In this unprecedented study of America's leading executives, John Kotter shatters the popular management notion of the effective "generalist" manager who can step into any business or division and run it. Based on his first-hand observations of fifteen top GMs from nine major companies, Kotter persuasively shows that the best manager is actually a specialist who has spent most of his or her career in one industry, learning its intricacies and establishing cooperative working relationships. Acquiring the painstaking knowledge and large, informal networks vital to being a successful manager takes years; outsiders, no matter how talented or well-trained seldom can do as well, this in-depth profile reveals. Much more than a fascinating collective portrait of the day-to-day activities of today's top executives, The General Managers provides stimulating new insights into the nature of modern management and the tactics of its most accomplished practitioners.

The General Managers

Business & Money

Kotter, John P.

Business Culture

Free Press

In today's complex work world, things no longer get done simply because someone issues an order and someone else follows it.
Most of us work in socially intricate organizations where we need the help not only of subordinates but of colleagues, superiors, and outsiders to accomplish our goals. This often leaves us in a "power gap" because we must depend on people over whom we have little or no explicit control.
This is a book about how to bridge that gap: how to exercise the power and influence you need to get things done through others when your responsibilities exceed your formal authority.
Full of original ideas and expert insights about how organizations?and the people in them?function, Power and Influence goes further, demonstrating that lower-level personnel also need strong leadership skills and interpersonal know-how to perform well.
Kotter shows how you can develop sufficient resources of "unofficial" power and influence to achieve goals, steer clear of conflicts, foster creative team behavior, and gain the cooperation and support you need from subordinates, coworkers, superiors?even people outside your department or organization.
He also shows how you can avoid the twin traps of naivete and cynicism when dealing with power relationships, and how to use your power without abusing it.
Power and Influence is essential for top managers who need to overcome the infighting, foot-dragging, and politicking that can destroy both morale and profits; for middle managers who don't want their careers sidetracked by unproductive power struggles; for professionals hindered by bureaucratic obstacles and deadline delays; and for staff workers who have to "manage the boss."
This is not a book for those who want to "grab" power for their own ends. But if you'd like to create smooth, responsive working relationships and increase your personal effectiveness on the job, Kotter can show you how?and make the dynamics of power work for you instead of against you.

Power and Influence

Management & Leadership

Explains how companies can recognize and promote leadership qualities, looks at examples of good and poor leadership, and includes suggestions on long range goals

The Leadership Factor

John P. Kotter shows with compelling evidence what leadership really means today, why it is rarely associated with larger-than-life charismatics, precisely how it is different from management, and yet why both good leadership and management are essential for business success, especially for complex organizations operating in changing environments. The critics who despair of the coming of imaginative, charismatic leaders to replace the so-called manipulative caretakers of American corporations don't tell us much about what leadership actually is, or, for that matter, what management is either. Leadership, Kotter clearly demonstrates, is for the most part not a god-like figure transforming subordinates into superhumans, but is in fact a process that creates change -- a process which often involves hundreds or even thousands of "little acts of leadership" orchestrated by people who have the profound insight to realize this. Building on his landmark study of 15 successful general managers, Kotter presents detailed accounts of how senior and middle managers in major corporations, in close concert with colleagues and subordinates, were able to create a leadership process that put into action hundreds of commonsense ideas and procedures that, in combination with competent management, produced extraordinary results. This leadership turned NCR from a loser to a big winner in automated teller machines, despite intense competition from IBM. The same process at American Express and SAS helped businesses grow dramatically despite the fact that they were "mature" and "commodity-like." Kotter also shows how leadership turned around operations at P&amp;G and Kodak; produced huge business successes at PepsiCo, ARCO, and ConAgra; and made the impossible occasionally happen at Digital. Thousands of companies today are overmanaged and underled, John Kotter concludes, not because managers lack charisma, but because far too few executives have a clear understanding of what leadership is and what it can accomplish. Without such a vision, even the most capable people have great difficulty trying to lead effectively and to create the cultures which will help others to lead.

Force For Change: How Leadership Differs from Management

Draws from research at such firms as Hewlett-Packard, Xerox, ICI, and Nissan to show how the culture--shared beliefs, attitudes, and practices--of a company can influence its performance for better or worse.

Corporate Culture and Performance

Biography & History

Leading Change

McGraw-Hill Companies

This volume offers conceptual frameworks for matching individual skills and preferences with job demands and requirements.

Self-assessment and career development

Job Hunting & Careers

PRENTICE/HALL

Self-Assessment and Career Development (3rd Edition)

Clawson, James G.

Faux, Victor

McArthur, Charles C.

Pearson College Div

A member of the AWL OD Series! This book offers managers and OD specialists a powerful way of diagnosing organizational problems and of deciding when, where, and how to use (or not use) the diverse and growing number of organizational improvement tools that are available today. Comprehensive and fully integrated, the book includes many different concepts, research findings, and competing philosophies and provides specific examples of how to use the information to improve organizational functioning.

Organizational Dynamics: Diagnosis and Intervention

Ft Pr

Organization: Text, Cases, and Readings on the Management of Organizational Design and Change (Irwin Series in Insurance and Economic Security)

R.D. Irwin

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Books by Kotter, John P.