Synopses & Reviews
How do companies, both large and small, in different countries and industries, achieve breakthrough performance when the odds are stacked against them? Such results are possible when people apply The Three Laws of Performance and rewrite their futures. This book will show you how to do the same in your organization and your life.
Although most of us aren't aware of it, we have a future that's already been written. Our future is written by hopes, fears, dreams, expectations, and decisions made about life. In the same way, organizations have futures written by history, circumstances, culture, aspirations, successes, and failures. These already-written futures determine and shape the level of performance that's possible for individuals and organizations. In The Three Laws of Performance, Steve Zaffron and Dave Logan crack the code on rewriting the future for people and organizations, elevating performance to unprecedented levels.
"This book is a wonderful reminder that things we don't see determine what we do see, and therefore, what really gets done. The Three Laws of Performance hits the mark in providing both rich food for thought and techniques that can create profound results."David Allen, author, Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity; Making It All Work: Winning at the Game of Work; and the Business of Life
"The Three Laws of Performance is must-reading for leaders who want to make a positive difference. Change doesn't happen in a vacuum; it happens when people see and hear a future they can get excited about. Steve Zaffron and Dave Logan show how true leaders sidestep negative stumbling blocks to articulate visions that heal and inspire."Ken Blanchard, coauthor, The One Minute Manager and Leading at a Higher Level
"An inspiring, practical book that will assist all who seek to rewrite the future of our world."Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, Nobel Laureate
Review
“The Three Laws of Performance provides a list of rules (and stories explaining how they work in practice) that promise to help individuals in leadership roles facilitate the group coherence and cohesion that are necessary to bring about transcendent performance. The book is based on a wealth of experience from decades of applying the ideas it explains. If you're interested in this kind of theory, the book is worth a read.” (
BrokenSymmetry.typepad.com)
“I received an email a few weeks ago asking if I would be interested in reviewing the new book from Steve Zaffron and Dave Logan titled “the three laws of performance”. I jumped at the opportunity….free book right?
Well…I’d happily pay twice the list price for this book and so should you….
The full title of the book is The Three Laws of Performance: Rewriting the Future of Your Organization and Your Life and it is called a ‘Warren Bennis‘ book…if you like Bennis, you’ll like this book too.
The premise of the book is that there are three laws that will always affect performance…just like the law of gravity will always have an effect on you.
The three laws are:
How people perform correlates to how situations occur to them
How a situation occurs arises in languages
Future based language transforms how situations occur to people
… This is a great book…I think it is one of the best books I’ve read in the last few years. Grab this book soon as you can and enjoy!” (EricBrown.com)
“Three Laws is about impossible transformations and how systemic change can remake your life or your organization.” (Life Insurance Selling)
Synopsis
When a hurricane warning is announced, everyone's concerns and actions become focused on that expectation; the hurricane essentially becomes the future which people are "living into." Similarly, when an organization needs to transform or make the leap to a higher level, everyone involved should be "living into" the vision of the organization's new, improved future. But in the majority of organizations, the future people are living into is based on past performance and experience, and so major transformation is almost impossible.
Steve Zaffron is, CEO of Vanto Group which has helped hundreds of companies envision and effectively implement major change and performance improvement. Zaffron and Dave Logan outline this proven system for rallying all of an organization's employees around a new vision, and more importantly, making it stick. Their focus is on making such transformations permanent and repeatable, providing practical examples from Vanto Group’s clients such as Apple, Lockheed Martin, Reebok, BHP-Billiton, Johnson & Johnson, Morgan Stanley, and many others.
Synopsis
How did companies, both large and small, in different countries and industries, all achieve breakthrough performance when the odds were stacked against them?
How did an engineer turned CEO transform his New Zealand steelmaking company around in one year and become a leader in the industry? How did a 600-person team, within the largest petroleum company in Brazil, overcome skepticism and dysfunctional dynamics to achieve the biggest process integration success in history? How did a major Japanese housing manufacturer thrive despite the worst economy in a generation? How did a South African platinum mine improve its safety performance by 57 percent in one year?
All of these results were possible because people applied The Three Laws of Performance and rewrote their futures. This book will show you how to do the same in your organization and your life.
Although most of us aren't aware of it, we have a future that's already been written. Our future is written by hopes, fears, dreams, expectations, and decisions made about life. In the same way, organizations have futures written by history, circumstances, culture, aspirations, successes, and failures. These already-written futures determine and shape the level of performance that's possible for individuals and organizations.
In The Three Laws of Performance, Steve Zaffron and Dave Logan crack the code on rewriting the future for people and organizations, elevating performance to unprecedented levels.
As Warren Bennis wrote in his editor's note: "I believe this book may be one of the most important written in many years. The ideas aren't tips, tools, or steps, but are in fact laws that govern individual, group, and organizational behavior. This book can be a resource for generations to come."
Synopsis
Praise for The Three Laws of Performance"You'd better read this book and fast, because it has the code for the future of your organization.If you can only read one book this year, this is the one."
—Dr. Clotaire Rapaille, author of the bestseller The Culture Code
"Cracks the code wide open for breakthrough performance. The recounting of specificsuccesses across diverse businesses makes their claims undeniable. A mustread for next-generation managers and leaders."
—Bob Young, former group president, Lockheed Corporation
"This book is a wonderful reminder that things we don't see determine what we do see, and therefore, what really gets done. The Three Laws of Performance hits the mark in providing both rich food for thought and techniques that can create profound results."
—David Allen, author, Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity and Making It All Work: Winning at the Game of Work and the Business of Life
"Implementing their three 'invariable laws' will help you and others perform beyond your limits, andwith integrity. The reasoning is sound, the language is clear, the illustrations are compelling. A delightful, informative read."
—Chris Argyris, James Bryant Conant Professor (Emeritus), Graduate Schools of Business Administration and of Education, Harvard University
"The Three Laws of Performance is mustreading for leaders who want to make a positive difference. Change doesn't happen in a vacuum; it happens when people see and hear a future they can get excited about. Steve Zaffron and Dave Logan show how true leaders sidestep negative stumbling blocks to articulate visions that heal and inspire."
—Ken Blanchard, coauthor, The One Minute Manager and Leading at a Higher Level
Synopsis
A proven system for rallying all of an organizations' employees around a new vision and ideas for making the vision stickWhen something at work isn't going smoothly, managers struggle with what part of the problem to tackle first. Do they start with cost reduction? Or should they go for process improvements first? The authors—who have helped hundreds of companies and individuals change and improve—say spend time and money adjusting the systems in which people operate, rather than targeting people and their performance directly. The authors show that it's in fact possible to change everything at once—with a focus on making such transformations permanent and repeatable.
- Brand-new Introduction written for the paperback edition
- Filled with illustrative examples from Northrup Grumman, BHP-Billiton, Reebok, Harvard Business School, and many others
- Two experts in the field show how to make major transformations happen
The book outlines a process for engaging all employees to buy-in to an improved vision of an organization's new and improved future.
About the Author
Steve Zaffron is the CEO of the Vanto Group, a global consulting firm that designs and implements large-scale initiatives to elevate organizational performance. Zaffron has directed major corporate initiatives with more than three hundred organizations in twenty countries.
Dave Logan is on the faculty at the Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California and is a former associate dean. He is also senior partner of CultureSync, a management consulting firm. Logan has written three books, including Tribal Leadership.
Table of Contents
Editor's Note, byWarren Bennis xiii
Foreword, by Michael C. Jensen xvii
Authors' Note xxi
Introduction: The Power of Rewriting the Future xxv
Part I: The Three Laws in Action.
1. Transforming an Impossible Situation 3
2. Where Is the Key to Performance? 31
3. Rewriting a Future That’s Already Written 65
Part II: Rewriting the Future of Leadership.
4. With So Many Books on Leadership, Why Are There So Few Leaders? 93
5. The Self-Led Organization 117
Part III: Mastering the Game of Performance.
6. Who orWhat Is Leading Your Life? 143
7. The Path to Mastery 169
8. Breaking the Performance Barrier 199
Appendix: The Three Laws of Performance and the Leadership Corollaries 212
Notes 213
Acknowledgments 215
The Authors 219
Index 221