Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
Management legend Henry Mintzberg (whose Berrett-Koehler books have sold over 225,000 copies worldwide) says we need to bring managing down from thin air and onto solid ground. Leaders need to be deeply rooted in what's happening on the front lines, not isolated in the privileged confines of the boardroom. "Enough of heroic leadership, it's time for engaging management " is the rallying cry from management and leadership giant Henry Mintzberg. He establishes this theme in the first story in the book, about the CEO of a failing airline who always flew comfortably in first class, blithely unaware of the terrible things happening with his customers in coach (in this case, being served famously inedible scrambled eggs). Managing can't be about sitting where you have become accustomed, insulating yourself--it has to be about eating the scrambled eggs.
So Mintzberg urges leaders to call their own call centers, work with their workers, expect extraordinary ideas from ordinary people. Be a keynote listener, not a keynote speaker. Don't say "top management" if you won't say "bottom management." In this best-of collection from his popular, entertaining and irreverent blog, Mintzberg writes that he captures "a lifetime of learning about managing and organizing and strategizing, while getting out many of the ideas that I buried in obscure publications... If some strike you as outrageous, please understand that my most outrageous ideas tend to be my truest." This is Mintzberg at his most playful, but always with serious intent.
Synopsis
In forty-two succinct, surprising essays, legendary scholar Henry Mintzberg brings management down from the clouds and onto solid ground. If you're like most managers and things keep you up at night, now you can turn to a book that's designed especially for you But you won't find talking rabbits or princesses here. (There is a cow, but it doesn't jump.) Henry Mintzberg has culled forty-two of the best posts from his widely read blog and turned them into a deceptively light, sneakily serious compendium of sometimes heretical reflections on management.
The moral here is this: managers need to leave their castles and find out what's actually going on in their kingdoms. And like real bedtime stories, these essays have metaphors galore. So prepare to grow strategies like weeds and organize like a cow. Discover the maestro myth of managing, find the soft underbelly of hard data, and learn why downsizing is bloodletting and your board should be a bee. Mintzberg writes, Just try not to be outraged by anything you read, because some of my most outrageous ideas turn out to be my best. They just take a while to become obvious.