The Mars Pathfinder Approach to "Faster-Better-Cheaper" [Paperback]

Price Pritchett (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0944002749 | ISBN-13: 978-0944002742 | Publication Date: March 30, 1998 | Edition: 1

There's a new market battle cry being sounded around the world: Faster-Better-Cheaper. Organizations everywhere are in a competitive war trying to pick up speed, improve output, and do it all for less money.

Actually, "improvement" per se isn't too hard to come by with all of today's technological advancements. The tricky part comes in doing things faster, better, and cheaper all at the same time. That takes creativity. Ingenuity. Innovation. To help your employees grow in this regard, they need role models. Good examples. It helps greatly to see living proof of "faster-better-cheaper" in action.

Price Pritchett's latest title, The Mars Pathfinder Approach to "Faster-Better-Cheaper" provides that proof, and breaks it down into 13 high-impact guidelines your employees can use to drive your organization to spectacular success.

Co-authored with Brian Muirhead, Flight Systems Manager of the JPL Mars Pathfinder Team, this book shows how a small group of dedicated people-tapping into the spirit of ingenuity and innovation-proved "faster-better-cheaper" works in deep space as well as it does on Earth.

Most important, the book draws the "faster-better-cheaper" business messages out of this intriguing story, and shows your employees how to apply them in your organization.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Price Pritchett is Chairman of Pritchett, LLC, a Dallas-based consulting, training and publishing firm. For 30 years he has been advising CEOs, presidents, and other senior executives on a wide range of strategic matters related to merger integration and major organizational change.

Price holds a B.A. and M.A. in English and a Ph.D. in psychology, and is recognized internationally as a leading authority on the dynamics of change in the workplace. His 26 books and handbooks have sold over 10 million copies, making him one of the best-selling business authors in the U.S.

Brian Muirhead lead the design, development and launch of the flight system for the Pathfinder mission to Mars and was named Project Manager upon the mission's successful landing. He has a MS in Aeronautics from Caltech and has worked on space and technology projects at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory since 1978.

Product Details

• Paperback: 84 pages
• Publisher: Pritchett Publishing Company; 1 edition (March 30, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0944002749
• ISBN-13: 978-0944002742
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.8 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #551,369 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #49 in Books > Professional & Technical > Professional Science > Astronomy & Space Science > Mars

More About the Author

Price Pritchett, Ph.D., is Chairman and CEO of PRITCHETT, LP, a company known worldwide for its expertise in organizational change, merger integration, corporate culture, and process redesign. For more than 30 years, he has helped executives and their workforces understand and rise to the challenge of accelerating change. With more than 20 million copies of his books in print, he is one of the bestselling authors in the world. Dr. Pritchett's clients include Pfizer, Chicago Mercantile Exchange, ABC Radio, Wachovia, McDonald's, John Deere, Michelin, ABN-AMRO, Lockheed-Martin, Novartis, and Delta Airlines. He is also the author of McGraw-Hill's Hard Optimism.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars At last a simple powerful book on how to perform in groups, March 11, 1999

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Mars Pathfinder Approach to "Faster-Better-Cheaper" (Paperback)

You were so impressed by the Mars Pathfinder mission, and you are definetely interested by people management issues: get this great little book, you will appreciate the conciseness, precision, and high value of all the concepts it expresses.

If history is to teach us how to be 'better' in the present and the future, such short and enjoyable summaries of what was done well, how and why, is THE way to learn, grow and improve.

What a mission, what a book ! I missed two metro stops while savoring each of its words ! Bravo !: 5 stars !

PS: Get Brian K. Muirhead & William L. Simon's excellent book HIGH VELOCITY LEADERDSHIP if you want to read more about faster, better, cheaper".

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Where Brian Muirhead when you need him?, December 11, 1999

By 

Ralph F. Munyan (Leawood, Ks) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Mars Pathfinder Approach to "Faster-Better-Cheaper" (Paperback)

What an incredible book! Brian Muirhead's story of developing, launching, and landing the successful Mars Pathfinder Mission is an incredible story of vision, hard work, attention to detail, and because of it all, success.

The professionalism exhibited by Brian and his team continue to inspire me months after I read the book.

In the current days of failed missions to Mars, I can't help but think that if Brian Muirhead had been in charge of those failed missions, they too would have been a success.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great ideas for finding new ways to do more with less!, August 22, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Mars Pathfinder Approach to "Faster-Better-Cheaper" (Paperback)

Outstanding book showing how the Pathfinder team put a rover on Mars in less time and with a fraction of the money than it took to put up Voyager. Great ideas for how to look beyond the status quo and do things better, faster, cheaper. A great team leadership book.