Download or read book Crisis Management in a Complex World written by Dawn R. Gilpin and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2008-07-31 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Today's managers, business owners, and public relations practitioners grapple daily with a fundamental question about contemporary crisis management: to what extent is it possible to control events and stakeholder responses to them, in order to contain escalating crises or safeguard an organization's reputation? The authors meet the question head-on, departing from other crisis management texts, and arguing that a complexity-based approach is superior to the standard simplification model of organizational learning.
Download or read book Managing the Unexpected written by Karl E. Weick and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2015-09-15 with total page 231 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Improve your company's ability to avoid or manage crises Managing the Unexpected, Third Edition is a thoroughly revised text that offers an updated look at the groundbreaking ideas explored in the first and second editions. Revised to reflect events emblematic of the unique challenges that organizations have faced in recent years, including bank failures, intelligence failures, quality failures, and other organizational misfortunes, often sparked by organizational actions, this critical book focuses on why some organizations are better able to sustain high performance in the face of unanticipated change. High reliability organizations (HROs), including commercial aviation, emergency rooms, aircraft carrier flight operations, and firefighting units, are looked to as models of exceptional organizational preparedness. This essential text explains the development of unexpected events and guides you in improving your organization for more reliable performance. "Expect the unexpected" is a popular mantra for a reason: it's rooted in experience. Since the dawn of civilization, organizations have been rocked by natural disasters, civil unrest, international conflict, and other unexpected crises that impact their ability to function. Understanding how to maintain function when catastrophe strikes is key to keeping your organization afloat. Explore the many different kinds of unexpected events that your organization may face Consider updated case studies and research Discuss how highly reliable organizations are able to maintain control during unexpected events Discover tactics that may bolster your organization's ability to face the unexpected with confidence Managing the Unexpected, Third Edition offers updated, valuable content to professionals who want to strengthen the preparedness of their organizations—and confidently face unexpected challenges.
Download or read book Simple Rules written by Donald Norman Sull and published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. This book was released on 2015 with total page 293 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Outlines an approach to high-performance problem solving and decision making that draws on insights from survival guides, pop culture, and other sources.
Download or read book Aspects of Complexity written by Terry Cooke-Davies and published by Project Management Institute. This book was released on 2011-08-01 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Complexity in projects may be one of those things that are difficult to define, but easy to recognize when encountered. Or maybe not so easy. This collection of analyses deals with complexity in a way that will appeal to both academics and practitioners. It arises from a series of four academic-business roundtables sponsored by the Project Management Institute in the U.S., Australia, Malta, and Brazil. Researchers will appreciate the academic rigor of the content and practitioners will appreciate the generally reader-friendly style and tone. The opening chapter offers that elusive definition and provides the foundation for common understanding. The next four chapters compose the theoretical portion of the book, establishing the underpinning concepts related to systems thinking, systems engineering, chaos or complexity theory, and behavioral and cognitive aspects. The remainder of the book is more practice-oriented. It is a serious attempt to pull together what is currently known and understood about the topic, to help practitioners and their managers improve future practice, and to guide research into answering those questions that will best help to improve understanding of the topic.
Download or read book Managing the Unexpected written by Karl E. Weick and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2011-01-06 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since the first edition of Managing the Unexpected was published in 2001, the unexpected has become a growing part of our everyday lives. The unexpected is often dramatic, as with hurricanes or terrorist attacks. But the unexpected can also come in more subtle forms, such as a small organizational lapse that leads to a major blunder, or an unexamined assumption that costs lives in a crisis. Why are some organizations better able than others to maintain function and structure in the face of unanticipated change? Authors Karl Weick and Kathleen Sutcliffe answer this question by pointing to high reliability organizations (HROs), such as emergency rooms in hospitals, flight operations of aircraft carriers, and firefighting units, as models to follow. These organizations have developed ways of acting and styles of learning that enable them to manage the unexpected better than other organizations. Thoroughly revised and updated, the second edition of the groundbreaking book Managing the Unexpected uses HROs as a template for any institution that wants to better organize for high reliability.
Download or read book Changing on the Job written by Jennifer Garvey Berger and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 2011-11-30 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Listen to people in every field and you'll hear a call for more sophisticated leadership—for leaders who can solve more complex problems than the human race has ever faced. But these leaders won't simply come to the fore; we have to develop them, and we must cultivate them as quickly as is humanly possible. Changing on the Job is a means to this end. As opposed to showing readers how to play the role of a leader in a "paint by numbers" fashion, Changing on the Job builds on theories of adult growth and development to help readers become more thoughtful individuals, capable of leading in any scenario. Moving from the theoretical to the practical, and employing real-world examples, author Jennifer Garvey Berger offers a set of building blocks to help cultivate an agile workforce while improving performance. Coaches, HR professionals, thoughtful leaders, and anyone who wants to flourish on the job will find this book a vital resource for developing their own capacities and those of the talent that they support.
Download or read book Managing Complex Projects written by International Institute for Learning and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2010-08-03 with total page 183 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The application of project management techniques is considered standard practice in today's business environment. What is not widely known is that the learning gap separating good project management from exceptional project management is not as great as one might think yet, the difference in the return on value can be quite significant. Many factors determine how projects are approached, such as rapid shifts in technology, a fluctuating market, changes in a business's organizational structure, and politics. As these forces add to a project's complexity and duration, project managers must develop strategies that allow them to think outside the box and create new on-the-go methodologies. Managing Complex Projects delivers the tools necessary to take on an unpredictable economy with an adaptable battle plan proven to meet the differing needs of an ever-expanding set of partners and stakeholders involved in a project. This book shows how to solve some of the issues facing today's project manager, including: Dealing with multiple virtual teams located around the world Working with partners and stakeholders that may have limited project management tools and experience Adjusting to long-term projects in which the stakeholders may change Managing projects where stated goals and objectives differ among stakeholders This book shows how companies such as IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft, and Siemens are exploring new avenues to aid them in taking on complex projects by combining "hard" skills, such as risk management and scheduling, with "soft" skills that focus on interpersonal communication. Managing Complex Projects serves as a lifesaver for time-crunched project managers looking for new ways to maximize their efforts.
Download or read book Principles for a Free Society written by Richard A. Epstein and published by Basic Books (AZ). This book was released on 2002 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The country's leading libertarian scholar sets forth the essential principles for a legal system that best balances individual liberty versus the common good.
Download or read book Great Leadership written by Antony Bell and published by Davies-Black Publishing. This book was released on 2006 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Contrary to the prevailing notion that people are an organization's greatest asset, leadership expert Antony Bell draws together compelling evidence to argue that it is leaders that take companies from good to great. Bell goes right into the heart of what defines this greatness: knowledge, skills, and talents combined with the inner qualities that drive noble action.
Download or read book Risk Up Front written by Adam Josephs and published by . This book was released on 2018-06-04 with total page 378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Successful projects depend more on your team's behavior than on their project tools. This book focuses on the fundamentals: simple structures and practices, applied with rigor. These are the tools you need to avoid the late changes that kill project schedules. Underlying all of them are four principles: accountability, transparency, integrity and commitment. Risk Up Front is designed to turn these principles into practice"--Cover, page 4.
Download or read book Critical Systems Thinking and the Management of Complexity written by Michael C. Jackson and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2019-03-15 with total page 728 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The world has become increasingly networked and unpredictable. Decision makers at all levels are required to manage the consequences of complexity every day. They must deal with problems that arise unexpectedly, generate uncertainty, are characterised by interconnectivity, and spread across traditional boundaries. Simple solutions to complex problems are usually inadequate and risk exacerbating the original issues. Leaders of international bodies such as the UN, OECD, UNESCO and WHO — and of major business, public sector, charitable, and professional organizations — have all declared that systems thinking is an essential leadership skill for managing the complexity of the economic, social and environmental issues that confront decision makers. Systems thinking must be implemented more generally, and on a wider scale, to address these issues. An evaluation of different systems methodologies suggests that they concentrate on different aspects of complexity. To be in the best position to deal with complexity, decision makers must understand the strengths and weaknesses of the various approaches and learn how to employ them in combination. This is called critical systems thinking. Making use of over 25 case studies, the book offers an account of the development of systems thinking and of major efforts to apply the approach in real-world interventions. Further, it encourages the widespread use of critical systems practice as a means of ensuring responsible leadership in a complex world. Comments on a previous version of the book: Russ Ackoff: ‘the book is the best overview of the field I have seen’ JP van Gigch: ‘Jackson does a masterful job. The book is lucid ...well written and eminently readable’ Professional Manager (Journal of the Chartered Management Institute): ‘Provides an excellent guide and introduction to systems thinking for students of management’
Download or read book Team of Teams written by Gen. Stanley McChrystal and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2015-05-12 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the New York Times bestselling author of My Share of the Task and Leaders, a manual for leaders looking to make their teams more adaptable, agile, and unified in the midst of change. When General Stanley McChrystal took command of the Joint Special Operations Task Force in 2004, he quickly realized that conventional military tactics were failing. Al Qaeda in Iraq was a decentralized network that could move quickly, strike ruthlessly, then seemingly vanish into the local population. The allied forces had a huge advantage in numbers, equipment, and training—but none of that seemed to matter. To defeat Al Qaeda, they would have to combine the power of the world’s mightiest military with the agility of the world’s most fearsome terrorist network. They would have to become a "team of teams"—faster, flatter, and more flexible than ever. In Team of Teams, McChrystal and his colleagues show how the challenges they faced in Iraq can be relevant to countless businesses, nonprofits, and organizations today. In periods of unprecedented crisis, leaders need practical management practices that can scale to thousands of people—and fast. By giving small groups the freedom to experiment and share what they learn across the entire organization, teams can respond more quickly, communicate more freely, and make better and faster decisions. Drawing on compelling examples—from NASA to hospital emergency rooms—Team of Teams makes the case for merging the power of a large corporation with the agility of a small team to transform any organization.
Download or read book Business Dynamics Systems Thinking and Modeling for a Complex World with CD ROM written by John Sterman and published by McGraw-Hill Education. This book was released on 2000-02-23 with total page 982 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Today’s leading authority on the subject of this text is the author, MIT Standish Professor of Management and Director of the System Dynamics Group, John D. Sterman. Sterman’s objective is to explain, in a true textbook format, what system dynamics is, and how it can be successfully applied to solve business and organizational problems. System dynamics is both a currently utilized approach to organizational problem solving at the professional level, and a field of study in business, engineering, and social and physical sciences.
Download or read book Strategy for Managing Complex Systems written by Fredmund Malik and published by Campus Verlag. This book was released on 2016-05-12 with total page 565 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Malik demonstrates that management and management theory have strong foundations in systems science, and most specifically in a certain type of cybernetics of truly complex systems, of organismic, self-organizing, and evolving systems. This book provides the basics on how to create robust, functional, and sustainably viable systems. One of the reasons why it has become a classic on management cybernetics, now in its 11th edition, is that the strategies and heuristic principles of complexity management are still relevant - now more than ever."--Back cover.
Download or read book Managing Complex Systems written by Howard Eisner and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2011-01-06 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Nine innovative methods to think outside the box and solve complex system problems Managing Complex Systems provides specific tools and guidance needed to be a more creative and innovative thinker. Following the author's methodology, the reader will be better able to devise and implement nontraditional solutions to seemingly intractable complex problems. By challenging the reader to think in new and creative ways, the book offers a road map to success, whether measured in terms of competitive advantage, greater market share, improved productivity, or higher profits, all based upon better solutions to difficult problems. The first four chapters set the foundation for creative thinking by exploring the nature of large-scale systems and complexity, thinking inside and outside the box, and examples of how an inventive mind solves problems in both management and scientific domains. Subsequent chapters address nine focused methods that the author has formulated to help the reader think outside the box: * Broaden and generalize * Crossover * Question conventional wisdom * Back of the envelope * Expanding the dimensions * Obversity * Remove constraints * Thinking with pictures * Systems approach Real-life examples are provided for each method that demonstrate how the approach enhances problem solving and decision making in system development and management. Following the discussion of the nine methods, the author examines group decision making as well as additional creative thinking procedures devised by other researchers, including references that assist in exploring these methods in greater detail. The author ends with a wrap-up chapter that includes a test to help readers practice their tendencies toward creative thinking skills and action with respect to solving real-world problems. The nine methods discussed in this book have broad applicability and can be used successfully by managers with a wide range of responsibilities in business and technology. For anyone who is tired of the same old approach with the same old results, this book is essential reading.
Download or read book Risk Governance written by Ortwin Renn and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2017-12-04 with total page 467 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Risk Governance is a tour de force. Every risk manager, every risk analyst, every risk researcher must read this book - it is the demarcation point for all further advances in risk policy and risk research. Renn provides authoritative guidance on how to manage risks based on a definitive synthesis of the research literature. The skill with which he builds practical recommendations from solid science is unprecedented. Thomas Dietz, Director, Environmental Science and Policy Program, Michigan State University, USA A masterpiece of new knowledge and wisdom with illustrative examples of tested applications to realworld cases. The book is recommendable also to interested students in different disciplines as a timely textbook on 'risk beyond risk'. Norio Okada, Full Professor and Director at the Disaster Prevention Research Institute (DPRI), Kyoto University, Japan There are classic environmental works such as The Tragedy of the Commons by Hardin, Risk Society by Beck, The Theory of Communicative Action by Habermas, and the seminal volumes by Ostrom on governing the commons. Renns book fits right into this series of important milestones of environmental studies. Jochen Jaeger, Professor at Concordia University, Montreal, Canada Risk Governance provides a valuable survey of the whole field of risk and demonstrates how scientific, economic, political and civil society actors can participate in inclusive risk governance. Jobst Conrad, Senior Scientist, Social Science Research Center Berlin, Germany Renn offers a remarkably fair-minded and systematic approach to bringing together the diverse fields that have something to say about 'risk'. Risk Governance moves us along the path from the noisy, formative stage of thinking about risk to one with a stronger empirical, theoretical, and analytical foundation. Baruch Fischhoff, PhD, Howard Heinz University Professor, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, USA 'I cannot describe how impressed I am at the breadth and coherence of Renn's career's work! Written with remarkable clarity and minimal technical jargon... [this] should be required reading in risk courses!' John Graham, former director of the Harvard Risk Center and former deputy director of the Office of Budget and Management of the Unites States Administration This book, for the first time, brings together and updates the groundbreaking work of renowned risk theorist and researcher Ortwin Renn, integrating the major disciplinary concepts of risk in the social, engineering and natural sciences. The book opens with the context of risk handling before flowing through the core topics of assessment, evaluation, perception, management and communication, culminating in a look at the transition from risk management to risk governance and a glimpse at a new understanding of risk in (post)modern societies.
Download or read book The New Global Manager written by Melissa Lamson and published by . This book was released on 2018-08-09 with total page 172 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Most managers already know that cultural differences are important when they're dealing with business partners from other countries. They understand that the current business environment is increasingly global. What today's managers don't fully get is that they must learn and use global management skills in every interaction they have. Managers who buy this book will be able to make sense of common situations that they do not understand. After reading this book they will be able to recognize, assess, react to and solve complex management situations where diverse styles, personalities and cultures are in play. The New Global Manager is a daily resource for managers, providing practical tools and frameworks like OAR(TM) and 4DCulture(TM), strategies and tips for successfully managing abroad and at home, face-to-face and virtually. If you are a new manager, or a manager with 20 years of experience, this is the comprehensive resource you've been waiting for.
