Making Strategy Work: Lessons Learned - Straight Talk From the World's top Business Leaders (Harvard Lessons Learned) [Paperback]

'Making Strategy Work (Lessons Learned: Straight Talk from the World's Top Business Leaders)',
by Harvard Business Press/Fifty Lessons;

In a nut shell, 'Making Strategy Work' is actually what I would call a small booklet, just under 100 pages. It has been created as part of a new book series by Harvard Business Press in partnership with Fifty Lessons, a leading provider of digital media content.

The series showcases the accumulated wisdom of some of the world's best known experts &/or CEOs, with insights into how they think, approach new challenges & use hard-won lessons from experience to shape their leadership philosophies.

Interestingly, each book draws from the Fifty Lessons' extensive video library of interviews with the experts &/or CEOs.

From what I have gathered, there are now ten books in the current series. 'Making Strategy Work' is one.

The others being:

- 'Leading by Example';
- 'Managing Change';
- 'Managing Your Career';
- 'Managing Conflict';
- 'Starting a Business';
- 'Hiring & Firing';
- 'Making the Sale';
- 'Executing for Results';
- 'Sparking Innovation';

Reading 'Making Strategy Work' reminds me of the bi-weekly digest known as 'Boardroom Reports', which I had subscribed faithfully during the seventies & eighties.

In those days, 'Boardroom Reports' offered the then-novel notion that simple insider information on how to run a business more effectively would be helpful to businesspeople.

Today, 'Boardroom Reports' doesn't exist anymore, but had splintered into other print periodicals, online newsletters & dozen of books. For more information, please visit the Bottomlinesecrets website.

Unfortunately, I regret to point out that 'Making Strategy Work' is only a small fraction of the 'Boardroom Reports'.

Frankly, I thought that it would have made more sense for the publisher to combine all the ten volumes into one large book, just like what 'Boardroom Reports' had done with their 'Book of Business Knowledge' &/or 'Book of Insider Information', which contained all the greatest hits from their bi-weekly digests.

In fact, the reader, like me, would have been more appreciative, in addition to enjoying substantial savings from the economics standpoint.

As it stands, 'Making Strategy Work' contains the powerful stories, in brisk format, from Sanjiv Ahuja, Jay Conger, Roger Parry, David Brandon, Philip Kotler, Clayton Christensen, Lynda Cratton, Mary Cantando, Prof Robert Sutton, Prof Jeffrey Pfeffer, Stuart Grief, Domenico De Sole, Sir John Egan, & John Whybrow.

I particularly like the first story from Sanjiv Ahuja, Chairman, Orange UK, one of the world's leading communications companies, in which he remarked beautifully:

". . .The way I look at it, if you can articulate your strategy in a one-minute elevator ride or put it on a single piece of paper - & that too without a lot of commas or semicolons in how you describe it - then you have a strategy that can be executed & worked upon. . ."

This really sets the appropriate tone for the rest of the entire book or booklet.

What the publisher has done in this book - I presume it also applies in the nine remaining books of the series - is great, especially for the reader:

At the end of each story, the key insights are captured in 'Takeaways'. In principle, a business reader can just read the 'Takeaways' of each story, without losing much substance.

Hence, reading is really a breeze! In fact, it is specifically for this reason that I feel that the publisher should have make a big book covering all the ten volumes in the first instance.

Nonetheless, I also have one complaint to make:

At the end of the book, there is a given code for the reader to gain exclusive free access to watch some bonus videos on the Fifty Lessons website. Mine didn't work.

The only good point about the videos is that they are inexpensive to pay to watch.

[Reviewed by Lee Say Keng, Knowledge Adventurer & Technology Explorer, January 2009]