The Management Mythbuster Book

Acknowledgments xiii

About the Author xv

Preface xvii

About this Book xix

Introduction 1

Strategic Plans Are of Little Use in Times of Great Uncertainty and Volatility 5

Operating Plans and Budgets Provide a False Sense of Security 6

Management Reporting Is Driven by an Obsolete View of the World 7

Incentive Compensation Rewards Poor Performance and Penalizes Outstanding Performance 7

Investments in Staff Education Have Been Inadequate and Misdirected 8

Technology Has Failed to Improve and in Many Cases Has Reduced the Effectiveness of Management What I Really Think! 9

Notes 10

Chapter 1 Missions, Visions, and Other Expensive Pastimes 11

Fiction: Meeting Room at an Exclusive Country Club, Northern New Jersey-February 2007 12

Facts: "We Are on a Mission from God" 14

So What? 19

Notes 20

Chapter 2 Strategy and Other Confusing Stuff 21

Fiction: The Four Seasons Hotel, Nevis-Early May 2007 22

Facts: Yes, We Are Very Strategic 25

Fatally Flawed 29

So What? 31

Notes 32

Chapter 3 Gurus, Consultants, and Other Snake Oil Salesman 33

Fiction: Henry's Office-October 2008 34

Facts: Are You Renting Bodies or Brains? 36 Objectivity and Independence-No, Not Really! 40

So What? 41

Notes 42

Chapter 4 Forget Success, Focus on Failure 43

Fiction: Sustained High Growth in Revenues and Earnings 44

Facts: Accept Failure, Fear Success 47

Success Can Be Dangerous for Your Health 49

The Perils of Being Number One 51

Forget "In Search of Excellence," How About Excellence Lost? 52

Preparing to Fail 52

New Coke-A Lesson in Management Excellence-Honesdy 57

IBM-From Survival to Leadership 59

So What?61

Notes 61

Chapter 5 Budgeting-A Modern Vision of Hell (Well, Purgatory at Least) 63

Fiction: Henry Pritchett's Office-Early September 2007 64

Facts: Not Just a Waste of Time 71

Detail Does-Not Equal Accuracy 73

Why Do We Plan the Wrong Stuff? 76

Are You on the Road to Hell? 79

Learn to Love the Budget 80

So What? 82

Notes 83

Chapter 6 The Futility of Forecasting 85

Fiction: September 2007 86

Facts: Forecasts-The Only Certainty Is That

They Will Be Wrong 90

The Extraordinary Is Now Ordinary 94

Not One Size Fits All 102

Are Long-Term Forecasts an Oxymoron? 104

Restoring Credibility 105

So What? 112

Notes 112

Chapter 7 Total Quality, Six Sigma, Process Re-Engineering and Other

Management Fads 115

Fiction: Quality Is Job 1-April 2006 116 Facts: The Scourge of Management Communism 118

Cheap Is Not Always Good 122

Too Much Process, Not Enough Product 128

So What? 130

Notes 131

Chapter 8 New Risks for a New World 133

Fiction: The Boardroom-April 2007 134

Facts: Risk Is a Four-Letter Word 137

Learn from Tiger, Phil, and the Rest 141

They Were Going to Change the World 143

Beware Irrelevance 144

Different Customers, Different Connections 149

Beware the Noncompetitive Threat 150

Remember-Stuff Happens 152

Revenue Volatility Means Down as Well as Up 155

Reputation Is Everything 159

So What? 161

Notes 162

Chapter 9 Pay for Performance? Failure Pays Very Well These Days 163

Fiction: January 2010 164

Facts: The Great Incentive Scam 166

So What? 177

Notes 178

Chapter 10 Lies, Damn Lies, and Performance Metrics 179

Fiction: Strategic Alignment-May 2007 180

Facts: Measurement Mania 182

Metric of the Month 186

Single Version of the Truth 187

The Balanced Scorecard-Yet Another Illusion 190

Reporting What or Why 192

Windshield or Rear View Mirror 195

Beware EBITDA 198

Traffic Light Syndrome-Should I Stop or Should I Go? 199

So What? 203

Notes 203

Chapter 11 Leveraging Technology for Competitive Advantage 205

Fiction: On Time, On Budget-But Irrelevant- February 2008 206

Facts: Automating Inefficiency Just Gets You Bad Data Faster 209

Death by Spreadsheet 212

IT ROL-An Oxymoron 217

Hype Versus Reality 220

Cool but Poindess 220

Whatever Happened to Real-Time Processing? 223

Breaking Down the Barriers 224

Why Do We Fix Costs in a Variable Revenue World? 226

Centralized the Decentralized? What a Dumb Question! 231

Outsourcing-the Myth and the Reality 232

So What? 237

Notes 237

Chapter 12 Why Accountants Rule the World 239

Fiction: Closing the Books, October 11, 2007 240

Facts: Death by Accounting and Other Fatal Diseases 242

Accounting-An Alternative Reality 243

Accounting Irrelevance 245

The Myth of Cost Allocations 246

Making the Numbers or Making The Numbers Up? 249

An Accounting Conspiracy Theory 256

So What? 257

Notes 258

Chapter 13 The Synergies Will Be Massive! 259

Fiction: The Myth of Synergy-August 2006 260

Facts: Synergy-Much Touted, Rarely Realized 263

Private Equity-It's Really Just a Corporate Enema! 266

So What? 272

Notes 273

Chapter 14 Talent Matters 275

Fiction: A Comer Office on the 15th Floor of Cruciant's Headquarters-April 2008 276

Facts: Talent Factories 281

All GE Managers Are Gods 283

Retaining Talent-Not Always a Good Thing 284

The Illusion of Competence 286

Fool Me Once, Shame on You; Fool Me Twice, Shame on Me 288

The MBA Myth 290

What Makes a Successful Leader? 292

So What? 295

Notes 295

Chapter 15 Ask The Dumb Questions 297

Fiction: May 2007 298

Facts: Keep It Simple 300

Isolating Management Stupidity 302

Follow the Herd 304

The Parable of the Leaky Valve 305

So What? 306

Notes 306

Chapter 16 The Business of Spin 307

Fiction: Steve Borden's Office-January 2008 308

Facts: The Business of Spin 313

What Planet Were They On? 319

Spin Cycle: Citigroup 2006-2009 320

Southwest Airlines: Succeeding Despite the Market 324

Tall Poppy Syndrome 326

Nice Work If You Can Get It 328

Beyond Spin: Sometimes It Is All Smoke and Mirrors 330

Spot the Crook 332

So What? 335

Notes 335

Epilogue

Cruciant-From Good to Great? January 2010 337

Index 341