Putting Strategy to Work: The Blueprint for Transforming Ideas into Action (Financial Times Management Series) - Hardcover

Obeng, Eddie; Durcan, Jim

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0273602659 ISBN 13: 9780273602651

Publisher: Ft Pr, 1995

Synopsis

Through its unique style of theoretical description, this book bridges the gap between strategy formulation and implementation. With its emphasis on strategic and project management issues, evoking a world of new language, new thinking and new behavior, it will enable readers to solve their unique problems.

About this title

About the Author

Dr Eddie Obeng, BSc, MBA, PHD, is Director of Pentacle The Virtual Business School and was previously Director of Project Management and Strategy Implementation Programs at Ashridge Management College.

From the Back Cover

Go beyond words: Transform your strategies into marketplace realities! Covers all the key techniques you need to manage strategic projects successfully. Why successful strategies don't have to be implemented top down — and don't even necessarily have to fit together. Invisible leadership: getting the results you're after — quietly!

Driving strategic change is unlike anything you've ever done — and it can influence the competitive future of your organization forever. Putting Strategy to Work is the complete guide to driving strategic change through successful project management.

Dr. Eddie Obeng covers every key aspect of managing strategic projects, exposing fallacies and revealing truths that will be obvious the instant you discover them for the first time. You'll learn why successful strategies don't have to be implemented from the top down; why all the parts of a strategy don't necessarily have to fit together; and why you don't have to tell everyone what your overall strategy is.

Obeng presents powerful "invisible leadership" techniques, case studies, and powerful laws of change — all with one goal: to help you transform ideas into actions.

Written by authors with experience implementing major strategic change in a variety of organizations, this book bridges the gap between strategy formation and implementation. It aims to provide managers with practical guidance for success. The content and structure of the book are based on the original ideas, research, and teaching material developed by the authors. Each chapter contains diagrams and frameworks that managers can easily adapt for their own use.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Preface

After I completed the manuscript for All Change! The Project Leader's Secret Handbook, I knew that I would have to write a companion book to go with it. The original idea to write a book on project change had come from members of an executive program on Implementing Strategic Change. But I had written All Change! to help people to deal with day-to-day change management and operational projects. All Change! had become a popular management textbook and yet it provided little for the people who gave me the original idea. I felt guilty. I knew that I would have to write something for the people who gave me the idea in the first place. I would have to write something about that special type of change, strategic change and the only way we seem to be able to systematically handle it, through programs of projects.

I had a problem. I didn't know how to write it. In my years of running business education courses, I've had dozens of phone calls from managers asking whether they can really learn anything about implementing strategic change on a course and especially on an open enrolment public course which is attended by people from several different organizations because their particular situation is different from all others. They can't see how program management can have common threads. They believe that they are solving a unique problem. I agree that there are differences. There must be or else the implemented strategy would not give you a sustainable competitive advantage. Indeed the long-term success of the strategy is heavily dependent on the ability to create something different. I do however believe that there are similarities. It is these similarities which I explain in this book.

Strategic change is weird. Strategic change is different. With strategic change, projects may fail but you may succeed overall. The effects of strategic change are immediate or soon or far in the future. With strategic change you may never experience the effects of your decisions. Others may learn from your mistakes. Leading strategic change carries great responsibilities. You, all by yourself, influence the future forever. It is for this reason that I have tried to make Putting Strategy to Work a dark comedy with a sense of pressure and gloom which only lifts as understanding of the situation is gradually gained.

For my courses I invented a concept which I call an "Individually Tailored Open Course." I design into the course significant space for one-to-one tutorials, diagnostics, clinics, and learning groups all supported by learning resources and research. The only way I could see to replicate that exactly in a book would be through an electronic book or multimedia CD-ROM or, on an ongoing basis via an electronic notice board or conference. So I have decided to approach writing this book in a different way to mainstream textbooks. Instead of being too specific I've stuck to the main learning areas and covered the techniques common to successful program management in greater detail. This means that anyone implementing strategy should be able to get a good proportion of the learning needed to ensure success. If, however, you feel that you need more individual tailoring or you want a peer group or mentor for support over the longer term of your implementation program you will have to give me a call or join Pentacle the Virtual Business School's network. I wish you all the best of luck. Enjoy!Eddie Obeng
Burke Lodge, Beaconsfield HP9 2JH, UK
100071,513@compuserve.com
February 1996

Edition details

• Publisher: Ft Pr
• Publication date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0273602659
• ISBN 13: 9780273602651
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 256