Foreword
Zoom out regularly and make systemic decisions
❝ it’s far better to zoom out and make a few big generic decisions that can apply to a large number of specific situations
Identify one big thing that would move the needle. Get it done.
❝ Identify one big thing that would most contribute to the future of the university and orchestrate getting it done
❝ What is the one absolutely fundamental contribution that would not happen without you?
To do list should not continually expand without being pruned too
❝ The presence of an ever-expanding to-do list without a robust stop-doing list is a lack of discipline. To focus on priorities means clearing away the clutter.
❝ as the organization grows, an increasing proportion of energy diverts to managing the internal mass rather than contributing to the outside world
Continually bring focus back to the "outside world", i.e. customers
❝ as the organization grows, an increasing proportion of energy diverts to managing the internal mass rather than contributing to the outside world
Focus on being useful, not on being successful
❝ The question is - how to be useful!
Preface
A key part of being an executive is being effective yourself
❝ Management is largely by example. Executives who do not know how to make themselves effective in their own job and work set the wrong example.
Introduction: What Makes an Effective Executive?
❝ What made them all effective is that they followed the same eight practices
Focus on one task
❝ But effective executives do not splinter themselves. They concentrate on one task if at all possible.
❝ I have never encountered an executive who remains effective while tackling more than two tasks at a time.
Set priorities and stick to them. After completing, reassess priorities.
❝ after asking what needs to be done, the effective executive sets priorities and sticks to them. For a CEO, the priority task might be redefining the
Ask if I am best suited to take on the priority. If so, take it on. Otherwise, delegate.
❝ Welch also thought through another issue before deciding where to concentrate his efforts for the next five years. He asked himself which of the two
❝ The action plan is a statement of intentions rather than a commitment. It must not become a straitjacket. It should be revised often, because every
The criteria of when a decision is made
❝ A decision has not been made until people know…
The importance of reviewing decisions
❝ It’s just as important to review decisions periodically—at a time that’s been agreed on in advance—as it is to make them carefully in the first plac
People decisions
❝ Such a review is especially important for the most crucial and most difficult of all decisions, the ones about hiring or promoting people. Studies o
❝ If they find that a decision has not had the desired results, they don’t conclude that the person has not performed. They conclude, instead, that th
❝ Executives also owe it to the organization and to their fellow workers not to tolerate nonperforming individuals in important jobs. It may not be th
❝ People who have failed in a new job should be given the choice to go back to a job at their former level and salary. This option is rarely exercised
❝ Very often it shows them that their decisions didn’t produce results because they didn’t put the right people on the job. Allocating the best people
❝ Most discussions of decision-making assume that only senior executives make decisions or that only senior executives’ decisions matter. This is a da
Organizations are held together by information rather than command
❝ We all know, thanks to Chester Barnard’s 1938 classic, The Functions of the Executive, that organizations are held together by information rather th
Focus on opportunities rather than problems
❝ Good executives focus on opportunities rather than problems. Problems have to be taken care of, of course; they must not be swept under the rug. But
❝ effective executives treat change as an opportunity rather than a threat. They systematically look at changes, inside and outside the corporation, a
❝ Effective executives also make sure that problems do not overwhelm opportunities. In most companies, the first page of the monthly management report
❝ Effective executives put their best people on opportunities rather than on problems.
❝ One way to staff for opportunities is to ask each member of the management group to prepare two lists every six months—a list of opportunities for t
Running effective meetings
❝ The key to running an effective meeting is to decide in advance what kind of meeting it will be. Different kinds of meetings require different forms
❝ A meeting whose only function is to allow the participants to be in the executive’s presence. Cardinal Spellman’s breakfast and dinner meetings were
❝ Making a meeting productive takes a good deal of self-discipline. It requires that executives determine what kind of meeting is appropriate and then
❝ At the beginning of a formal meeting, Sloan announced the meeting’s purpose. He then listened. He never took notes and he rarely spoke except to cla
Don't think or say "I"
❝ Don’t think or say “I.” Think and say “we.” Effective executives know that they have ultimate responsibility, which can be neither shared nor delega
Listen first, speak last
❝ We’ve just reviewed eight practices of effective executives. I’m going to throw in one final, bonus practice. This one’s so important that I’ll elev
Chapter 1: Effectiveness Can Be Learned
Getting the right things done
❝ the executive is, first of all, expected to get the right things done. And this is simply that he is expected to be effective.
❝ Working on the right things is what makes knowledge work effective. This is not capable of being measured by any of the yardsticks for manual work.
Knowledge workers must be self-directed
❝ The knowledge worker cannot be supervised closely or in detail. He can only be helped. But he must direct himself, and he must direct himself toward
Executives can be managers or nonmanagers
❝ Most managers are executives—though not all. But many nonmanagers are also becoming executives in modern society. For the knowledge organization, as
Executives are those who are expected to have a significant impact on results
❝ I have called “executives” those knowledge workers, managers, or individual professionals who are expected by virtue of their position or their know
By default, executives' time belongs to everyone else
❝ The executive’s time tends to belong to everybody else. If one attempted to define an “executive” operationally (that is, through his activities) on
❝ Executives are forced to keep on “operating” unless they take positive action to change the reality in which they live and work.
❝ the complaint is common that the company president—or any other senior officer—still continues to run marketing or the plant, even though he is now
❝ The fundamental problem is the reality around the executive. Unless he changes it by deliberate action, the flow of events will determine what he is
❝ events rarely tell the executive anything, let alone the real problem. For the doctor, the patient’s complaint is central because it is central to t
❝ If the executive lets the flow of events determine what he does, what he works on, and what he takes seriously, he will fritter himself away “operat
There are no results within the organization
❝ Every executive, whether his organization is a business or a research laboratory, a government agency, a large university, or the air force, sees th
❝ there are no results within the organization. All the results are on the outside. The only business results, for instance, are produced by a custome
❝ it is the inside of the organization that is most visible to the executive. It is the inside that has immediacy for him. Its relations and contacts,
❝ An organization, a social artifact, is very different from a biological organism. Yet it stands under the law that governs the structure and size of
Effectiveness is a habit and set of practices, and can be learned
❝ Effectiveness, in other words, is a habit; that is, a complex of practices. And practices can always be learned. Practices are simple, deceptively s
❝ Practices one learns by practicing and practicing and practicing again.
❝ even the great pianists could not play Mozart as they do unless they practiced their scales and kept on practicing them.
❝ Mastery might well elude him; for this one might need special talents. But what is needed in effectiveness is competence. What is needed are “the sc
The key elements of being an effective executive
❝ Effective executives know where their time goes. They work systematically at managing the little of their time that can be brought under their contr
❝ Effective executives focus on outward contribution. They gear their efforts to results rather than to work. They start out with the question, “What
❝ Effective executives build on strengths—their own strengths, the strengths of their superiors, colleagues, and subordinates; and on the strengths in
❝ Effective executives concentrate on the few major areas where superior performance will produce outstanding results. They force themselves to set pr
❝ They know that an effective decision is always a judgment based on “dissenting opinions” rather than on “consensus on the facts.” And they know that
❝ What is needed are few, but fundamental, decisions. What is needed is the right strategy rather than razzle-dazzle tactics.
Chapter 2: Know Thy Time
Executives start with their time rather than their tasks
❝ Effective executives, in my observation, do not start with their tasks. They start with their time. And they do not start out with planning. hey start by finding out where their time actually goes.
3 steps: record time, manage time, consolidate time
❝ This three-step process- • recording time, • managing time, and • consolidating time is the foundation of executive effectiveness.
Time is the limiting factor
❝ Effective executives know that time is the limiting factor. The output limits of any process are set by the scarcest resource. In the process we cal
❝ Everything requires time. It is the one truly universal condition. All work takes place in time and uses up time. Yet most people take for granted t
Executives must know where their time goes
❝ The effective executive therefore knows that to manage his time, he first has to know where it actually goes.
Many tasks contribute nothing or little; most valuable tasks require a lot of time
❝ In every executive job, a large part of the time must therefore be wasted on things which, though they apparently have to be done, contribute nothin
❝ To write a report may, for instance, require six or eight hours, at least for the first draft. It is pointless to give seven hours to the task by sp
❝ To be effective, every knowledge worker, and especially every executive, therefore needs to be able to dispose of time in fairly large chunks. To ha
❝ To spend a few minutes with people is simply not productive. If one wants to get anything across, one has to spend a fairly large minimum quantum of
❝ Wherever knowledge workers perform well in large organizations, senior executives take time out, on a regular schedule, to sit down with them, somet
It's only possible to manage a few people if those people need to come together
❝ Management literature has long known the theorem of “the span of control,” which asserts that one man can manage only a few people if these people h
Make personnel decisions slowly
❝ Among the effective executives I have had occasion to observe, there have been people who make decisions fast, and people who make them rather slowl
❝ Alfred P. Sloan, Jr., former head of General Motors, the world’s largest manufacturing company, was reported never to make a personnel decision the
❝ all effective executives I have had occasion to observe have learned that they have to give several hours of continuous and uninterrupted thought to
Time is required in large uninterrupted quantities to make important and impactful decisions
❝ Time in large, continuous, and uninterrupted units is needed for such decisions as whom to put on a task force set up to study a specific problem; w
People are always "almost fits". To get work done with people requires time, thought, and judgement
❝ People-decisions are time-consuming, for the simple reason that the Lord did not create people as “resources” for organization. They do not come in
The only quick work is work that you already know and have done before
❝ All one can think and do in a short time is to think what one already knows and to do as one has always done.
To manage your time, you first need to know where it goes
❝ one cannot even think of managing one’s time unless one first knows where it goes.
Time tracking must be done in real-time, not after the fact
❝ The specific method in which the record is put together need not concern us here. There are executives who keep such a time log themselves. Others,
Even with regular reworking of where time goes, drifting will happen, so managing time requires constant effort
❝ At a minimum, effective executives have the log run on themselves for three to four weeks at a stretch twice a year or so, on a regular schedule. Af
First eliminate work that does not need to be done at all
❝ First one tries to identify and eliminate the things that need not be done at all, the things that are purely waste of time without any results what
Learn to say no
❝ Actually, all one has to do is to learn to say “no” if an activity contributes nothing to one’s own organization, to oneself, or to the organization
A quarter of work can likely be eliminated
❝ I have yet to see an executive, regardless of rank or station, who could not consign something like a quarter of the demands on his time to the wast
Delegate items that could be done just as well or better by someone else
❝ The next question is- “Which of the activities on my time log could be done by somebody else just as well, if not better?”
Do not "delegate" to give someone else part of "my work"; people are paid to do their own work
❝ There has been for years a great deal of talk about “delegation” in management. Every manager, whatever the organization—business, government, unive
There is not enough time to do what is important. The only way to get to the important things is to enable others to do anything they can do.
❝ The first look at the time record makes it abundantly clear that there just is not time enough to do the things the executive himself considers impo
❝ “Delegation” as the term is customarily used is a misunderstanding—is indeed misdirection. But getting rid of anything that can be done by somebody
Ask others "what do I do that wastes your time?"
❝ Effective executives have learned to ask systematically and without coyness- “What do I do that wastes your time without contributing to your effect
Don't be afraid to cut too much as it's easy to correct
❝ Many executives know all about these unproductive and unnecessary time demands; yet they are afraid to prune them. They are afraid to cut out someth
❝ there is not much risk that an executive will cut back too much. We usually tend to overrate rather than underrate our importance and to conclude th
When a workforce is too big, it spends an increasing amount of time "interacting", and there are more people problems
❝ A work force may, indeed, be too small for the task. And the work then suffers, if it gets done at all. But this is not the rule. Much more common i
❝ There is a fairly reliable symptom of overstaffing. If the senior people in the group—and of course the manager in particular—spend more than a smal
❝ In a lean organization people have room to move without colliding with one another and can do their work without having to explain it all the time.
Specialists with infrequently needed skills should remain outside the organization
❝ One should only have on a team the knowledges and skills that are needed day in and day out for the bulk of the work. Specialists that may be needed
Meetings
❝ Meetings are by definition a concession to deficient organization for one either meets or one works. One cannot do both at the same time. In an idea
❝ if executives in an organization spend more than a fairly small part of their time in meeting, it is a sure sign of malorganization.
❝ An organization in which everybody meets all the time is an organization in which no one gets anything done.
❝ Wherever a time log shows the fatty degeneration of meetings—whenever, for instance, people in an organization find themselves in meetings a quarter
❝ As a rule, meetings should never be allowed to become the main demand on an executive’s time. Too many meetings always bespeak poor structure of job
❝ Too many meetings signify that work that should be in one job or in one component is spread over several jobs or several components. They signify th
Reducing time-waste is worthwhile
❝ Time-wasting management defects such as overstaffing, malorganization, or malfunctioning information can sometimes be remedied fast. At other times,
It's important to have discretionary time
❝ The executive who records and analyzes his time and then attempts to manage it can determine how much he has for his important tasks. How much time
An hour and a half
❝ After this had been going on for about one year, I finally asked him, “Why always an hour and a half?” He answered, “That’s easy. I have found out t
The larger the organization, the more time just to keep it going
❝ The larger the organization, the more time will be needed just to keep the organization together and running, rather than to make it function and pr
Large amounts of time are needed, small chunks of time are no time at all
❝ The effective executive therefore knows that he has to consolidate his discretionary time. He knows that he needs large chunks of time and that smal
It's a good plan to do important work first, and do it in the morning rather than in the evening
❝ One of the most effective executives in Professor Sune Carlson’s study, mentioned above, spent ninety minutes each morning before going to work in a
Protect and continually reclaim discretionary time
❝ Effective executives start out by estimating how much discretionary time they can realistically call their own. Then they set aside continuous time
Continually manage time
❝ all effective executives control their time management perpetually. They not only keep a continuing log and analyze it periodically. They set themse
Chapter 3: What Can I Contribute?
Focus on contribution and results rather than effort and what you should get from the organization
❝ The great majority of executives tend to focus downward. They are occupied with efforts rather than with results. They worry over what the organizat
❝ The man who focuses on efforts and who stresses his downward authority is a subordinate no matter how exalted his title and rank. But the man who fo
❝ The focus on contribution turns the executive’s attention away from his own specialty, his own narrow skills, his own department, and toward the per
❝ To ask, “What can I contribute?” is to look for the unused potential in the job. And what is considered excellent performance in a good many positio
Performance is needed in 3 areas: direct results, building and affirming of values, developing people for tomorrow
❝ every organization needs performance in three major areas- It needs direct results; building of values and their reaffirmation; and building and dev
Direct results must come first. But values are vital too.
❝ Direct results always come first. In the care and feeding of an organization, they play the role calories play in the nutrition of the human body. B
Focus on direct results is a powerful way to develop people
❝ An executive’s focus on contribution by itself is a powerful force in developing people. People adjust to the level of the demands made on them. The
❝ Executives in an organization do not have good human relations because they have a “talent for people.” They have good human relations because they
❝ The focus on contribution by itself supplies the four basic requirements of effective human relations- • communications; • teamwork; • self-developm
❝ Knowledge workers must be professionals in their attitude toward their own field of knowledge. They must consider themselves responsible for their o
Chapter 4: Making Strength Productive
❝ To make strength productive is the unique purpose of organization. It cannot, of course, overcome the weaknesses with which each of us is abundantly
Chapter 5: First Things First
❝ IF THERE IS ANY ONE “secret” of effectiveness, it is concentration. Effective executives do first things first and they do one thing at a time.
Chapter 6: The Elements of Decision Making
❝ Effective executives do not make a great many decisions. They concentrate on the important ones.
❝ 1. The clear realization that the problem was generic and could only be solved through a decision which established a rule, a principle;
❝ 2. The definition of the specifications which the answer to the problem had to satisfy, that is, of the “boundary conditions”;
❝ 3. The thinking through what is “right,” that is, the solution which will fully satisfy the specifications before attention is given to the compromi
❝ 4. The building into the decision of the action to carry it out;
❝ 5. The “feedback” which tests the validity and effectiveness of the decision against the actual course of events.
Chapter 7: Effective Decisions
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