Execution

The Discipline of Getting Things Done

By: Larry Bossidy, Ram Charan

Narrated by: John Bedford Lloyd

Length: 8 hrs and 14 mins

Publisher's summary

The audio that shows how to get the job done and deliver results...whether you're running an entire company or in your first management job.

Larry Bossidy is one of the world's most acclaimed CEOs, with a track record for delivering results. Ram Charan is a legendary adviser to senior executives and boards of directors, a man with unparalleled insight into why some companies are successful and others are not. Together they've pooled their knowledge and experience into one guide on how to close the gap between results promised and results delivered.

The discipline of execution means understanding how to link together people, strategy, and operations, the three core processes of every business. Leading these processes is the real job of running a business, not formulating a "vision" and leaving the work of carrying it out to others. Bossidy and Charan show the importance of being deeply and passionately engaged in an organization and why robust dialogues about people, strategy, and operations result in a business based on intellectual honesty and realism.

The leader's most important job - selecting and appraising people - is one that should never be delegated. As a CEO, Larry Bossidy personally makes the calls to check references for key hires. Why? With the right people in the right jobs, there's a leadership gene pool that conceives and selects strategies that can be executed. People then work together to create a strategy building block by building block, a strategy in sync with the realities of the marketplace, the economy, and the competition. Once the right people and strategy are in place, they are then linked to an operating process that results in the implementation of specific programs and actions and that assigns accountability. This kind of effective operating process goes way beyond the typical budget exercise that looks into a rearview mirror to set its goals. It puts reality behind the numbers and is where the rubber meets the road.

©2002 Crown Business
(P)2002 Random House, Inc.

Critic reviews

"A terrific book that will make smart managers rethink how business gets done within every level of their organization or department." (Publishers Weekly)
"A great practitioner and an insightful theorist join forces to write a compelling business story of 'how to get it done.'" (Jack Welch)

An important contribution to any business

The linking of Strategy, Operations and People processes is a valuable insight to getting things done. The title is practice-oriented with insight I can talk about and spread in my business in order to get where we want to go.

A little dated but has some nuggets

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

There were enough nuggets in this to make it useful.

Would you be willing to try another book from Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan ? Why or why not?

Possibly if it was a more recent title.

What did you take away from Execution that you can apply to your work?

Some good bits about organizational behaviour. I also liked the bits about the budget process.

A Must Read

Would you consider the audio edition of Execution to be better than the print version?

This is just a great book in either audio or print.

Any additional comments?

Execution is about managing to get things done. I found it excellent. It's cases and there are lots of them are around big business management situations at places like GE and I thought that might be a problem but they are familiar in any situation. The principles are clear and well organized. A must read for anyone needing to get things accomplished.

Great for small businesses also

I saw other reviews that said it wasn’t for small businesses. Yes they discuss large enterprises, but

Great help for new or old managers

Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan share extremely valuable and helpful experiences. A great help for managers old and new!

still a good listen

good advice for leaders; performance mgmt, decision-making, competitiveness. two narrators sometimes have different volumes so hard to hear consistently well but not too bad.

The book all leaders should know

The book pairs real life examples of success and failures that tie back to the core philosophies and give the reader tangible advice to act on. The ending chapters are more valuable for senior leaders but the majority of the book is valuable at any level.

Execution

Great principles for driving your organization and teams forward. The author’s layout a framework for who you should measure, inspire, and test your assumptions.

Execution

Loved the book and got a lot out of it. Am surprised at the reviews by small biz owners, you don't have to be a CEO of a large corporation to learn their lessons about people, strategy and execution. It is the people aspect that I like the most.

Could be better

This book has some good stuff in it interrupted by long sections full of generalities. The book is best when it examines concrete examples, like the one about Dell in the sample. I bought the book based on the sample, so I was disappointed that it frequently drifts into generalities. The sections read by Larry Bossidy are generally very engaging, those read by the narrator are mostly boring, and the sections read by Ram Charan are almost incomprehensible because of Mr. Charan's tedious accent.