Review
Debbe Kennedy, author and apparent creator of this array of resources, comes with solid business credentials and an impressive set of endorsements from the likes of Joel Barker and Francis Hesselbein. Kennedy's basic proposition is that since most problems are similar and are the result of universal core issues, too much time is wasted in starting up the problem solving process.The approach offers several advantages. Aside from speed, the group is provided an inventory of possible root causes. The card deck contains over fifty common roadblocks to work group effectiveness. Participants sort through the cards, identify the most likely problem areas and pull those cards out for discussion. After a re-sort and cull down to the key issues, the members turn to each issue's corresponding chapter in the book for a comprehensive listing of generic solutions.There are typically eight to ten carefully described alternatives for each problem. This is the heart of Breakthrough!; well conceived, clearly written and often insightful. The easy to follow format allows even the uninitiated to run a problem solving session with reasonable assurance of having a successful outcome. Its a particularly nice tool for a line manager who wants to practice team building skills or doesn't have available HR resources. Breakthrough! is clever idea with broad potential audience. The package can be considered a next step in the evolution of educational tools, and if properly positioned, Breakthrough! can be an alternative delivery vehicle for the devolution of team building responsibility to line managers. If only it told the outside temperature. --
Excerpt from book review by Steve McIntosh, PhD for HR Magazine, June 1999... wonderful book... outstanding work. --
Kazuo Inamori, Letter to publisher, February 18, 1998...great wisdom, great style, great utility, and great innovation. I've run out of superlatives. I love it! --
Frances Hesselbein, President and CEO, Leader to Leader Institute (The Peter F. Drucker Foundation for Non-Profit Management)...the value of
Breakthrough! is the ease of its adaptions for use with basic models of organizational change. An unknown author said, Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.
Breakthrough! provides an organization with tools to fish for real solutions. You can take it anywhere, on a plane, or a train ... Use it alone or in a group setting. It offers insightful concrete direction for solutions to difficult problems. It is truly an essential item in any consultants tool box. --
Dolores Murrey, Ph.D., Black Hawk Center for Organizationl Excellence, Letter to the publisherBreakthrough!--1998 InnoThink Award Winner ...for most far-thinking combination of message and media. This slipcased set with book, CD-ROM, card deck is a helpful kit for hands-on organizational renewal. If fully used, problems diminish as new possibilities emerge. Pioneering. --
Management General's 1998 InnoThink Award Official Announcement, January 21, 1999Kennedy's Breakthrough! is simultaneously a compendium of timeless, recognized wisdom and a great toolkit for getting something done on Monday morning. Few management packages - book, CD - pack the punch of this effort. --
Nicholas Imparato, Co-Author, Jumping the Curve and Professor of Marketing and Management, University of San Francisco Research Fellow, Hoover Institute, Stanford UniversityNomination for Top 10 Books in 1998 --- In what may very easily be the future format of many business books, Kennedy focuses on the workplace syndrome of talking about problems without ever developing concrete actions to address the real business issues. --Rating: *** Newletter March 9, 1998
From the Publisher
Breakthrough! The Problem Solving Advantage is a breakthrough in the business book market. Debbe Kennedy has put together a comprehensive organizational problem-solving business tool by breaking through the barrier of the printed page and the paradigm of what we have known as a business book. She is reaching out to her readers in a new and unprecedented way to help them unleash the solution power that resides within them and their organizations. "...clearly written and full of good information. Really excellent!", Mae Kavin, Editor, The Last Detail.
