|
Everyone knows where a straight line goes...
but a squiggly line can go anywhere.
Computers generate straight lines. Life
generates squiggly ones. That's why your predictable business
strategies never turn out the way you expect. Too many strategy
books see the world as if it were a straight line. Serious.
Predictable. And deadly dull. This book knows something
they don't. It knows you need to slay dragons and charm
snakes in a business world that's awfully squiggly, but,
also, endlessly fun and fascinating. So, this book takes
you off the beaten path. Way off.
Here, strategy finally does bite back, at
all the boring books and professors you had to stomach to
get here. It'll knock you off your chair and help open your
mind... to get past the "straight line" thinking
that can't be right.
- Dare to be creative, contrarian... heck,
be bold and make your own personal strategy revolution:
- Strategy as a "little black dress"
-- Bringing simplicity and eloquence back into strategy
formation.
- A deep dive inside the strategist's head
--- What you can know, what you can't know, and how
to tell the difference.
- Seduction, not just deduction -- Using
strategy to treat employees like lovers, not servants.
- Strategy with the gloves off -- and the
halo on -- Power, intrigue, punch, and serious jeopardy.
- And much more -- and much less.
Henri Mintzberg normally bites back on
issues of management, organization, and corporate social
irresponsibility (i.e., shareholder value), as well as management
education and strategy. (Managers not MBAs, with
Berrett-Koehler in the U.S. and Financial Times-Prentice
Hall in Europe was his last book.) He managed to get a Ph.D.
in management at MIT and has slipped about 130 articles
past unsuspecting editors. He is the Cleghorn Professor
of Management Studies at McGill University.
Bruce Ahlstrand likes to prospect for
strategy gems in unlikely places, from the game of Texas
Hold'em to the Greek tragedies. He is devoted to developing
new and creative ways of teaching business strategy and
has never met a case study that he liked. He has a Doctorate
from Oxford University and an M.Sc. degree from the London
School of Economics. He is a professor of management at
Trent University in Ontario, Canada.
Joseph Lampel began his career believing
that strategy is the answer but has recently concluded that
it might be the answer to the wrong question. Joe was awarded
a Ph.D. degree in management by McGill University for good
behavior. He subsequently spent seven years at Stern School,
NYU, trying to break into sow business. He resides at Cass
Business School, City University London, an institution
that happily accommodates his quest to find the answer to
strategy's unanswerable questions.
Henry, Bruce, and Joe are also the authors
of the best-selling Strategy Safari
(Financial Times-Prentice Hall).
|
