The Management Mythbuster

The Management Mythbuster - Review

A wonderful review of the Management Mythbuster - thank you. Check out the full details at Amazon.

"It's as if he has been following me around for much of my career, transcribing surreal conversations and documenting odd thought processes which ultimately keep me motivated to always have an up to date resume. Seriously, Axson clearly has been there and heard that.  His book alternates between telling the fictitious story of a company as its managers absurdly act out every management fad of the past several generations, followed with a good dose of sage advice and observations on how to avoid those pitfalls.  It's frequently humorous and often funny in a very uncomfortable way, as it hits close to home for those of us who have lived through such experiences.
Many readers will no doubt agree with Axson's assertion that "all sense of perspective has disappeared from the practice of management. Common sense has been subjugated by nonsense.

Even as I write this review, I am engaged in activities of questionable value involving consultants, forecasting, strategic planning, etc., so the book serves as a cautionary tale and reminder for the need to step away from the kool-aid and smell the coffee so to speak. Most business books ultimately disappoint me, but The Management Mythbuster is an excellent read, providing a bit of catharsis for anyone who may have become just a little cynical over the years, even though you know in your heart that you are your employer's most valuable asset."

Management Mythbuster podcast at StrategyDriven.com

Just completed an interview with Nathan Ives at StrategyDriven on the Management Mythbuster and the implications for today's managers. We discuss why many of today's common practices are no longer relevant, the dubious value of mission and vision statements, how to balance short and long term incentives, and much more! Listen to the full interview here.

Did you know Andrew Carnegie built the first Data Warehouse?

I am currently reading David Nasaw's biography of Andrew Carnegie and found the following passage fascinating in light of today's obsession with data.  

"American railroads...were the first complex business enterprises to employ the principles of accounting to keep track of their far-flung operations. The Pennsylvania (Railroad, where Carnegie worked in the 1850's) was maintaining 144 different sets of accounting records by 1857."

Sounds rather complex, especially in the days before the ERP system or even the spreadsheet. However, Nasaw's description continues:

"Almost manically detailed data was compiled, month by month, station by station, division by division on every category of expenditure." This sounds like a multi-dimensional database to me. But there's more:

"Division superintendents kept separate records on each locomotive engine, with information on its builders, the date it went into service, its size, weight (loaded and unloaded), miles run with different types of equipment, total cost, cost per 100 miles for repairs, fuel, fluid, oil, waste and tallow."  This must have been the fixed asset register and the first set of key performance indicators (KPI's) which were supplemented by the always crucial customer data: 

"They recorded how many passengers entered and left each station each month, where they were bound, and whether they were locally or transferring to another railway."  Obviously, the makings of a customer information system!  

So there we have it, a data warehouse from the 1850's designed by one of the first business titans of the Industrial Age. As I read on it was interesting to note one difference from many of today's mind-numbing data silos was that Carnegie and his colleagues actually did something with the data as Nasaw explains:

"Together (Carnegie and his boss, Tom Scott) the two men steadily cut unit costs and increased revenues by investing in capital improvements -  new and larger locomotives, better braking systems, improved tracks, new bridges. Instead of running several smaller trains along the same route, they ran fewer but longer trains with larger locomotives and freight cars. To minimize delays - a major factor in escalating costs - they erected their own telegraph lines, built a second track and expanded sidings alongside the first one."

Now if they could do all this 150 years ago, why does it appear so hard to many organizations today?  

The Management Mythbuster - Pay For Performance?

My new book The Management Mythbuster is published today!  Here is a brief extract from the chapter on incentive compensation one of the most emotive subjects in business today.

"The principle of paying for performance is elegant and simple. Sport has done it for years. However, in the corporate world, the problems start with the most basic element. Most organizations still insist on setting goals, targets, or budgets that determine rewards. If performance meets or exceeds the standard, bounteous rewards will be paid out. Once this principle is adopted, the rot has already set in. It is both naïve and stupid to believe that a fi xed performance target set months, or sometimes years, in advance of the measurement period will remain relevant given the uncertainty and volatility that are inherent in today’s world. However, this is not the only problem. The setting of fixed incentive targets destroys what should be one of the most valuable of all management processes — planning.

Planning is supposed to be an exercise in developing tactics, allocating resources, and optimizing performance to meet strategic goals. As soon as people understand that their personal rewards will be tied to the outcome, it immediately becomes a game to negotiate a set of performance targets that set the lowest bar possible for maximizing compensation."

Download the complete chapter for free here or order your personally signed copy at www.sonaxbooks.com

Some things change, others don't - or Nevil Shute revisited

A few weeks ago I dug out a bunch of my father's favourite paperbacks. I remember as a kid he talked about Nevil Shute as one of his favourite authors. Shute is largely forgotten now but his novels A Town Like Alice and On The Beach were best sellers in the 50's and 60's and made into a couple of cool films.

Currently I'm reading the Lonely Road written in 1932; three passages caught my attention as reflective of both how much things have changed and how much things are the same:

1. "I was the last to leave, or one of the last. Our three cars were drawn up together outside the club, and because I could see that the others might want help I waited till they got away. Kennet was the first to go; he got in to second all right, but third defeated him, and so he went home like that."

Drinking and driving was commonly accepted back in '32, after all they were comparatively few cars on the roads and this was years before the breathalyser or the field sobriety test. As long as you didn't kill anyone it was perfectly acceptable to roll legless out of your club and navigate your home by whatever circuitous route took your fancy.

2. "So I ordered a cup of coffee for her; she would not eat anything because eating between meals was bad for the figure. Then I bought her cigarettes."

Back then smoking was cool and dare I say it healthy and snacking was universally bad. Now smoking kills and we are supposed to eat six small meals a day. No doubt in a few more years, smoking will be found to be perfectly safe and the low cholesterol will be found to be a dangerous killer!

3. Finally just to prove some things remain the same:

"But I tell you this, there's a darn sight more light manufactured stuff comes into this country than goes out of it."

Remember this was written seven years before WWII, the trade deficit was alive and well, at least in the U.K. well before Japan and China came on the scene.
By today’s standards the novels appear quaint and that’s exactly why I am enjoying them so much: plot matters, violence is muted and sex is barely implied although sexual tension riddles the stories. The issues have not dated at all: life after a nuclear holocaust (On The Beach); industrial decay (Ruined City); and dodgy military intelligence (Landfall). Oh, and the books are not 600 pages long.

Einstein and me

I have just finished reading Walter Isaacson's biography of good old Albert. I was struck by the parallels between the two of us! We both grew up in Europe and then moved to the U.S. where we both then became citizens. However, we shared somewhat confused views of our new homeland. As Isaacson comments about Al's view of America:

“He could recoil at its occasional displays of crassness and materialism, yet find himself powerfully drawn to the freedoms and unvarnished individuality that were on the flip side of the same coin.”

Very succinct and mirroring my own views exactly. Of course Al was just a little smarter than me. I barely understood Isaacsons's simplified descriptions of relativity and Al's other research. As far as I could tell the real message of relativity is demonstrated by the fact that when you are flying in a plane and try to pour coffee into a cup, the liquid falls straight into the cup because you, the coffee and the cup are all moving at 600mph. This of course would not happen if anyone of the three elements were moving at a different speed - imagine trying to pour coffee into a cup that is on a station platform while you and the coffee are on a train passing by at 100mph - that folks is relativity - at least I think it is!

Half the World Away - editors blues

For nearly 18 years I have been writing the book of this blog. How come you may ask, blogs are a relatively new phenomena aren't they? Well yes they are but this blog simply became an extension of my recording my multi-year cynicism. The fruits of all this labor should see the light of day shortly - I have an agent and a publisher so that nearly makes me a real author don't you think?

The last few days have caused me question my future as a writer. I have editing the final manuscript. It's amazing that even on the 40th or so revision I can still find stuff that reads like crap! Maybe I'm just not that good a writer. We artists are such sensitive souls and so self-critical. I think I need a hug.

Anyway editing is supposed to be easier in the PC-age. Well its not, courtesy of Microsoft Word's squiggly little red (spelling) and green (grammar) lines that make the text look like its been attacked by a drunken graffiti artist. the purist in me wants to eliminate all such imperfections from my witty, fluent prose, but I cannot bring myself to spell humour as humor or put a comma after every "which" but not after every "that". A friend suggested using the English/English spellchecker instead of the American/English one but the whole point of the book is to contrast the two countries. cultures and David Axson's who inhabit them.

Anyway the run through is complete and I think the book will shatter the conventional norms of published material. I have no idea what this means but I have been reading a book on how to market my book and the basic gist is to make outrageous claims that may or may not be true in order to generate a flood of orders. Its sort of like politics then isn't it.

So watch this space for further news on the imminent publication of Half the World Away. Rowling, Grisham and King better watch out!

Harry Potter vital to US economy - well part of it anyway!

This post will be hitting the net just as I take off from Stockholm on my way back to the US after a three week jaunt. My Swedish sojourn got me thinking about popular culture and economics - after all for many years ABBA were Sweden's biggest export - way ahead of of IKEA, Volvo and the rest.

The following comment was posted on the Wall Street Journal's website as Barnes and Noble, America's biggest book retailer announced disappointing results, "Barnes & Noble swung to a quarterly loss as its gross margin declined due to deeper member discounts. The next Harry Potter book is expected to boost sales in the current quarter."

Think about that for a moment. Barnes and Noble sells over 300 million books a year and each shop/store carries up to 200,000 different titles yet its whole financial quarter will be depednant upon the sales of just one title - talk about putting all your eggs in one basket. JK better deliver!

We are used to hearing that a movie studio's year can be made or broken by a single hit or flop but I am not sure I have seen the same criterion applied to books; after all more than 170,000 new books are published each year in the US which is just a little more, well about 169,400 more to be precise, than the number of movies Hollywood produces! Not only is Harry a book publishing phenomenon he is also a major economic driver, right up there with interest rates, housing starts and the price of pork belly futures...

Axson outsells Grisham, King, Dickens & Clinton!

Surely the royalties will start flowing now! My second book with the gripping title of "Best Practices in Planning and Performance Management" has just vaulted into the Top 5000 on Amazon's sales list! This stunning achievement probably reflects daily sales of about 12 copies but nonetheless it elevates me into elite company. The Da Vinci Code (#3,000), Hemingway's "For Whom the Bell Tolls" and a number of Stephen King novels are my near neighbours on the list. More statisfying still is that my exulted rank leaves such literary masters as Dickens (around #1,000,000), Shakespeare, and even Bill Clinton floundering in my wake. No doubt the world is finally waking up to the attractions of a rolling forecast versus a good horror story. More likely it is the direct of a small number of the 500 people who attended my speech last Monday deciding to try out my theory that my tome is the perfect cure for insomnia.

This instant feedback is one of the cool things about the Internet age. I can see my sales fluctuate by the hour and also check out my eBay buyer/seller rating, see how many of you actually look at this post, Google myself a few times and I suppose if I were a Youtube type of guy I could check out my latest ratings. Of course this could be a double edged sword as my ego is a fragile thing and any downturn in my ratings may induce severe depression.

Damn - I dropped to #16,722 on Amazon - pass the Prozac...

Potter withdrawal

I can see it already - blogs will chronicle the societal impact (does that count as a self-fulfilling prophecy?), schools will set up special counseling programs, churches will throw open their doors to the distraught, Barnes and Noble will have doctors stationed by the checkouts ready to dispense much needed depressions pills.  Hysterical young girls will be weeping in the streets, the boys will stoically suck it up.  The cause of this mass outpouring of emotion?  The end of the Harry Potter saga. 

By about noon on July 21st about 4 billion people will start suffering withdrawal symptoms as they close Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and begin to ponder life without Quidditch.  The effect will be akin to ripping an IV out of a wounded man's arm.  J.K. Rowling will need to go into hiding as irate fans seek assurances that book seven just marks the end of the beginning for Harry and friends; Salman Rushdie had it easy by comparison. The consolation will be that her net worth will rocket past that of Belgium and the US will offer her citizenship and most of Wyoming if she moves here thereby single handedly wiping out the U.S. trade deficit. 

A few enterprising authors will craft prequels covering Harry's birth and the death of his parents and no doubt there will be sequels if Harry survives J.K. Rowling's final chapter; if not expect Ron and Hermione to pick up the mantle. The series will be perpetuated on film much as James Bond moved beyond the realm of Ian Fleming's books.  Of course there will be a very bad television spin off put on by one of the American networks in a vain attempt to cash in.  Unfortunately, Harry's Brooklyn accent, Hermione being renamed Kaitlyn, the relocation of Hogwarts to West Hollywood, and the casting of Kevin Federline as Professor Snape doesn't resonate with fans and the show is cancelled after a single episode. 

After five years, J.K. makes a comeback with a new seven part series about a psychic dog called Fred...