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The New How:

Creating Business Solutions Through Collaborative Strategy (Google eBook)
Front Cover
5 Reviews
O'Reilly Media, Inc., Jan 25, 2010 - Business & Economics - 288 pages

What people are saying about The New How

"How are you going to get rid of your Air Sandwich if you don't even know what it is? Provocative and practical at the same time."

--Seth Godin, author of Linchpin

"The New How is informative and provides exciting insights because the suggestions are practical and doable. Merchant gets the new reality--leadership fails not so much from flawed strategy as it does from failed processes of engagement from those responsible for implementing the strategy. In high-performing organizations, everyone acts like a leader, and they own the strategy and take actions to ensure its success. If you care about making a difference, read this book."

--Barry Posner, author of The Leadership Challenge

"Collaboration is a powerful, competitive weapon: this book shows you how to use it to win markets."

--Mark Interrante, VP Content Products, Yahoo, Inc.

"In a world in which the pace of change is ever quickening, collaboration, not control, is the route to a successful organization. This book tells you how to make your organization collaborative. And Nilofer Merchant's writing is a model of clarity."

--Barry Schwartz, author of The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less

"Want to transform your organization into a collaborative enterprise? Nilofer Merchant provides insightful and practical strategies in The New How."

--Padmasree Warrior, CTO, Cisco Systems, Inc.

"Merchant's book is a practical guide for the journey from strategy to implementation. The collaborative tools described here can help companies reach strategic success--and avoid pitfalls along the way."

--Tom Kelley, General Manager, IDEO, and author of Ten Faces of Innovation

Once in a generation, a book comes along that transforms the business landscape. For today's business leaders, The New How redefines the way companies create strategies and win new markets.

Management gurus have always said "people matter." But those same gurus still relegate strategy to an elite set of executives who focus on frameworks, long presentations, and hierarchical approaches. Business strategy typically has been planned by corporate chiefs in annual meetings, and then dictated to managers to carry out. The New How turns that notion on its head. After many years of working with Apple, Adobe, HP, and many other companies, Nilofer Merchant discovered the secret sauce: the best way to create a winning strategy is to include employees at all levels, helping to create strategy they not only believe in, but are also equipped to implement.

In The New How, Nilofer shows today's corporate directors, executives, and managers how they can transform their traditional, top-down approach to strategy planning and execution into collaborative "stratecution" that has proven to be significantly more effective.

  • Enhance performance and outcomes by deflating the "air sandwich" between executives in the boardroom and employees
  • Recognize that strategy and execution are thoroughly intertwined
  • Understand how successful strategy is founded in effective idea selection-a pile of good ideas doesn't necessarily build good strategy
  • Create company strategy and link it to targeted execution, using the practical models and techniques provided

  

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Review: The New How: Creating Business Solutions Through Collaborative Strategy

User Review  - Jerry - Goodreads

I found this book at TED in Long Beach. Business books like this are all the same and always different, too. The same because they all encourage openness, collaboration, truthfulness -- and then good ... Read full review

Review: The New How: Creating Business Solutions Through Collaborative Strategy

User Review  - Derek - Goodreads

Nilofer Merchant provides terrific, practical insights in "The NEw How" about collaboration and leadership, with many examples that are accessible and easy to implement. Her analysis of how ... Read full review

All 5 reviews »

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Contents

Why Strategies Fail
1
System Overload
21
Part I
39
Each of Us
41
As We Lead
69
Part II
101
Question
107
Envision
139
Part III
209
Collaborating to Win
211
Its What We Make of It
231
Acknowledgments
235
Tools
239
Resources
251
Notes
257
Index
259

Select
155
Take
193

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Common terms and phrases

About the author (2010)

Nilofer Merchant is the CEO of Rubicon Consulting and a noted strategist, global high-tech industry thought leader and trusted advisor to an elite set of entrepreneurs, officers and CEOs. Rubicon's founder, she has built a distinguished team of fellow strategists who collaborate with a wide range of Silicon Valley executives at client firms such as Adobe, Autodesk, Cogito, Hewlett-Packard, Pinnacle, Riverside, SAP, Symantec, VA Software, VMware and other firms. The proprietary Rubicon methodology Nilofer developed continuously delivers significant material results to clients, driving revenue growth, market share-price and profits. It resulted in an additional $28 million in profit over 6 months for one industry leader. Merchant founded Rubicon in 1999 after gaining fifteen years of operational experience in key leadership positions at iconic technology firms such as Apple, Autodesk, and GoLive (later acquired by Adobe). The experience she gained in pricing, product management, the channel, sales, marketing and revenue generation prepared her for the interdisciplinary deep listening and precise questioning that are at the heart of Rubicon's work today. Through her many successes (and some losses), Nilofer has honed her multidisciplinary approach for assessing a business situation clearly, applying critical wisdom, and defining a strategic direction. Her ability to put business history in context enables her to discern the right future moves. Nilofer's writing and ideation abilities have led to syndication with major business publishing entities. At conferences her energetic, approachable and pragmatic keynote speaking style helps people connect to her viewpoint whether their role is that of board member, grad student, engineer, marketer or business leader. Nilofer's forthcoming book on strategy will be published by O'Reilly Media in 2009. She has been published in AdAge, ChiefMarketer, MarketingProfs, RainToday, SandHill.com, The Pragmatic Marketer and many other publications. A keynote speaker at conferences for The Anita Borg Institute, Women in Technology International and SoftSummit, her speaking style is approachable and interactive. Audiences find her presentations practical, visionary and insightful. She has also spoken at Stanford University's School of Business, Santa Clara University's Leavey School of Business, AJAXWorld, EMC, PDMA, the SAP Research Forum, Symantec, and frequently gives private presentations for organizations. She holds an M.B.A. from Santa Clara University, a B.S. in Economics from University of San Francisco, and is an Interaction Associates-certified Instructor of Facilitative Leadership. Nilofer sits on Santa Clara University's Leavey School of Business Advisory Board. She contributes to her local church's strategy and stewardship plans, and has held the position of Chair of Community Fundraising and been a Board Member of the Cupertino YMCA. Early on, she was a Governor-appointee to the California Community College Board of Trustees - a position she held for an unusually long 3-year term. Nilofer and her husband enjoy the challenge of integrating the complexities of their respective high tech careers and personal interests with the demands of parenting.