The Advantage
Book

The Advantage

Why Organizational Health Trumps Everything Else in Business

Patrick Lencioni
Jossey-Bass, 2012

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Editorial Rating

6

Qualities

  • Well Structured
  • Concrete Examples

Recommendation

Management consultant and author Patrick Lencioni, known for his popular business fables, steps into straight exposition to explain how to handle complex business problems by building organizational health and relying on common-sense solutions. Yet few organizations practice what Lencioni preaches. Companies generally focus on traditional business areas rather than digging into the nitty-gritty of developing what Lencioni calls a “healthy organization.” He offers a step-by-step prescription – based on familiar nostrums – for improving corporate health. getAbstract recommends his casual, basic and accessible advice to new business leaders who want to build an effective organizational framework.

Summary

Is Your Organization Healthy?

Most executives are in their comfort zone working on business fundamentals like “strategy, marketing, finance and technology.” Yet all these areas will suffer if an organization is unhealthy. Healthy businesses operate with “minimal politics and confusion,” and with “high degrees of morale and productivity, and very low turnover.”

The benefits of organizational health are hard to quantify, so leaders often don’t even try to achieve it. They focus their time and energy on business staples, even if they recognize that being healthier could do a lot for their organization. Even those who recognize the damaging effects of infighting, confusion and low morale – problems that healthy organizations can avoid – would rather focus on business staples than deal with emotions or uncomfortable interactions.

Solid strategy and industry expertise can’t counterbalance the hazards of an unhealthy corporate culture. Firms with an unhealthy culture are less able to handle problems, recover from mistakes or respond to opportunities. High-functioning, healthy companies keep improving over time because they can progress without having to overcome...

About the Author

Patrick Lencioni, best-selling author of Death by Meeting, Getting Naked and The Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive, is president of The Table Group consultancy.

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