Sunday, December 6, 2009

Streetwise Time Management or Youre in Charge Now What

Streetwise Time Management: Get More Done with Less Stress by Efficiently Managing Your Time

Author: Marshall Cook

and/or stickers showing their discounted price. More about bargain books

Go to: Oracle Privacy Security Auditing or Multivariable Control Systems

You're in Charge - Now What?: The 8-Point Plan

Author: Thomas J Neff

Getting a new job or a big promotion is like building a house: You need to get the foundation right for both. With a job, the quick-drying cement is how well you do in your first hundred days, since they establish the foundation for long-term momentum and great performance.

Tom Neff and Jim Citrin are two of the world’s leading experts on leadership and career success. As key figures at Spencer Stuart (hailed by the Wall Street Journal as the number one brand name in executive search), they must understand the criteria for success when they recruit top executives for new leadership positions.

Through compelling, first-hand stories you will hear from people such as Jeffrey Immelt, CEO of GE, on how his career has been a series of successive first hundred days. Larry Summers, president of Harvard University, talks candidly about what he could have done differently in his early days to avoid dissipating goodwill among the diverse constituencies important for his future success. Gary Kusin of Kinko’s shares the specifics of the hundred-day action plan he crafted for himself before he started his new job. Paul Pressler of Gap Inc. shows how he developed a general strategic agenda that established fundamental principles and goals, waiting to prepare a more detailed strategic plan until later in his tenure.

Tom Neff and Jim Citrin’s actionable eight-point plan will be the foundation for your success—whether you are moving to a new organization or being promoted—showing how to:

• Prepare yourself mentally, physically, and emotionally from the time you accept until the time you begin
• Manage others’ expectationsof you—bosses, colleagues, and subordinates
• Shape and build the team that will work with you
• Learn the lay of the land and find out how things “really work around here”
• Communicate your story effectively to people inside and outside the organization
• Avoid the top ten traps that confront every new leader, such as disrespecting your predecessor, misreading the true sources of power in the organization, or succumbing to the “savior syndrome”

When you start a new job you are in what AOL’s Jon Miller calls a “temporary state of incompetence,” faced with having to do the most when you know the least. But with the eight-point plan of You’re in Charge—Now What? you’ll understand and be able to take action on the patterns that will build your success.

Also available as an eBook

Carrie Coolidge - Forbes

An ex-Havard prof claims two recruiters copied his how-to book. How can you tell?

Management advice is a book category that involves the recycling, repackaging and regurgitation of bromides. How many different ways can you say "Get close to the customer"? So now here comes what has to be a first: An author of a how-to book claiming his material was ripped off by another.

The book in question is You're in Charge-Now What?, written by two of the nation's most sought-after executive recruiters, Thomas J. Neff and James M. Citrin of search firm Spencer Stuart. Published recently by Crown, the book got gushy publicity-a seven-page excerpt in the Jan. 24 Fortune and favorable book reviews in Time and the Wall Street Journal. In January Citrin chatted with Today's Katie Couric about how new executives need to hit the ground running.

Michael Watkins, a former Harvard Business School professor, observed all this with gritted teeth. He says he has found "extensive parallels" between You're in Charge and two management books he wrote while at Har-vard: The First 90 Days: Critical Success Strategies for New Leaders at All Levels (2003) and Right from the Start: Taking Charge in a New Leadership Role (1999), which he co-wrote. Watkins says he's exploring a copyright infringement suit. An associate professor specializing in leadership and negotiation from 1996 to 2004, he is now a management consultant with Genesis Advisers, near Boston.

Outrageous, says Citrin, who insists he didn't even see Watkins' First 90 Days until after finishing You're in Charge. "I found it to be very different than our book and very academic," he says. Whatreally ticks off Neff and Citrin is that Watkins wrote a complaining letter to book-jacket endorsers, including Time Warner Chief Executive Richard Parsons. Now the two headhunters are consulting lawyers about possible defamation charges.

Watkins would likely have a tough case if he proceeds. You can copyright a sentence but not the ideas it repre-sents. He may be having regrets now anyway. Near our deadline Watkins said he was under "threat of legal action" from Crown and asked to retract his claims. Seems Watkins skipped over the media-advice section in You're in Charge that advises: "Don't try to come across as smarter than you are. You could get lucky-or you could be terri-bly embarrassed."

Publishers Weekly

For any manager in a new position, from CEO to department subhead, the title's question is of paramount importance. The authors of this seminal book, top brass at leading global executive search firm Spencer Stuart, answer it with a comprehensive approach to maximizing the first 100 days on the job, drawing dramatically on the experience of more than 50 chief executives (as well as other corporate personnel) interviewed in depth. The authors' clear, sound eight-point plan covers the bases of what incoming business leaders need to know, from how to prepare physically and mentally for the first 100 days to crafting a strategic agenda; dealing with and transforming corporate culture; shaping the management team; working with a boss or a board; and more. What truly distinguishes this book from available management volumes, besides its inspiring hit-the-ground-running approach, is the material gleaned from the chief executives (among them, for example, Gary Kusin of Kinko's; Paul Pressler of Gap Inc.; Jonathan F. Miller of AOL; Steve Bennett of Intuit), which is full of entertaining, enlightening first-person anecdotes. Notably, this material focuses on steps to avoid as well as on appropriate actions to take. Lawrence Summers, for instance, named president of Harvard University in 2001, recalls that he "didn't fully appreciate the importance of simply providing traditional institutional reassurance.... I failed to appreciate that if you're going to be questioning everybody and challenging everybody, you have to do a lot of reassuring in return." Near book's end, Neff and Citrin (Lessons from the Top, etc.) distill their plan into two principles: "Listen and Learn. Underpromise and overdeliver." Their expert elaboration of those principles throughout will make their work a guiding light to many an incoming manager. First serial to Fast Company. (Jan. 11) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

Consultants with the executive search firm Spencer Stuart, authors Neff and Citrin (Lessons from the Top: The Search for America's Best Business Leaders) provide an eight-point plan to help executives prepare for the CEO role. Thankfully, the authors eschew the glib hype found in many management titles for concrete tips that address aligning expectations with associates and board members, shaping their management team, crafting a strategic agenda, transforming the corporate culture, establishing a productive relationship with a board, and avoiding the top ten traps for new leaders. While the focus is on those assuming the duties of the CEO, this wise material will be of value to anyone newly appointed to a leadership position. Based on the authors' critical study of the successes and failures of hundreds of executives, this unique title is a praiseworthy gem in the saturated management genre. Highly recommended for all management and business collections, especially academic libraries supporting schools of business.-Dale Farris, Groves, TX Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.



No comments: