Why Managers Fail

The 12 Pitfalls of Power, Pressure and Poor Judgment

In the forensic tradition of Jerry Kennard’s narrative precision and analytical clarity, Why Managers Fail explores the quiet implosions behind modern leadership collapse. This is not a book of clichés or LinkedIn-friendly platitudes. It is a ruthlessly intelligent examination of the behaviours, blind spots, and systemic distortions that lead good people—and once-functional institutions—into mediocrity, decline, and eventual failure.

Each chapter dissects a common pathology of management: the tyranny of busyness, the erosion of trust, the evasion of accountability, the cult of charisma, and more. What emerges is not just a catalogue of dysfunction, but a mirror held up to the reader: a challenge to see what we tolerate, excuse, and perpetuate in the name of leadership.

Drawing on contemporary case studies, behavioural science, and organisational psychology—supported by references to thinkers such as Daniel Kahneman, Patrick Lencioni, and Amy Edmondson—Why Managers Fail offers readers a sobering but ultimately hopeful message: failure is not a destiny. It is a pattern. And patterns can be changed—if we are willing to see them.