Business brain, 
of BookBuzz, shares his thoughts
on last year's best business books
Reinventing Organisations According to Frederic Laloux, the way we manage organisations seems increasingly out of date. Survey after survey shows that a majority of employees feel disengaged from their companies. Organisational disillusionment goes way beyond corporate America – teachers, doctors, and nurses are leaving their professions in record numbers because the way we run schools and because hospitals kill their vocation. Deep inside, we long for soulful workplaces, for authenticity, community, passion, and purpose. The pioneering companies researched for this book have already “cracked the code. They operate in very different industries and geographies. It’s hard not to get excited about this finding: a new organisational model seems to be emerging, and it promises a soulful revolution in the workplace. Are the new organisations just outliers or is this the start of a shift?
Aligning sales with strategy 100 billion is spent on strategy consultants. 90% fail. Why? Too much mission, vision, passion and purpose, not enough sales. Key question: what happens to strategy when you are in front of potential customers?
Coherence: The Secret Science of Brilliant Leadership Dr Alan Watkins argues that “what we feel has a far bigger impact on what we do than thinking does.” Taking a leaf from Einstein, he goes on to describe coherent leadership as “learning to control all levels of the human system and not just the surface behaviours”. He shows us how “Emotion is significantly more important to health and happiness than exercise or what you eat” and how “mismanaged emotion is the superhighway to disease and distress.”
Hidden champions of the 21st century There are a lot of companies that are very successful, but you have never heard of them. Why? Because they have embedded themselves in the value chain of other companies. Being the absolute best about what they are doing. They are supernichist, they are family business and they are German. Key success factors are a lateral thinking perspective, selling instead of marketing, focus, high performance and investing in staff. Simple.
Does the education system prepare us for the new world? ‘No' is the answer and, as Ken Robinson's Metaskills suggest, we should focus our education on passion, purpose, making, design and entrepreneurship. Forget about STEM, focus on creativity and ideation.
Great Brand Blunders It is an Almanac of awfulness for all great brand blunders. Great fun! Tons of stuff to guffaw at and say “I don’t believe it!” The only one he’s missing is Guinness Light.
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