Philip M. Rosenzweig

Much of our business thinking is shaped by delusions -- errors of logic and flawed judgments that distort our understanding of the real reasons for a company's performance. In a brilliant and unconventional book, Phil Rosenzweig unmasks the delusions that are commonly found in the corporate world. These delusions affect the business press and academic research, as well as many bestselling books that promise to reveal the secrets of success or the path to greatness. Such books claim to be based on rigorous thinking, but operate mainly at the level of storytelling. They provide comfort and inspiration, but deceive managers about the true nature of business success.The most pervasive delusion is the Halo Effect. When a company's sales and profits are up, people often conclude that it has a brilliant strategy, a visionary leader, capable employees, and a superb corporate culture. When performance falters, they conclude that the strategy was wrong, the leader became arrogant, the people were complacent, and the culture was stagnant. In fact, little may have changed -- company performance creates a Halo that shapes the way we perceive strategy, leadership, people, culture, and more.Drawing on examples from leading companies including Cisco Systems, IBM, Nokia, and ABB, Rosenzweig shows how the Halo Effect is widespread, undermining the usefulness of business bestsellers from "In Search of Excellence" to "Built to Last" and "Good to Great."Rosenzweig identifies nine popular business delusions. Among them:"The Delusion of Absolute Performance: " Company performance is relative to competition, not absolute, which is why following a formula can never guarantee results. Success comes from doing things better than rivals, which means that managers have to take risks."The Delusion of Rigorous Research: " Many bestselling authors praise themselves for the vast amount of data they have gathered, but forget that if the data aren't valid, it doesn't matter how much was gathered or how sophisticated the research methods appear to be. They trick the reader by substituting sizzle for substance."The Delusion of Single Explanations: " Many studies show that a particular factor, such as corporate culture or social responsibility or customer focus, leads to improved performance. But since many of these factors are highly correlated, the effect of each one is usually less than suggested.In what promises to be a landmark book, "The Halo Effect" replaces mistaken thinking with a sharper understanding of what drives business success and failure. "The Halo Effect" is a guide for the thinking manager, a way to detect errors in business research and to reach a clearer understanding of what drives business success and failure.Skeptical, brilliant, iconoclastic, and mercifully free of business jargon, Rosenzweig's book is nevertheless dead serious, making his arguments about important issues in an unsparing and direct way that will appeal to a broad business audience. For managers who want to separate fact from fiction in the world of business, "The Halo Effect" is essential reading -- witty, often funny, and sharply argued, it's an antidote to so much of the conventional thinking that clutters business bookshelves.

Left Brain, Right Stuff takes up where other books about decision making leave off. For many routine choices, from shopping to investing, we can make good decisions simply by avoiding common errors, such as searching only for confirming information or avoiding the hindsight bias. But as Phil Rosenzweig shows, for many of the most important, more complex situations we face--in business, sports, politics, and more--a different way of thinking is required. Leaders must possess the ability to shape opinions, inspire followers, manage risk, and outmaneuver and outperform rivals. Making winning decisions calls for a combination of skills: clear analysis and calculation--left brain--as well as the willingness to push boundaries and take bold action--right stuff. Of course leaders need to understand the dynamics of competition, to anticipate rival moves, to draw on the power of statistical analysis, and to be aware of common decision errors--all features of left brain thinking. But to achieve the unprecedented in real-world situations, much more is needed. Leaders also need the right stuff. In business, they have to devise plans and inspire followers for successful execution; in politics, they must mobilize popular support for a chosen program; in the military, commanders need to commit to a battle strategy and lead their troops; and in start-ups, entrepreneurs must manage risk when success is uncertain. In every case, success calls for action as well as analysis, and for courage as well as calculation. Always entertaining, often surprising, and immensely practical, Left Brain, Right Stuff draws on a wealth of examples in order to propose a new paradigm for decision making in synch with the way we have to operate in the real world. Rosenzweig's smart and perceptive analysis of research provides fresh, and often surprising, insights on topics such as confidence and overconfidence, the uses and limits of decision models, the illusion of control, expert performance and deliberate practice, competitive bidding and new venture management, and the true nature of leadership.

The third title from Executive Development from IMD is devoted toAccelerating International Growth, one of today's most crucialbusiness challenges. It provides the knowledge and the tools neededto speed up the development process and reach a stronger globalposition efficiently and quickly, and is firmly focused onanswering the real questions facing leading companies as theyundertake expansion in the field. Accelerating International Growthfocuses on the strategic, organizational and human aspects ofinternational growth. The book is aimed at practising managers incompanies that are either in the process of expandinginternationally, or are considering whether to do so.Philip Rosenzweig and his IMD colleagues combine a thoroughconceptual understanding of the attractions and challenges ofinternational growth with a practical explanation of the keyelements of successful implementation. Foreign entry modes,managing entry and post-entry phases, cross-border joint ventures,organizational learning, and human resource management are allexplored in detail. Readers will emerge with the skills to clearlyunderstand what drives the process, identify the key challenges,and avoid the greatest pitfalls.

マネジメントに関する本の大半は「企業パフォーマンスを向上させるにはどうすればよいか」をテーマにしている。本書はそれに対し、「こうすれば成功する」というような公式は存在しないと主張する。著者は、経営戦略のプロやコンサルタントや教授や記者などの専門家がなぜ頻繁に間違いを犯すのかを示し、ビジネス誌や学術調査や最近のベストセラーなど、あちこちに見られる妄想を暴いてみせる。「ハロー効果」とは、企業の全体的な業績を見て、それにもとづいてその企業の文化やリーダーシップや価値観などを評価する傾向のこと。業績のよい企業が、すべての面で高く評価されがちな妄想を、後光(ハロー)が射していることになぞらえた表現である。

A breakthrough book about how to optimize decision-making in business showing that to achieve the highest performance managers must sometimes act in ways that seem overconfident and make choices that might seem irrational. A great deal has been written in recent years about how irrational human decision-making is, plagued by systematic biases and illusions, such as overconfidence, that inflict great costs in many areas of life. But as Phil Rosenzweig, the critically acclaimed author of The Halo Effect , which Nicholas Nassim Taleb called “one of the most important management books of all time,” shows in this groundbreaking book, when it comes to managerial decision-making, some of the ways of thinking and behaving that have been described as irrational are important in certain circumstances in order to achieve optimal performance. Rosenzweig shows that the judgments managers have to make are different from so much of everyday judgment because managers don’t just choose from possible outcomes but must actually shape outcomes. This means that in order to succeed, managers must often be willing to act with a degree of confidence that might seem excessive, they must inspire people to achieve, they must not allow the odds dictate to them, and they must sometimes make decisions that might seem highly risky in order to prevail against competitors. The key, Rosenzweig shows, is knowing how to switch at the right times from a deliberate, analytical mindset to an implemental, winning mindset, and through lively storytelling about a host of real-life business stories, he explains how to determine which circumstances require which mindset. Judgment 3.0 is a major contribution to the study of decision-making and essential reading for all managers.

Un ouvrage au carrefour du management et de la psychologie, qui ne dit pas ce qu’il faut faire, mais explique pourquoi ceux qui prétendent dire ce qu’il faut faire se trompent aussi souvent…