Why Can't We Get Anything Done Around Here?: The Smart Manager's Guide to Executing the Work That Delivers Results [Paperback]

R. Lefton (Author), Jerome Loeb (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 12, 2003

A proven system for ensuring that your business is productive--not just busy!

Coauthored by the president and CEO of the prestigious international consulting firm Psychological Associates, Why Can't We Get Anything Done Around Here? Shows business leaders how to get bottom-line results with new methods for designing and implementing business strategies. These proven methods will help any business:

• Zero in on tasks essential to company success and assign them to the right people
• Motivate employees to achieve and maintain crisis-level performance without crisislevel stress and burnout
• Match tasks with technical, interpersonal, and decision-making skills

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Accomplish so much more by focusing on how you organize and assign work

Sure, your people are busy, but is all their hard work achieving the goals that are essential to your department, your division, and your company? Most unproductive work in any organization stems from poor decisions about who should be assigned to do the task in the first place. Why Can't We Get Anything Done Around Here? shows you how to get bottom-line results, with a proven system for ensuring that everyone in your organization is working on the right task at the right time and being productive--not just busy!

Authors Robert E. Lefton and Jerome T. Loeb introduce the Task Management System, a simple and practical tool that any manager can use to make effective work assignment decisions. Illustrating each step of the task management process with live examples of good and bad decisions and practices, they describe a totally different approach to getting projects done effectively and identifying and rooting out unproductive work. Using this battle-tested system, you'll learn how to:

• Zero in on tasks essential to success and assign them to the right people
• Match tasks with people's technical, interpersonal, and decision-making skills
• Avoid the five management errors that keep you from getting things done
• Manage in a crisis mode--without the crisis
• Maximize your own productivity

About the Author

Robert E. Lefton is cofounder, president, and co-CEO of Psychological Associates, a leading U.S. management and organizational consultancy servicing many Fortune 500 companies. He lives in St. Louis.

Jerome T. Loeb is former Chairman of the Board of The May Department Stores Co. He is currently adjunct professor of marketing at the Olin School of Business, Washington University in St. Louis. He lives in St. Louis.

Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill; 1 edition (December 12, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0071430067
• ISBN-13: 978-0071430067
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,587,001 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Good Read!, April 21, 2004

By 

Rolf Dobelli "getAbstract" (Switzerland) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Why Can't We Get Anything Done Around Here?: The Smart Manager's Guide to Executing the Work That Delivers Results (Paperback)

Do you feel that your employees just don't grapple with the tasks at hand? Take heart. This handbook offers one way to solve one of the major conundrums of modern management: how do we get things done? Authors Robert E. Lefton and Jerome T. Loeb focus on a productivity-oriented Task Management Model that requires managers to categorize employees along a spectrum of capabilities, including which jobs they like best and do well. Then, the model helps managers understand their own leadership styles and assign the right tasks to the right people to increase efficiency. The book cites examples of its model in use, but it is short on analysis, insights and detailed cases. However, .We think it would be useful to managers and human resources professionals in large organizations who need a quick way to categorize staff members in hopes of improving productivity.

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Reminder, January 1, 2009

By 

Nick McCormick - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Why Can't We Get Anything Done Around Here?: The Smart Manager's Guide to Executing the Work That Delivers Results (Paperback)

In this brief book the authors offer up their "Task Management Model" to assist with the assignment of tasks. It has 3 dimensions: Task Importance, Employee Capability, and Employee Enjoyment. The important tasks are split into four quadrants with capability as the X axis and enjoyment as the Y axis. The authors give names to each quadrant. For example, the task assignments in which employees enjoy and are highly capable of completing are called gold stars. Those in which employees are not capable and don't enjoy are red flags. Unimportant tasks are not part of any quadrant. They are called black holes and should never be done.

Obviously, the world would be a better place if all task assignments could be gold star tasks. Unfortunately that is not reality, so the authors explain how to address tasks within each quadrant. They also explain management styles that are most effective and common management mistakes that prevent them from getting things done.

The book is an important reminder that managers day-to-day task assignments have a significant impact on employee productivity and when executed properly are critical to the success of their organizations.

-- Nick McCormick, Author, Lead Well and Prosper: 15 Successful Strategies for Becoming a Good Manager