Thought leader and rattler of CEO’s cages, Lee Thayer, has done it again. In his newest book, from WME Books, he advises in his overview, “For all those who would presume to manage a human enterprise, there are two ways of succeeding. One is to get lucky. The other is to avoid failing.” According to Thayer, “There are also two ways of failing: One is to follow one’s peers, lemming-like down the slippery slope of mediocrity. The other is to be oblivious to what part of the problem you are.”
“Hardly anyone sets out to fail,” Thayer says. “But most managers and executives do fail. They fail their own hopes and aspirations, if not their roles.” This book, he goes on to note, offers insight into how to avoid failing – by turning the current flood of advice on how to succeed, upside-down.
Thayer’s inverted lessons will, in the end, show us that success is knowing how to be in the “learning mode,” to fulfill your “role,” and to go against pop psychology that says “tolerance is a virtue.“ As a follow-up to Thayer’s popular book, Leadership: Thinking, Being, Doing, How Executives Fail gives readers pause – in its 25 Surefire Recipes for Sabotaging Your Career.
Warren Bennis, Distinguished Professor of Business from the University of Southern California, says, “Habit is a great deadener and this book will help you break the ones that could fatally end your career (and ambitions). The best ‘insurance’ book on leadership I’ve read.”
Greg Novak, of Harris Interactive, writes, “If you’re a leader who, like me, is determined to create a great organization, this book will help you to avoid … failing.”
How Executives Fail is a perverse look at how to succeed in business today. Thayer takes the view that the world is a perverse place to live and do business, and unless you are perverse in kind, you risk following friends and colleagues down the path of mediocrity, a surefire path to failure. Rather than do so by default, he recommends doing so with intent, with dash, with aplomb.
James O’Toole, author of Creating the Good Life, writes, “Absolutely brilliant! Since you can’t learn luck, Thayer offers his readers a baker’s two dozen ways to ‘fail on purpose’ in this original, funny, and useful lilttle gem of a book.”
If your goal in life is to succeed, you need to read this book. If you’re caught up in disappointment and failure, you need to read this book. If you want to rattle cages [your own, your boss’s, your managers’], contact Lee Thayer and have him give his unique coaching in person by writing to us and requesting information on Thayer’s availability. For more fun and real interactive cage rattling, visit Thayer’s blog A Leader's Journey. Lee will be happy to engage you in conversation sure to expose life’s perversities in ways you never dreamed of.
Excellent article. I am going through a few of these issues as well..
Posted by: kredyt konsolidacyjny | October 18, 2013 at 02:35 PM