Harvard Business Review on Crisis Management [Paperback]

Harvard Business Press (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 2000

This collection of eight essays highlights leading ideas on how to deal with difficult situations, crises, and other sensitive topics in a business environment. Obtaining the managerial skills and tools to effectively manage or avoid these crises is critical to the survival and success of your organization. The Harvard Business Review Paperback Series is designed to bring today's managers and professionals the fundamental information they need to stay competitive in a fast-moving world. Here are the landmark ideas that have established the Harvard Business Review as required reading for ambitious business people in organizations around the globe. Articles include: Managing the Crisis You Tried to Prevent by Norman R. Augustine; When an Executive Defects by Anurag Sharma and Idalene F. Kesner; A Strategic Approach to Managing Product Recalls by N. Craig Smith, Robert J. Thomas, and John A. Quelch; Right Away and All at Once: How We Saved Continental by Greg Brenneman; Media Policy - What Media Policy? by Sandi Sonnenfeld; After the Layoffs, What Next? by Suzy Wetlaufer; Leadershp When There Is No One to Ask: An Interview with ENI's Franco Bernabe by Linda Hill and Suzy Wetlaufer; and Lincoln Electric's Harsh Lessons from International Expansion by Donald F. Hastings.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Since 1984, Harvard Business School Press has been dedicated to publishing the most contemporary management thinking, written by authors and practitioners who are leading the way. Whether readers are seeking big-picture strategic thinking or tactical problem solving, advice in managing global corporations or for developing personal careers, HBS Press helps fuel the fire of innovative thought. HBS Press has earned a reputation as the springboard of thought for both established and emerging business leaders.

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Harvard Business Press; 1 edition (January 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1578512352
• ISBN-13: 978-1578512355
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #329,585 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A useful tool, June 18, 2000

By 

Sunil Govinnage (PERTH Australia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Harvard Business Review on Crisis Management (Paperback)

Acquiring required skills and tools to effectively manage or mitigate crises is essential to the success of modern organizations. `Harvard Business Review on Crisis Management' is a collection eight essays presenting new ideas and concepts on how to manage, mitigate crises and other related key issues in a rapidly changing business environment.

Some of the essays in this collection are written by leading management consultants and CEOs. Topics covered include; `strategic approaches to product recalls', `leadership', `what happens when an executive defects' and how companies can develop better media policies and plans as part of crisis management and preparedness.

My favorite is Norman R Augustine's essay titled `Managing the Crisis You Tried to Prevent'. In this well researched essay, Augustine describes six stages of a crisis drawing lessons from several well-known crises. The important issue emerging is that "almost every crisis contains within itself' the seeds of failures as well as the "roots of failure." Drawing quotations from Shakespeare and Oscar Wilde, the author provides very useful insights into understanding, managing and preventing a crisis.

This book is a useful tool for executives and managers who need to upgrade their knowledge or gain access to leading experts on topics related to crisis management.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Dated contexts but durable insights, May 16, 2007

By 

Robert Morris (Dallas, Texas) - See all my reviews
(TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Harvard Business Review on Crisis Management (Paperback)

This is one in a series of several dozen volumes that comprise the "Harvard Business Review Paperback Series." Each offers direct, convenient, and inexpensive access to the best thinking on the given subject in articles originally published by the Harvard Business School Review. I strongly recommend all of the volumes in the series. The individual titles are listed at this Web site: www.hbsp.harvard.edu. The authors of various articles are among the world's most highly regarded experts on the given subject. Each volume has been carefully edited. Supplementary commentaries are also provided in most of the volumes, as is an "About the Contributors" section that usually includes suggestions of other sources that some readers may wish to explore.

In this volume, the reader is provided with eight articles. Given when they first appeared in the HBR (1994-1999), some of the material is dated but the core concepts remain relevant. Here are some questions and comments that indicate issues the various contributors examine:

How to manage the crisis you tried to prevent? (Norman R. Augustine)

What can be an effective strategic approach to managing product recalls? (N. Craig Smith, Robert J. Thomas, and John A. Quelch)

How was Continental Airlines "saved"? (Greg Brennehan)

What to do when a key executive defects? (Anurag Sharma and Idalene F. Kesner)

How to formulate and then implement an effective media policy? (Sandi Sonnenfeld)
Note: Five experts respond to a fictitious scenario and offer their advice.

After layoffs, what to do next? (Suzy Wetlaufer)
Note: Five experts offer their advice on how to revive morale at a company in another fictional case study.

In "Leadership When There Is No One to Ask," Linda Hill and Suzy Wetlaufer interview Franco Bernabe, CEO of Eni (a large, energy-focused industrial group in Italy), who explains why he made turnaround decisions in "solitude."

In "Lincoln Electric's Harsh Lessons from International Expansion," chairman emeritus Donald F. Hastings explains how Lincoln suffered throughout the 1990s and then returned to prosperity.

Those who share my high regard for this volume are urged to check out the recently published Harvard Business Review on Making Smarter Decisions as well as other series title in the Harvard Business Review Paperback Series such as those on Advances in Strategy, Becoming a High-Performance Manager, the Innovative Enterprise, Leadership at the Top, and Measuring Corporate Performance. Also these excellent sources which provide other perspectives on crisis management: Eric Dezenhall and John Weber's Damage Control: Why Everything You Know About Crisis Management Is Wrong, Dominic Elliot's Key Readings in Crisis Management: System and Structures for Prevention and Recovery, Ian I. Mitroff and Gus Anagnos'Managing Crises Before They Happen: What Every Executive and Manager Needs to Know About Crisis Management, Edward Borodzicz's Risk, Crisis and Security Management, Gerald Lewis' Organizational Crisis Management: The Human Factor, and Edward S. Devlin's Crisis Management Planning and Execution.

Oh yes, I almost forgot. Here's another excellent source published by Harvard Business School Press: Crisis Management: Mastering the Skills to Prevent Disasters (Harvard Business Essentials).

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A useful tool, June 28, 2006

By 

Fiona Bokulic "Fifi" (Australia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Harvard Business Review on Crisis Management (Paperback)

Without having to dredge through a plethora of material to find what you're looking for, you can use it to quickly flick through for refence material, checklists and guides.

A handy tool for any workplace....