? According to Thomas H. Davenport and John C. Beck, we live in an age of information overload, where attention has become the most valuable business currency.Welcome to The Attention Economy.

If yesterday was the age of information, today is the age of trying to attract or employ people's attention. Indeed, leaders and managers in the business world face this two-fold problem daily, constantly seeking the attention of their customers and employees while managing their own limited supply.Declaring that "understanding and managing attention is now the single most important determinant of business success," the authors examine what attention is, how it can be measured, how it's being technologically constructed and protected, and where and how attention is being most effectively exploited.

Predictably, nowhere are these economics more important than in the realm of e-commerce. In the chapter entitled "Eyeballs and Cyber Malls," the authors discuss the strategies needed to gain and maintain attention "stickiness." The book contains numerous suggestions on how leaders can manage their own attention and that of their employees more effectively (and how to avoid and treat info-stress), but always with an eye on the ultimate goal: affecting the type and amount of attention your customers give you. Already, more money is often spent on attracting attention to a product than spent on the product itself (we're reminded of The Blair Witch Project, which cost a mere $350,000 to make and $11 million to market). And as our information environment gets increasingly saturated, holding a person's attention becomes an ever more difficult proposition; as the authors suggest, actually paying for someone to receive your information is a realistic prospect in the not-too-distant future. Indeed, the book's final chapter is devoted to what the authors predict will affect attention in the future, and how attention can and will be acquired, monitored, and distributed.

The Attention Economy is peppered with anecdotal pull-outs and "overheard" comments; though intriguing in as random factoids and zippy, little quotes, this sideline information doesn't always tie in with the authors' points and often seems distracting. The book is well written, though, and the authors, both of whom work at the Accenture Institute for Strategic Change, take an informed and well-balanced look at what is perhaps our society's most priceless, ephemeral commodity. --S. Ketchum ... Read more

Reviews (21)

Fascinating!
This book is a delightfully interesting combination of academic and general audience writing that makes it quite readable and holds your attention page after page. The content is nicely woven into twelve chapters that explain more aspects of attention, gaining attention, and holding attention than you could imagine. You'll learn a lot from these pages. An abundance of footnotes will give you more resources to pursue to expand your learning even further.

I turned down more pages than usual in this volume. I marked all sorts of things to share with others and to go back to. I even wrote notes on some of the pages, which I don't usually do when reading a book like this. The authors explain that "attention is the real currency of business and individuals...In post-industrial societies, attention has become a more valuable currency than the kind you store in bank accounts."

The official definition: "Attention is focused mental engagement on a particular item of information. Items come into our awareness, we attend to a particular item, and then we decide whether to act." There's more, but I don't want to spoil this delicious read for you. You'll gain valuable insight into the role of attention in all aspects of our lives, how the ability to manage our attention is all-powerful . . . and how we struggle with our own personal challenge of managing the tremendous volume of information and other stimulants that bombard our senses. Part of the attention process is filtering and sorting, which is difficult for some people and can be overwhelming. There is so much in this book that I have no hesitation in giving it very high marks. Have your highlighter ready!

The one negative-if it even is a negative-is the quotes and illustrative comments that appear in smaller type at the bottom of many of the pages. They distracted my attention from the flow of the text, making the book consciously a bit more difficult to read. Ah! The authors have made their point! Recommended for people in all walks of life; this is a book about us, not just an economy or business treatise.

Good Summary of Latest Research and Measurement Model
Professor Thomas H. Davenport is well known for his superb summaries of best practices in knowledge management. In The Attention Economy, he and co-author, Professor John C. Beck, outline the work that others are doing in measuring how attention is gained, and provide a prototype measurement device for attention. The book modestly advances our knowledge of this subject. The book's weakness is that it misdefines the key issue, which should be "What Should We Be Paying Attention to in Business?"

The authors feel that the most pressing problem today is "not enough attention to meet the information demands of business and society." They argue that everything except human attention is plentiful and cheap. They think of attention as "human bandwidth." As a result, they suggest that like all scarce resources, attention is a "currency." In support of these observations, the authors note that 71 percent of white collar workers feel "info stress." They also argue that companies have "organizational ADD."

The most interesting part of the book is the proposed measurement model. There are three continuums involved: one is from aversive to attractive, a second is from captive to voluntary, and a third is from front-of-mind to back-of-mind. The authors provide some examples of how to use this as a measurement tool, and prescribe some potential solutions for what they find in the examples. I thought that the weakness of this approach is that without experimental experience and testing, one will probably be wrong in prescribing from a new measurement tool. In that sense, the writing here exceeds the scope of the research the authors have done. However, I am glad they are sharing their prototype.

Of existing research, you will get a quick look at psychobiology, the impact of technology on solving or making the problem worse, lessons from advertising, Web issues (especially e-mail, which they mention incessantly), leadership effects, strategy effects, and organizational structure as it affects attention.

Basically, their argument is that less is more in most situations. Their goal is to create a world where technology enhances attention, you have control over sending and receiving information, you can escape information, and institutions (like companies and schools) make information more relevant for you. In so doing, they would like to see information providers focus on quality, not quantity.

"In the end, the greatest prize for being able to capture attention will be the freedom to avoid it."

Being familiar with the literature in this area, I found only the measurement model to be new. If you have read widely, you can focus on just that part of the book.

My own sense is that measuring attention is less important than measuring what people use information for. Are they working on the right things, with the right people and tools, and in the best possible way? I also suspect that attention does need to be somewhat open. You do not know what you do not know, nor do I. Openness is clearly valuable to creativity and innovation. Hopefully, it will remain so.

I was also struck that not enough attention was paid to giving people more tools for handling information that would already work. But this is a theoretical book, rather than a practical one. If you want to know more about how to turn information into influence, I suggest you read Robert Cialdini's classic, Influence.

Basically, this subject is only of interest because voice mail and e-mail are being overused. That source of stress is fairly unimportant though, because little of importance comes from either source. They just happen to waste time. Good manners and more consideration would solve most of those problems. For most companies, a little attention to suggesting what should be done in both areas would solve much of the stress described here.

I think we do need to do more work on helping people to appreciate their perceptual weaknesses. Like many management books, this one focuses more on "doing things to people" rather than helping people do things for themselves better. I hope that future work in this area will be more practical for the individual.

My experience has been is that if people have good information, almost everyone decides and acts in the same way. The poorest sources of such information are regular financial reports in companies. As a result, Professor Kaplan's work with the Balanced Scorecard, as described lately in The Strategy-Focused Organization, is a area to focus on if you are concerned about organizational ADD.

The relatively new book, Simplicity, by Bill Jensen is also a good source of ideas for how to overcome many of these issues.

After you think about this issue, I suggest that you focus your organization on what are the three things you need to do better than anyone else. Then be sure that everyone understands what information needs to be addressed. Give them lots of freedom to wallow in the information anyway they like. A regimented approach will help with execution, but limit your choices.

Expand your mind's control over what you focus on, to avoid the bad habits that stall progress!

Disappointingly fluffy
The book sets out in a bad direction, and never really recovers. There's some interesting survey material for those who are completely unfamiliar with the issues, but also many random unsubstantiated claims, much that's illogical or contradictory, and a ream of chapters later in the book with what seems to me to be vague management advice.

The initial bad direction comes in the form of a broken definition of attention: the authors claim attention is a narrowing of perception (sensory input), followed by an action decision. The latter part of this is completely bogus from a psychological perspective, and only there to support the marketing/advertising-oriented slant of the book. Yes, attention does involve a focus on a subset of sensory input, but no decision making needs to be attached. Think of watching a movie: it has your full attention; you're blocking out surrounding stimuli to some extent. But when the movie is effective, you're along for the ride, not making decisions. Furthermore, the authors *claim* that attention-management is different from time-management, but are very sloppy in distinguishing between attention, time, mind share, effort, persuasion, and a variety of other measures. It's maddening.

An example of the contradictory nature of the authors' advice is that they both advise managers to be creative in seeking their employees' attention (including multimedia messages, clowning in meetings, and other nonsense) AND advise that companies deploy "attention guards" to keep employees focused. Well, which is it? Distractions or focus? The sheer enthusiasm with which the authors endorse the arms race for attention (more and more baroque packaging of messages (ads) to get your attention) is disturbing.

The graphic design of the book makes a point and is amusing at first, but when you're trying to stick to the flow of the main text, the sidebars and tangential blurbs become very distracting. They becgome more distracting as the amount of real information in the main text decreases in later chapters.

I read this as a bookclub book to discuss it with a few (high-tech focused) friends, and we unanimously hated the book. I recommend taking a good look at it before spending your money.

Seminal - A Paradigm Changing Book
A book which is not only well paced and well written, but most importantly, has something to say which does not echo the 'me too' mantra of most recent management books.

A truly insightful book, I recommend you pause to listen to its message and judge its insight against your personal experience.

Davenport et al present a new paradigm, a new way of viewing the causality of corporate thinking, and for that he should be applauded.

It didn't hold my attention
I found this book disappointing. Attention (and lack thereof) is on a lot of peoples' minds these days. The book highlights the distinction between time and attention. It also does a reasonable job of describing the increasing prevalence of attention deficit among individuals and organizations.

I suspect however that anyone reading the book is already well aware of the problem and is looking for solutions. The book offers few that are particularly new or useful. The book itself looks new. It has a 'weby' feel in that chunks of text and 'factoids' are scattered around the pages. No doubt this was intended to be attention-getting but in book format I found it distracting.

Given the ever-increasing demand for our attention, it seems more important than ever to get to the point quickly and avoid tangents. This book violates that principle by squandering the readers' attention on ideas that are old (e.g.: Maslow's Hierarchy), of questionable relevance to this topic (e.g.: mergers and acquisitions) or dealt with more comprehensively elsewhere (e.g.: how to structure documents to maximize attention) ... Read more

Book Description

Rosabeth Moss Kanter is at the forefront of management thinkingand practice--a leading figure in the attack on organizationalrigidities, boundaries, and top- down traditions whose ideas arespearheading a period of great discovery and change in the businessworld.

Here, for the first time, is the essential Kanter: thecutting-edge ideas and wisdom of nearly two decades that are even morerelevant today. With Rosabeth Moss Kanter on the Frontiers ofManagement, the renowned management guru presents a sweeping look backacross a decade of change in business--what has worked well, whathasn't, and what businesses still need to learn--as well as apenetrating look forward at the hard work of leadership and innovationstill to be done.

In this landmark book, Kanter has integrated allher Harvard Business Review articles and the framing essays she wroteas Editor into a powerful new statement. The six sections span today'smost critical topics--strategy, innovation, customer focus, globaltrends, planning for change, strat