The New How: Creating Business Solutions Through Collaborative Strategy - Softcover

Merchant, Nilofer

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0596156251 ISBN 13: 9780596156251

Publisher: O'Reilly Media, 2009

Synopsis

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

About this title

About the Author:

Nilofer Merchant has gone from admin to CEO to board member of a NASDAQ-traded company along her 20 year career, gathering monikers such as "the Jane Bond of Innovation" along the way for her ability to guide Fortune 500 and startup companies through impossible odds.

She's worked for major companies like Apple (with Steve Jobs) and Autodesk (personally hired and fired by Carol Bartz) and startups in the early days of the Web (Golive/ later bought by Adobe). And Logitech, Symantec, HP, Yahoo, VMWare, and many others have turned to her guidance to develop new product strategies, enter new markets, defend against competitors, and optimize revenues. And, Merchant is one of the few people who can say they've fought a competitive battle against Microsoft and won, for Symantec's Anti-Virus $2.1B annual business. She has personally launched more than 100 products, netting $18B in sales, with expertise in Europe and US markets. Today she serves on boards for both public and private companies.

The 11 Rules for Creating Value in the #SocialEra, published by Harvard Business Review in 2012 follows her previous book, The New How (Oreilly, 2010), on Collaborative work. She lectures on innovation, board governance, and marketing at Stanford University.You can follow her current thinking at nilofermerchant.com and follow her on Twitter @Nilofer.

Review:

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

Rubicon as always stood apart from other consulting firms because they engender true engagement across an organization. Adobe's first of many engagements with Rubicon was to develop the Education segment go-to-market plan. Adobe's Education market growth over the past decade is testimony to the value of a collaborative implementation of strategy, Merchant's signature, and the foundation of The New How.
-- Katie Keating, VP, WW eCommerce and NA Channel Sales, Adobe Systems

The New How is informative and provides exciting insights because the suggestions are practical and do-able. 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

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

Collaboration is a powerful competitive weapon; this book shows you how to use it to win markets.
--Mark Interrante, VP Content Products, Yahoo!

"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

About this edition

• Publisher: O'Reilly Media
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 0596156251
• ISBN 13: 9780596156251
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 266