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Management & Leadership |
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The Ten Commandments for Business Failure
written by Donald R. Keough
Studio : Portfolio Hardcover
by Portfolio Hardcover
Publisher : Portfolio Hardcover
Released : 2008-07-24
Availability : Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Number of Items : 1
EAN : 9781591842347
Avg. Customer Rating: (based on 14 reviews)
List Price : $24.95
Our Price : $2.31
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Product Description |
Don Keough—a former top executive at Coca-Cola and now chairman of the elite investment banking firm Allen & Company—has witnessed plenty of failures in his sixty-year career (including New Coke). He has also been friends with some of the most successful people in business history, including Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, Jack Welch, Rupert Murdoch, and Peter Drucker.
Now this elder statesman reveals how great enterprises get into trouble. Even the smartest executives can fall into the trap of believing in their own infallibility. When that happens, more bad decisions are sure to follow.
This light-hearted “how-not-to” book includes anecdotes from Keough’s long career as well as other infamous failures. His commandments for failure include: Quit Taking Risks; Be Inflexible; Assume Infallibility; Put All Your Faith in Experts; Send Mixed Messages; and Be Afraid of the Future.
As he writes, “After a lifetime in business I’ve never been able to develop a step-by-step formula that will guarantee success. What I could do, however, was talk about how to lose. I guarantee that anyone who follows my formula will be a highly successful loser.” |
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Plain |
Former Coca-Cola president Don Keough has written a plain-talking book that exudes wisdom for executive reflection. Although the title is The Ten Commandments for Business Failure, there are actually eleven. Rather than try to provide a formula for success that is unlikely to be replicated, Keough uses his many years of experience to call attention to those approaches and tendencies in each of us that when we practice them are likely to lead to failure. While each of these commandments sounds simple, and they can be avoided in the extreme, each of us is likely to follow them to some degree quite often. In addition to his own experience, mostly at Coke, Keough uses recent examples of executives and companies who have followed these commandments and achieved failure. I read this book at the end of the year, and it provided a great chance to reflect on these commandments and examine which of them I may be following to my detriment. I highly recommend this book to any reader who enjoys plain, straightforward approaches, and who are prepared to think about their effectiveness at work.
Rating: Four-star (Highly Recommended)
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Truths We All Need |
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There are books that I buy to read on a free weekend. There are books I buy and take some time to read. And then there are books that I buy and read immediately and finish in a day or two. This is one such great book. A book to read and cherish. One can identify the many failures that the author writes about in working life and how to avoid making such mistakes. Simple and straight to the point. |
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A Good Guide |
Unable to develop a set of rules that guarantee success in anything, Keough instead created a guide for becoming a highly successful loser. Key points, illustrated mostly with Keough's experiences within Coca-Cola, include:
1)Quit taking risks.
2)Be inflexible.
3)Isolate yourself.
4)Assume infallibility.
5)Play the game close the the foul line.
6)Don't take time to think.
7)Put all your faith in experts and outside consultants.
8)Love your bureaucracy.
9)Send messages.
10)Be afraid of the future.
11)Lose your passion for work - for life.
I'm thinking Keough's advice is good for politicians as well. |
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Wonderful. Get it, Read it, and Watch for these things in your company |
This is a spectacular business book and I can't imagine that you (and everyone else) would wait another day before starting to read it. Donald R. Keough has had long business experience in running companies and investing in others. He has seen the ups and downs and in this delightfully written and concise book he provides ten things you can do to ensure business failure. They are (and even though I provide them here, you will want to read what he has to say about each of them):
1) Quit taking risks
2) Be inflexible
3) Isolate yourself
4) Assume infallibility
5) Play the game close to the foul line
6) Don't take time to think
7) Put all your faith in experts and outside consultants
8) Love your bureaucracy
9) Send mixed messages
10) Be afraid of the future
and a bonus commandment for failure
11) Lose your passion for work and for life
Keough illustrates each of these stories from his own experience, from well known business stories, from history, and using simple reason. He writes well and makes everything he says read naturally and seem so sensible. Because it is. Yet you and I know and have seen people break everyone of these commandments and the failure that inevitably follows. Of course, like the 10 commandments in the Bible, you can't break one. If you break one, you also break others. For example, committing adultery also involves lying, coveting, and usually dishonoring what your parents taught you. Here, infallibility usually includes inflexibility, bureaucracy, and lack of thought. Right? Just because this makes sense, don't assume you won't fall prey to them. These are the kinds of failings that creep up on you and you have to actively look for them forming in your business. If you wait for them to get to full bloom, you are already in big trouble.
Warren Buffett provides a few pages of introduction that also make sense.
Enjoy, learn, and keep this book handy. I keep it within easy reach.
Reviewed by Craig Matteson, Ann Arbor, MI
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A Must-read for corner executives |
Unlike Peter and Waterman's "In Search of Excellence" and Collins' "Good to Great", Keough does not tell corner executives how to map out any strategic directions to achieve business success for their firms. Through more than six decades of business experience, he suggests 10 common blunders that corner executives are used to make and such blunders can take their firms to business failure.
According to Keough, corner executives who aspire to fail tend to avoid taking risks and be afraid of staying in terra incognito, Due to their high level inflexibility and self-complacency, they love taking things for granted, never admit mistakes, and send mixed messages to their people beneath him/her. Moreover, they are great fans of bureaucratic fog and always hire external and experts to make every major decision. Without any passion for work and life, they demand for short term results by breaking the line of ethical behavior.
In this book, Keough seldom adopts management theories to sustain his arguments but an array of business anecdotes is demonstrated to comment about such common blunders made by corners executives from giant firms such as Coca-Cola, Xerox, Kmart, IBM, Republic Steel, Montgomery Ward, and Ford. Keough also concludes that such financial scandals as Enron and sub-prime hurricane can be avoided if corner executives do not fall into one or more of the blunder traps.
Warren Buffet has praised Keough as Mr. Coke because he has made a significant contribution to business growth of Coca-Cola Company before his retirement. This book can be a must-read for corner executives who are eager to avoid making such blunders when the going still gets good.
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