Who Really Matters: The Core Group Theory of Power, Privilege and Success - Softcover

Kleiner, Art

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1857883357 ISBN 13: 9781857883350

Publisher: Nicholas Brealey Publishing, 2003

Synopsis

When corporate leaders announce, with seeming sincerity that they make their decisions on behalf of their shareholders, their words are taken at face value. But as recent news stories prove, this imperative is routinely violated. In Who Really Matters Art Kleiner argues that the dissonance between a declared mission and actual operation can be seen in both large and small organistions. All organisations have one motive in common: everything they do - choosing which projects to back, who to promote, where to spend the money is affected by the perceived wants and needs of a core group of key people. The composition of the core group can differ from organisation to organisation. Often the most senior people in the hierarchy are members - but not always. Sometimes the people who matter can extend far down the corporate ladder, as well as reach outside the company to include key customers, union leaders and stock holders. Kleiner gives readers the key to reading a core group's real mission by observing its day-to-day actions, including what its fundamental message to employees is and how it gets that message across: how it manages the energy of new members, what basic ideas shape its policies, about management, money and the way the world works, and what taboos govern the way it operates.

About this title

About the Author

Art Kleiner is a contributing editor at strategy + business magazine and the author of The Age of Heretics, which was runner up for the Edgar G Booz Award for the most innovative business book of 1996. He also coordinator and was lead writer on The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook, The Dance of Change and Schools That Learn.

From the Inside Flap

"Art Kleiner has uncovered a central truth about the way organizations work. His concept of the Core Group clarifies one key reason why rational people
often act in seemingly irrational ways within the confines of an institution. Like any deep insight, it makes explicable what had previously been mysterious." Jim Collins, author of Good to Great and coauthor of Built to Last

"Fresh, pragmatic, wise and eminently accessible . . . Who Really Matters cuts through our needlessly complex views of organizations and brilliantly
reveals what s at the core of both their promise and dysfunction. Kleiner s astute and grounded analysis makes it possible for all of us who work within
or around organizations to be more skillful and successful while maintaining our personal values and purposes." James Flaherty, founder of New Ventures West and author of Coaching: Evoking Excellence in Others

"Provides a much needed new perspective on leadership, power, and authority in showing clearly how Core Groups unconsciously guide and control
organizations. This is a must read for all managers and would-be leaders." Edgar H. Schein, Sloan Fellows Professor of Management Emeritus, MIT Sloan School of Management

"This original and carefully-argued text suggests how to penetrate the apparent and understand the real driver of corporate conduct. Most important are the practical suggestions for how to effect change. This addition to the conventional wisdom should be part of everyone s library buy it!" Robert A. G. Monks, shareholder activist and author of Corporate Governance and The New Global Investor

Edition details

• Publisher: Nicholas Brealey Publishing
• Publication date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1857883357
• ISBN 13: 9781857883350
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 292