Download or read book Work Matters written by Francesca Cardona and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-03-25 with total page 197 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Work is complicated: It can be fulfilling and exciting, or disappointing and disruptive. We spend most of our adult lives at work; it shapes our identities and provides a context for our creativity and talents. It can be the source of great pleasure – and of profound distress. In Work Matters, organizational consultant and Tavistock lecturer Francesca Cardona examines our changing relationship with work today. Drawing on case studies from a wide range of individuals and organizations, she considers the dynamics at play in our working lives. Cardona examines how to navigate times of transition, and the balance of power in the work place, while also addressing latent issues such as the effects of shame, the cost of ill-conceived organizational structures and tasks, the interface between the personal and the professional, and the manager’s most precious skill: the ability to be psychologically present. Finally, Cardona casts an eye on the consultant’s role in helping organizations move forwards in ways that are professionally and personally rewarding. Whether you are a business leader, manager, consultant or student, or simply interested in how your work affects you, Work Matters offers essential insights into an area that occupies so much of our lives.

Download or read book Consulting That Matters written by David R. Seibold and published by . This book was released on 2018-12-14 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Each year, thousands of consulting contracts are awarded by organizations to experts who help them with challenges involving people, processes, technologies, goals, resource allocation, decision making, problem solving, and more. These experts - consultants - diagnose problems, recommend solutions, facilitate interventions, and evaluate outcomes that are often related to human communication. Some consultants are academicians skilled in both doing and interpreting research for clients; others are practitioners with little use for research and theory. Driving all of the ideas showcased in Consulting That Matters: A Handbook for Scholars and Practitioners is the premise that sound theory and research are critical to consulting success, and should be the blueprints for successful organizational transformation. Thus, this book is for all types of consultants, including the very best who are at the top of their games and those who believe theory and research belong in ivory towers, not business settings. Featuring a «who's who» of preeminent communication scholars/consultants, each author shares frameworks, strategies, and examples from their own diverse experiences, all grounded in rich, substantive theory and research. The volume offers even the most skilled and experienced consultants a range of alternative approaches, paradigms, and competencies to build their credibility and make them more valuable to their clients in a dynamic, ever-evolving business climate.

Download or read book The Secrets of Consulting written by Gerald M. Weinberg and published by Dorset House Publishing Company, Incorporated. This book was released on 1985 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Secrets of Consulting--techniques, strategies, and first-hand experiences--all that you'll need to set up, run, and be successful at your own consulting business.

Download or read book The Flawless Consulting Fieldbook and Companion written by Peter Block and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2012-03-21 with total page 480 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Don't venture into the consulting field without this essential Fieldbook & Companion! Following on the heels of the best-selling Flawless Consulting, Second Edition comes The Flawless Consulting Fieldbook and Companion. Whether you work as a consultant or you work with consultants, this relentlessly practical guide will be your best friend as you discover how consulting influences your business- and real life-decisions and those of others. The Flawless Consulting Fieldbook and Companion is packed with: Sample scenarios Case studies Client-consultant dialogues Hands-on tools Action plans Implementation checklists "Wow! A companion a business owner can't be without! The insights of 30 consultants the caliber of Peter Block is priceless." --Sue Mosby, principal, CDFM2 Architecture Inc. "This book is a companion piece for both the desktop and bedside of those who do consulting full time or in their role as leader. I plan to keep this book close to me to both guide and inspire my work." --Phil Harkins, president, Linkage, Inc.

Download or read book Measure What Matters written by John Doerr and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2018-04-24 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: #1 New York Times Bestseller Legendary venture capitalist John Doerr reveals how the goal-setting system of Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) has helped tech giants from Intel to Google achieve explosive growth—and how it can help any organization thrive. In the fall of 1999, John Doerr met with the founders of a start-up whom he'd just given $12.5 million, the biggest investment of his career. Larry Page and Sergey Brin had amazing technology, entrepreneurial energy, and sky-high ambitions, but no real business plan. For Google to change the world (or even to survive), Page and Brin had to learn how to make tough choices on priorities while keeping their team on track. They'd have to know when to pull the plug on losing propositions, to fail fast. And they needed timely, relevant data to track their progress—to measure what mattered. Doerr taught them about a proven approach to operating excellence: Objectives and Key Results. He had first discovered OKRs in the 1970s as an engineer at Intel, where the legendary Andy Grove ("the greatest manager of his or any era") drove the best-run company Doerr had ever seen. Later, as a venture capitalist, Doerr shared Grove's brainchild with more than fifty companies. Wherever the process was faithfully practiced, it worked. In this goal-setting system, objectives define what we seek to achieve; key results are how those top-priority goals will be attained with specific, measurable actions within a set time frame. Everyone's goals, from entry level to CEO, are transparent to the entire organization. The benefits are profound. OKRs surface an organization's most important work. They focus effort and foster coordination. They keep employees on track. They link objectives across silos to unify and strengthen the entire company. Along the way, OKRs enhance workplace satisfaction and boost retention. In Measure What Matters, Doerr shares a broad range of first-person, behind-the-scenes case studies, with narrators including Bono and Bill Gates, to demonstrate the focus, agility, and explosive growth that OKRs have spurred at so many great organizations. This book will help a new generation of leaders capture the same magic.

Download or read book Lords of Strategy written by Walter Kiechel and published by Harvard Business Press. This book was released on 2010-03-03 with total page 363 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Imagine, if you can, the world of business - without corporate strategy. Remarkably, fifty years ago that's the way it was. Businesses made plans, certainly, but without understanding the underlying dynamics of competition, costs, and customers. It was like trying to design a large-scale engineering project without knowing the laws of physics. But in the 1960s, four mavericks and their posses instigated a profound shift in thinking that turbocharged business as never before, with implications far beyond what even they imagined. In The Lords of Strategy, renowned business journalist and editor Walter Kiechel tells, for the first time, the story of the four men who invented corporate strategy as we know it and set in motion the modern, multibillion-dollar consulting industry: Bruce Henderson, founder of Boston Consulting Group Bill Bain, creator of Bain & Company Fred Gluck, longtime Managing Director of McKinsey & Company Michael Porter, Harvard Business School professor Providing a window into how to think about strategy today, Kiechel tells their story with novelistic flair. At times inspiring, at times nearly terrifying, this book is a revealing account of how these iconoclasts and the organizations they led revolutionized the way we think about business, changed the very soul of the corporation, and transformed the way we work.

Download or read book Everybody Matters written by Bob Chapman and published by Portfolio. This book was released on 2015-10-06 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Bob Chapman, CEO of the $1.7 billion manufacturing company Barry-Wehmiller, is on a mission to change the way businesses treat their employees.” – Inc. Magazine Starting in 1997, Bob Chapman and Barry-Wehmiller have pioneered a dramatically different approach to leadership that creates off-the-charts morale, loyalty, creativity, and business performance. The company utterly rejects the idea that employees are simply functions, to be moved around, "managed" with carrots and sticks, or discarded at will. Instead, Barry-Wehmiller manifests the reality that every single person matters, just like in a family. That’s not a cliché on a mission statement; it’s the bedrock of the company’s success. During tough times a family pulls together, makes sacrifices together, and endures short-term pain together. If a parent loses his or her job, a family doesn’t lay off one of the kids. That’s the approach Barry-Wehmiller took when the Great Recession caused revenue to plunge for more than a year. Instead of mass layoffs, they found creative and caring ways to cut costs, such as asking team members to take a month of unpaid leave. As a result, Barry-Wehmiller emerged from the downturn with higher employee morale than ever before. It’s natural to be skeptical when you first hear about this approach. Every time Barry-Wehmiller acquires a company that relied on traditional management practices, the new team members are skeptical too. But they soon learn what it’s like to work at an exceptional workplace where the goal is for everyone to feel trusted and cared for—and where it’s expected that they will justify that trust by caring for each other and putting the common good first. Chapman and coauthor Raj Sisodia show how any organization can reject the traumatic consequences of rolling layoffs, dehumanizing rules, and hypercompetitive cultures. Once you stop treating people like functions or costs, disengaged workers begin to share their gifts and talents toward a shared future. Uninspired workers stop feeling that their jobs have no meaning. Frustrated workers stop taking their bad days out on their spouses and kids. And everyone stops counting the minutes until it’s time to go home. This book chronicles Chapman’s journey to find his true calling, going behind the scenes as his team tackles real-world challenges with caring, empathy, and inspiration. It also provides clear steps to transform your own workplace, whether you lead two people or two hundred thousand. While the Barry-Wehmiller way isn’t easy, it is simple. As the authors put it: "Everyone wants to do better. Trust them. Leaders are everywhere. Find them. People achieve good things, big and small, every day. Celebrate them. Some people wish things were different. Listen to them. Everybody matters. Show them."

Download or read book Consulting Spirit written by Ian Rubenstein and published by . This book was released on 2015-06-01 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One morning during a busy clinic my dead grandfather dropped in for a chat... This sent me off on a journey: a mad dash through territory populated by mediums, psychics, poltergeists, and ghosthunters. Along the way I met some fascinating and often strange people. Let me take you with me as I travel through the hinterland of what we touchingly call reality. I'll introduce you to some of the people and beings I met on my journey. You'll get the inside story, the nuts and bolts of how someone like me can train to become a medium. Dr. Ian D. Rubenstein is a U.K. doctor who works in Enfield, North London. Since training as a medium, he has attempted to use the mediumistic skills he has learned in his medical work as a primary care physician."

Download or read book Environmental Consulting Fundamentals written by Benjamin Alter and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2012-06-25 with total page 399 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written by an environmental consultant with more than 20 years of experience, and based on a course he taught for 10 years, Environmental Consulting Fundamentals: Investigation and Remediation introduces the basic building blocks of environmental consulting. Rather than formulas and equations, it emphasizes the thought processes that go into design

Download or read book High Impact Consulting written by Robert H. Schaffer and published by Jossey-Bass. This book was released on 2002-03-01 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this new and revised edition of the landmark book High-Impact Consulting, Robert H. Schaffer reveals how senior managers unwittingly collude with their consultants to perpetuate the great waste inherent in "the five fatal flaws of conventional consulting." Drawing on his own work with companies-- Motorola, Rio Tinto, IBM, General Reinsurance Corporation, The World Bank, and other successful organizations-- Schaffer offers a field-tested approach to working with consultants that has proven to get results. He identifies the key elements of an effective project design?particularly that project objectives are defined in terms of client results rather than just consultant deliverables. The process enables clients to be certain that the work is carried out in ways that ensure success.

Download or read book Advanced Consulting written by Bill Pasmore and published by Berrett-Koehler Publishers. This book was released on 2020-03-20 with total page 303 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the first book to address the specific needs and challenges faced by high-level consultants, who work on very complex projects and must win the confidence of the most senior leaders in organizations. Advanced consulting requires both expertise and personal qualifications that are distinct from those needed in everyday consulting. Advanced consultants work with high-level executive teams on complex issues such as strategy, organizational design, merger integration, digital disruption, culture change, and system-wide transformation. While neophyte consultants are often given a playbook to follow, advanced consultants need to invent methods that take full advantage of the opportunities that their work with clients presents. There is an art to advanced consulting as well as a science; who you are is as important as what you do. Bill Pasmore draws on his four decades of experience as a consultant and teacher of consultants to show readers how to see possibilities that are not evident, conduct analyses that support the value of more comprehensive work, build relationships that engender deeper trust, adapt to changing circumstances, and empower members of their team to take independent actions while maintaining overall control of an engagement. Illustrated with vivid real-world examples and including a self-assessment to measure your progress, this book equips you to advance to more senior positions in your firm or to build a successful independent practice.

Download or read book Consulting Mastery written by Keith Merron and published by Berrett-Koehler Publishers. This book was released on 2005-06 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The author of Riding the Wave: Designing Your Organization for Enduring Success offers readers a master plan for becoming a leading consultant to corporations hungry for meaningful change.

Download or read book Good Strategy Bad Strategy written by Richard Rumelt and published by Currency. This book was released on 2011-07-19 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Good Strategy/Bad Strategy clarifies the muddled thinking underlying too many strategies and provides a clear way to create and implement a powerful action-oriented strategy for the real world. Developing and implementing a strategy is the central task of a leader. A good strategy is a specific and coherent response to—and approach for—overcoming the obstacles to progress. A good strategy works by harnessing and applying power where it will have the greatest effect. Yet, Rumelt shows that there has been a growing and unfortunate tendency to equate Mom-and-apple-pie values, fluffy packages of buzzwords, motivational slogans, and financial goals with “strategy.” In Good Strategy/Bad Strategy, he debunks these elements of “bad strategy” and awakens an understanding of the power of a “good strategy.” He introduces nine sources of power—ranging from using leverage to effectively focusing on growth—that are eye-opening yet pragmatic tools that can easily be put to work on Monday morning, and uses fascinating examples from business, nonprofit, and military affairs to bring its original and pragmatic ideas to life. The detailed examples range from Apple to General Motors, from the two Iraq wars to Afghanistan, from a small local market to Wal-Mart, from Nvidia to Silicon Graphics, from the Getty Trust to the Los Angeles Unified School District, from Cisco Systems to Paccar, and from Global Crossing to the 2007–08 financial crisis. Reflecting an astonishing grasp and integration of economics, finance, technology, history, and the brilliance and foibles of the human character, Good Strategy/Bad Strategy stems from Rumelt’s decades of digging beyond the superficial to address hard questions with honesty and integrity.

Download or read book Flawless Consulting written by Peter Block and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2011-01-31 with total page 359 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This Third Edition to Peter Block's Flawless Consulting addresses business changes and new challenges since the second edition was written ten years ago. It tackles the challenges next-generation consultants face, including more guidance on how to ask better questions, dealing with difficult clients, working in an increasingly virtual world, how to cope with complexities in international consulting, case studies, and guidelines on implementation. Also included are illustrative examples and exercises to help you cement the guides offered.

Download or read book Humble Consulting written by Edgar H. Schein and published by Berrett-Koehler Publishers. This book was released on 2016-04-04 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Consulting in Complex and Changing Times Organizations face challenges today that are too messy and complicated for consultants to simply play doctor: run a few tests, offer a neat diagnosis of the “problem,” and recommend a solution. Edgar Schein argues that consultants have to jettison the old idea of professional distance and work with their clients in a more personal way, emphasizing authentic openness, curiosity, and humility. Schein draws deeply on his own decades of experience, offering over two dozen case studies that illuminate each stage of this humble consulting process. Just as he did with Process Consultation nearly fifty years ago, Schein has once again revolutionized the field, enabling consultants to be more genuinely helpful and vastly more effective.

Download or read book Emerging Trends and Issues in Management Consulting written by Anthony F. Buono and published by IAP. This book was released on 2009-04-01 with total page 297 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The ninth volume in the Research in Management Consulting (RMC) series—much like the volumes that preceded it—underscores that management consulting is a multifaceted field with a truly eclectic nature. Management consultants range from sole practitioners and those working in small boutique firms to members of global consultancies that literally span the world. Their interventions can consist of relatively simple, commonly available services focused on mid- to lower level organizational members, to those that are far more esoteric in nature, providing vital assistance and direction to key players at the upper echelons of the corporate hierarchy. As consultants we can have individuals, groups and work units, or organizations as our “client,” and engagements can be dominated by junior-level specialists or guided by senior-level gurus and advisors. The volume contains 11 chapters that continue the RMC series’ commitment to enhancing our understanding of and insight into management consulting and the consulting process from a cross-cultural, global perspective. The book is divided into three sections that explore emerging issues and challenges in the management consulting industry, trends and techniques in management consulting interventions, and reflections on consulting and the consulting process. This volume, which captures the dual nature—possibilities and challenges — associated with management consulting, adds to the Janus-faced portrayal of the field. Drawing on the interplay between practice and scholarship, the volume adds to the series goal of gaining a fuller understanding of management consulting theory in practice and practice in context in a quest for actionable knowledge about consultants, consultancies and the consulting process.

Download or read book Difficult Conversations written by Douglas Stone and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2010-11-02 with total page 351 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The 10th-anniversary edition of the New York Times business bestseller-now updated with "Answers to Ten Questions People Ask" We attempt or avoid difficult conversations every day-whether dealing with an underperforming employee, disagreeing with a spouse, or negotiating with a client. From the Harvard Negotiation Project, the organization that brought you Getting to Yes, Difficult Conversations provides a step-by-step approach to having those tough conversations with less stress and more success. you'll learn how to: · Decipher the underlying structure of every difficult conversation · Start a conversation without defensiveness · Listen for the meaning of what is not said · Stay balanced in the face of attacks and accusations · Move from emotion to productive problem solving