Managing for Excellence

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The drive for excellence is on. Faced with declining profits and prestige, American corporations are rediscovering the competitive advantages of quality. But even when a commitment to excellence is made a top priority of corporate management, the question remains: How do we translate our lofty goals into concrete results-especially when one department is sniping at another, somé key people are dragging their feet on a major project, and a committee that was supposed to iron out the problems is running down ablind alley? Books on management have typically begged the question. Until now Managing For Excellence is the first book to address the problem of how to move from strategy to action. Its a book for doers-for the middle manager whose job is to turn the grand designs of CEOs and presidents into a personal commitment on the part of the individuals in a department. Managing For Excellence explains why the traditional concept of "Manager as Hero" is outmoded, why it leads to... Tovább

Fülszöveg

The drive for excellence is on. Faced with declining profits and prestige, American corporations are rediscovering the competitive advantages of quality. But even when a commitment to excellence is made a top priority of corporate management, the question remains: How do we translate our lofty goals into concrete results-especially when one department is sniping at another, somé key people are dragging their feet on a major project, and a committee that was supposed to iron out the problems is running down ablind alley? Books on management have typically begged the question. Until now Managing For Excellence is the first book to address the problem of how to move from strategy to action. Its a book for doers-for the middle manager whose job is to turn the grand designs of CEOs and presidents into a personal commitment on the part of the individuals in a department. Managing For Excellence explains why the traditional concept of "Manager as Hero" is outmoded, why it leads to overresponsibility on the part of managers and actually results in employees performing at levels far below their capability. As an alternative, Dávid Bradford and Allan Cohen introduce a totally new concept of leadership called "Manager as Developer," which brings together for the first time somé of the most important breakthroughs in management thinking of the last decade. This new model of leadership is the key to raising mere adequacy to excellence. Using "Manager as Developer" as a focus, Bradford and Cohen provide fresh ideas for getting more effort from subordinates by developing overarching goals that tie employees' interests to the needs of the department. They introduce "Supportive Confrontation," a technique for dealing with problem subordinates in a way that increases mutual influence. They help managers build shared-responsibility teams, and, when appropriate, use manageabie levels of conflict to spur team performance. Most importantly, they show managers how to lead-how to motivate employees to get even routine jobs done creatively and productively, while preparing them to take on greater challenges and responsibilities.
(continued from front flap) Many of the ideas here were conceived, developed, and fíne-tuned in work with over 200 managers from leading corporations and government agencies. Bradford and Cohen observed managers trying to deal with difficult situations, explored their reasoning and strategies, and applied what they learned to their thinking on leadership. The results are in Managing For Excellence. For managers who have made the commitment to excellence- and are determined to achieve it-this is the book that will get them there. Vissza