Product Description

The new grand theory of leadership by Ram Charan . . . The breakthrough book that links know-how—the skills of people who know what they are doing— with the personal and psychological traits of the successful leader.

How often have you heard someone with a commanding presence deliver a bold vision that turned out to be nothing more than rhetoric and hot air? All too often we mistake the appearance of leadership for the real deal. Without a doubt, intelligence, vision, and the ability to communicate are important. But something big is missing: the know-how of running a business—the capacity to take it in the right direction, do the right things, make the right decisions, deliver results, and leave the people and the business better off than they were before.

For well over four decades, Ram Charan has been learning in the most visceral way the underlying reasons why leaders succeed and fail. As one of the most influential advisers to top management teams of leading companies around the world, he has had a front-row seat to observe the cause and effect of leadership practices and behaviors.

Ram Charan’s insight into the real content of leadership provides you with the eight fundamental skills needed for success in the twenty-first century:

• Positioning (and, when necessary, repositioning) your business by zeroing in on the central idea that meets customer needs and makes money
• Connecting the dots by pinpointing patterns of external change ahead of others
• Shaping the way people work together by leading the social system of your business
• Judging people by getting to the truth of a person
• Molding high-energy, high-powered, high-ego people into a working team of leaders in which they equal more than the sum of their parts
• Knowing the destination where you want to take your business by developing goals that balance what the business can become with what it can realistically achieve
• Setting laser-sharp priorities that become the road map for meeting your goals
• Dealing creatively and positively with societal pressures that go beyond the economic value creation activities of your business

Know-How is the missing link of leadership. By showing how the eight know-hows link to, interact with, and reinforce personal and psychological traits, Ram Charan provides a holistic and innovative portrait of successful leaders of the twenty-first century.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #96532 in Books
• Published on: 2007-01-02
• Released on: 2007-01-02
• Format: Bargain Price
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 304 pages

Amazon.com Review
In Know-How, Ram Charan, coauthor of the bestseller Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done, gives readers a bold new approach to understanding leadership. Charan suggests that when it comes to choosing our business leaders, we don't recognize the crucial difference between the appearance of leadership and the actual ability to run a business. We focus too much on superficial things, like raw intelligence or a commanding presence, and don't pay near enough attention to the skills leaders need. In his new book, Charan identifies the eight skills leaders must develop and refine, and explains how personal traits factor in. Curious readers can learn more about Know-How: The 8 Skills That Separate People Who Perform from Those Who Don't in our brief Q & A with author Ram Charan, and sneak a peek at the first chapter, below. --Daphne Durham

Read the First Chapter of Know-How

The Substance of Successful Leaders

Know-how is what separates leaders who perform--who deliver results--from those who don't. It is the hallmark of people who know what they are doing, those who build longterm intrinsic value and hit short-term targets. What gets in the way of finding people who can perform is the appearance of leadership. All too often I see people being chosen for leadership jobs on the basis of superficial personal traits and characteristics, such as:

• The seduction of raw intelligence: "He's extremely bright, incisive, and very analytical. I just feel in my gut he can do the job."

• A commanding presence and great communication skills: "That presentation was awesome. How she ever boiled down all that data onto the PowerPoints is beyond me. Shecertainly had the committee in the palm of her hand. Mark my words, she's going to the top."

• The power of a bold vision: "What a picture he painted of where we are going, moving forward."

• The notion of a born leader: "The people in the unit love her. Such a morale builder and motivator!"

Certainly intelligence, self-confidence, presence, the ability to communicate, and having a vision are important. But being highly intelligent doesn't mean that a person has the knack for making good business judgments. How many times have you seen people confidently making decisions that turn out to be disastrous? How often have you heard a vision that turned out to be nothing more than rhetoric and hot air? Read more from Chapter 1...

Review
"This is the leadership book for the new generatin. It's not about climbing to the top of the heap. It's about substance- becoming the kind of leader who makes the right decisions time and time again. If you want to make your business, yourself, and your world better, use this book as your guide."
–Ron Meyer, president and COO, Universal Studios

"If you believe (as I do) that 'leaders are made,' or more precisely, choose to lead and to develop their skills as leaders, then you will find Ram Charan's very practical book on the eight 'know-hows' that are the foundation for leadership performance and success a very worthwhile read."
–A.G. Lafley, chairman and CEO, Proctor & Gamble

"Ram Charan has hit the nail on-the-head by constructively linking personal attributes and business success. His is an important message at an important time for business leaders."
–James McNerney, Jr., chairman, president and CEO, The Boeing Company

"Ram Charan cuts through the fog and 'mystique of the leader' with bold, fresh insights into the real substance of business leadership. What is truly pathbreaking is Know-How's integration of the eight skills for running a business with the personal and psychological traits of the successful leader. It is the must-have book if you want to differentiate yourself from the pack."
–Bill Conaty, senior vice president, human resources, General Electric

"Uniquely Charan. Pactical, insightful, application-oriented and full of wisdom. Read it and then refer to i frequently to enrigh your career. A real treasure."
–Larry Bossidy, retired chairman and CEO of Honeywell International and co-author of Execution and Confronting Reality

"Know-How is the distilled wisdom of one of our era's most insightful business minds. How do you achieve great business performance? Ram Charan kno...

Review
"This is the leadership book for the new generation. It's not about climbing to the top of the heap. It's about substance- becoming the kind of leader who makes the right decisions time and time again. If you want to make your business, yourself, and your world better, use this book as your guide."
–Ron Meyer, president and COO, Universal Studios

"If you believe (as I do) that 'leaders are made,' or more precisely, choose to lead and to develop their skills as leaders, then you will find Ram Charan's very practical book on the eight 'know-hows' that are the foundation for leadership performance and success a very worthwhile read."
–A.G. Lafley, chairman and CEO, Proctor & Gamble

"Ram Charan has hit the nail on-the-head by constructively linking personal attributes and business success. His is an important message at an important time for business leaders."
–James McNerney, Jr., chairman, president and CEO, The Boeing Company

"Ram Charan cuts through the fog and 'mystique of the leader' with bold, fresh insights into the real substance of business leadership. What is truly pathbreaking is Know-How's integration of the eight skills for running a business with the personal and psychological traits of the successful leader. It is the must-have book if you want to differentiate yourself from the pack."
–Bill Conaty, senior vice president, human resources, General Electric

"Uniquely Charan. Pactical, insightful, application-oriented and full of wisdom. Read it and then refer to i frequently to enrigh your career. A real treasure."
–Larry Bossidy, retired chairman and CEO of Honeywell International and co-author of Execution and Confronting Reality

"Know-How is the distilled wisdom of one of our era's most insightful business minds. How do you achieve great business performance? Ram Charan knows how."
–Geoffrey Colvin, editor-at-large, Fortune magazine

"What Peter Drucker's The Practice of Management and The Effective Executive were to the 20th century industrial age, Ram Charan's Know-How is to the 21st century global digital knowledge worker age. Brilliant, immensely practical and comprehensive- with almos self evident prophetic wisdom. But, as we all know, what is common sense is seldom common practice."
–Stephen R. Covey, author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and The 8th Habit

"Know-How brings the complex subject of business leadership down to earth with practial advice on what you really need to know to run a business."
–Michael J. Critelli, chairman and CEO, Pitney Bowes

"Know-How puts to rest a lot of myths and false assumptions about the job of a leader. In a commonsense, practical way, it provides eight how-tos that are the foundation of leadership. Know-How is a breakthrough book for leaders and those who aspire to a leadership job."
–James M. Kilts, Centerview Partners, former chairman and CEO of Gillette

"Ram has an unparalleled track record of providing executives with compelling yet practical advice on how to succeed in tumultuous business environments. Know-How continues the tradition, defining in detail the performance factors that can give executives a competitive edge no matter how markets evolve."
–Ivan G. Seidenberg, chairman and CEO of Verizon

Customer Reviews

The Substance of Leadership
In an era of constant change, there is a crying need for leadership. Although change is a constant, today's magnitude, speed and depth, is unlike previous renditions. Multibillion dollar businesses emerge from nowhere. Highly-valued institutions and organizations are rendered impotent over-night.

Yet, many cling to choosing future leaders on the basis of superficial personal traits and characteristics. How many times have you heard an anointed future leader described as "intelligent," "a commanding presence," "a great communicator," "having a bold vision," or "a born leader?"

Ram Charan, a consultant with a Harvard Business School MBA and doctorate, has identified, eight skills - he calls them "know-hows" - essential for leadership success:

1. Positioning and Repositioning. The ability to find an idea for the organization that meets customers' demands and makes money.
2. Pinpointing External Change. The ability to identify patterns that place the organization on the offensive.
3. Leading the Social System. The ability to get the right people with the right behaviors and the right information to make better decisions and business results.
4. Judging People. The ability to calibrate people based on their actions, decisions and behaviors and matches them to the job's non-negotiables.
5. Molding a Team. The ability to coordinate competent, high-ego leaders.
6. Setting Goals. The ability to balance goals that give equal weighting to what the business can become and what it can achieve.
7. Setting Priorities. The ability to define a path and direct resources, actions, and energy to accomplish goals.
8. Dealing with Forces beyond the Market. The ability to deal with pressures you cannot control but affect your business.

Citing case studies from his consulting practice, Charan identifies personal traits of leaders that help or interfere with the know-hows.

1. Ambition. The drive to accomplish something but not win at all costs.
2. Tenacity. The drive to search, persist and follow through, but not too long.
3. Self-confidence. The drive to overcome the fear of failure and response, or the need to be liked and use power judiciously but not become arrogant and narcissistic.
4. Psychological Openness. The ability to be receptive to new and different ideas but not shut other people down.
5. Realism. The ability to see what can be accomplished and not gloss over problems or assume the worst.
6. Appetite for Learning. The ability to grown and improve know-hows and not repeat the same mistakes.

Charan reduces the concept of business leadership to essential qualities. Know-How is readable and insightful. By linking personal attributes and business success, he delivers a vital message to a society starving for true leadership.

Know-How - The Critical Linkage to Success
Why does a gifted person tagged for a leadership role fail when he/she gets there? And how does a leader with little or no education succeed? Best selling author and acclaimed management philosopher, Ram Charan, provides an answer to this paradox in his latest offering, "Know How" by focusing on the critical linkage - know-how - that separates leaders who perform from those who do not.

In the book, Charan details eight critical know-hows observed in the most successful leaders, discusses real life examples of success and failure, and provides a checklist, "Questions to Ask Yourself" for the reader. Charan, relying on his 45 years of observational research, constructs a more complete theory integrating know-how with personality traits, psychological orientation and cognitive architecture. He shows how these know-hows and individual personal traits are interlinked and reinforce each other.

Every leader Charan has known has mastered the nuts and bolts of one or more know-hows early in life and has used these skills over and over again to learn all of the critical know-hows. ...And this is how real leaders are really made.

The eight critical Know-Hows include:

1. Will the Dogs Eat the Dog Food? Positioning and Repositioning the Business to Make Money. Shaping and reshaping the value proposition to meet the needs of an ever changing external landscape. The quality of the leader depends on the ability to sort out so many elements of the complexity of the business and connecting them with the money making formula.

2. Before the Point Tips: Connecting the Dots by Pinpointing and Taking Action on Patterns of External Change. The need to look at the big picture and then work through the messy details. We are in uncharted waters. Relatively linear, continuous, and predictable are not the norm. Do you have the broad lens? Section on how to detect points before they tip.

3. Herding Cats: Getting People to Work Together by Managing the Social System of Your Business. Getting people to align their efforts is a lot like herding cats. Understanding the social system of a business is the best way to get a handle on the otherwise mysterious subject of managing and changing how people work together to meet ever-changing business requirements. Have to establish and enforce what behaviors are acceptable and which are not.

4. Leaders Are Made, Not Born: Judging, Selecting, and Developing Leaders. Discovering and developing a person's natural talent.

5. Unity Without Uniformity: Molding a Team of Leaders. Making a team more than the sum of its parts.

6. The Buck Starts With You: Determining and Setting the Right Goals.

7. It's Monday Morning, Now What"Setting Laser-Sharp Dominant Priorities.

8. Driving on Brokeback Mountain: Dealing with Forces Outside Your Control. Knowing how to anticipate and prepare for issues outside constituencies raise and judging the risks they pose to the business model.

Charan closes "Know-How" with a letter to a future leader, Michael, in which he advises that "given the transparency of today's world, any shortcoming in his know-hows, personality traits, or character will be revealed very quickly." He encourages Michael to be self-reflective; speed his progress through learning by experience, through others; be open to new ideas, people, situations, and problems; embrace fear and disappointment: and to focus on the know-hows of business.

While written for business, "Know How" will serve as an excellent guide for all who aspire to be successful leaders whether in the private, public, or non-profit sectors. It joins Dotlich's "Head, Heart, and Guts" (Wiley, 2006) as a perfect bookend to all that has been written on what makes a successful leader. These two books are unique, covering critical leadership attributes previously un-addressed.

Good 1st leadership book, otherwise pretty worthless
I'm thoroughly disappointed with this book. It's like the elementary school guide for recognizing someone who does things well. It might as well say, if your company makes a lot of profits, it's a good business. There is not a single revolutionary concept or idea in the book's 262 oddly sized pages. Go figure, aligning your business with the market, putting together a good team, setting goals, and anticipating and responding to forces beyond the market are strong traits in a leader. I wish I could include a more in-depth analysis, but there's nothing significant here to analyze. He doesn't go out on any limbs that can be criticized.

That said, I think this book might be of some value as someone's 1st book on leadership because it does a good job of presenting the foundations of a leader (that many other authors have already written volumes about) in a condensed form.