Synopses & Reviews
Review
"An outstanding contribution! Practical applications . . . immensely beneficial."
—David Celmer, director, Corporate Quality Management, Ciba-Geigy Corporation
"A structured learning process for both the experienced and new manager to learn when and how to take career and business risks."
—Keith Blurton, Ph.D., general manager, Technology Development and Commercialization, Center for Innovative Technology
"An important contribution to management thinking."
"The play-it-safe management strategies of the past are no longer good enough in today's marketplace. This book shows managers how to embrace the opportunities of risk and to walk the tightrope of today's business world."
"One skill that all executives attempting to manage technology need is the ability to evaluate and undertake risk.... Drawing from an impressive variety of sources, Mr. Calvert teaches readers to assess their current risk skills, challenge false risk assumptions, judge risks soundly, lower risk levels, control emotional responses to risk, and, perhaps most important, survive the inevitable failures."
Synopsis
Draws on numerous examples of working managers in organizations such as Aetna, MCI, and NASA to explain and illustrate how to manage the risk-taking process from start to finish, while giving careful consideration to the pros and cons of each risk. Offers specific, practical tactics and provides easy-to-use instruments that will help managers set priorities and develop risk-taking strategies and skills.
Portraits of working managers in organizations such as Aetna, MCI, nad NASA illustrate how to manage the risk-taking process from start to finish.
About the Author
GENE CALVERT is founder and president of Carpe Diem, a management consulting group based in Washington, D.C. He is a faculty member of the Institutes for Organization Management of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and an associate professor of management at Johns Hopkins University.
Table of Contents
Part One: The Value of Risk Taking.1. The New Realities: Walking the Management Highwire.
2. Excellence and Innovation: The Rewards of Risk Taking.
Part Two: Building Strong Risk-Taking Skills.
3. Assess Your Boundaries, Traits, and Assumptions.
4. Reframe Your Perceptions: Avoiding the Distortion Factors.
5. Improve Your Decision Making: Taking the Right Risk at the Right Time.
6. Confront Your Emotions: Handling the Roller Coaster Rides.
7. Reduce the Dangers: Risk Taking Is Not Risk Free.
8. Survive the Failures: Dealing with the Downside of Risk.
Part Three: Keeping Risk Alive: Encouraging Effective Risk Taking in Yourself and Others.
9. Nurture Your Skills: Learning by Taking Action.
10. Foster Risk Taking in Others,
Appendix: Research Notes.