Customer Reviews

The New Pioneers: The Men and Women Who Are Transforming the Workplace and Marketplace

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After spending three years in a weekend MBA program I swore I'd never buy another "must read" business book. I lied. Tom's writing makes this book a joy to read. Written in the style of his features in the WSJ, New Pioneers should be on the desk of every CEO, as well as the reading lists of serious students of economic and business theory.

Reading The New Pioneers is a pleasant occupation. On theother hand, reviewing this book for people who have not yet read it isa challenging task. This is primarily because the book is written to be read and understood at many different levels.

The simplest and most obvious level is as a series of charming stories in the best humanistic tradition that demonstrate that there is good business in being a good human.

At a deeper level, Mr. Petzinger is also telling us that the economy is changing in a fundamental way because of the experiences of small and middle sized business leaders, such as those cited in the book.

Beyond that, he is suggesting something fundamental about human civilization and its potential to create astonishingly positive results.

At whatever level you consider the book, you will be well rewarded for reading it.

I must admit that it is tempting to ignore the book's shortcomings, but that would shortchange the principles that Mr. Petzinger is exploring...

As heart-warming as this book is, it is a scrapbook rather than a vision for individual entrepreneurs. Its value for entrepreneurs is, nonetheless, quite substantial. The benefit comes from stimulating ideas among readers by showing new business examples that have not been widely published and discussed before. I hope all entrepreneurs will read this book for that important benefit.

A fine effort from a talented journalist! END

Tom has done a fabulous job with his latest book. It clearly shows how top people get there and make their organizations top performers. The book is chock full of examples that are relevant. The style of writing is, of course, meant for us by being easy-to-read and descriptive. Buy it!

Also recommend a well-receoved book that addresses how managers can be top performers by focusing on bettering themselves, their co-workers, and their organizations. It's called ""The Leader's Guide: 15 Essential Skills."

The small and home business "crowd" is growing. It's the best kept secret of the American Economy as we roll into the next Millenium.

Now Mr.Petzinger has cast the spotlight on this exciting new wave of entrepreneurship and prosperity and shown that it's still the "good old fashioned values" of service, enthusiasm, ingenuity and industry that win the gold. The writing is eloquent and inspiring. Whether you're an old hand at your small business or a dreamer in your corporate cubicle, we think you'll be as inspired by the pictures he paints as we were.

--Emily Page,

A must-read both for the individual and the organizations. By collecting Data from different human environments Petzinger draws general conclusions that are useful to know, as it were, the future, so we are empowered by those general conclusions. This is the main characteristic of the new science, where Data is not just a part anymore, but some sort of basic unit system in which both the quantitative and the qualitative are embedded. "The new pioneers celebrate individuality over conformity...and the new frontier is of technology, ideas and values" and "What a concept: Treating people individually and with dignity...turns out to be good for businness!" The new age of adaptation as Petzinger calls this new stage of mankind is certainly based on truly leadership, and this is what THE NEW PIONEERS is all about. "Just as economic pressures had once created larger and larger organizations, a new set of pressures began pushing business in the opposite direction.". Finally we have an optimistic and realistic message for this turbulent and changing times.

In Chapter 10 of Leading Change, James O'Toole discusses Robert Owen (1771-1858) whom he characterizes as "the Thomas Edison of social invention. He was the first to devise or advocate numerous practices in industrial relations, education, and social policy that are still considered progressive today, more than 130 years after his death." In The New Pioneers, Petzinger focuses on the contemporary world in which a "revolution" is now underway in business, "for the most part invisible in the headlines and the boardrooms, but dizzying in its effect on the front lines." Much of what he discusses is directly relevant to Owen's initiatives. He agrees with Abraham Maslow that "the most valuable one hundred people to a deteriorating society" would be entrepreneurs because "the arrow of evolution flies toward the pioneering."

Over the years, I have learned a great deal from reading Petzinger's column in the Wall Street Journal, "The Front Lines." He is constantly alert to subtle but potentially significant developments within and beyond the ever-changing workplace. The material he shares in this brilliant book is drawn from "the front lines" of companies based in more than 40 cities in 30 states as well as several companies in foreign countries.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who seeks answers to questions such as these:

1. Which "new frontiers" offer the greatest opportunities for institutional growth and human development?

2. Which economies of scale are most relevant to such growth?

3. To optimize development of "human capital" in small-to-midsize organizations, which strategies (eg incentives and rewards) work best?

4. Which of these strategies will also be effective in larger organizations?

5. Amidst turbulent change caused by new technologies, which traditional values will enable any organization to nourish its "human systems"?

To succeed in what he calls "The Age of Adaptation" (the subject of his Introduction), Petzinger asserts that organizations (regardless of size or nature) must cope effectively with certain "new realities" which serve as the subtitles of the book's ten chapters. For example: "Trade and technology are fundamentally human", "Why the new rules favor the small and connected", "The customer is the common denominator", and "Knowledge and self-organization flourish at the edge of chaos." It is important to reiterate that Petzinger's observations and assertions are based on a wealth of real-world experience. He is firmly convinced that "We, our tools, and the businesses by which we accomplish nearly everything are all products of the natural world." Although granting that "Wrong turns and backsliding will occur from time to time", Petzinger is convinced that each new age will produce another generation of "pioneers" who will continue to transform a global marketplace which is rapidly becoming the same workplace for nearly everyone.

Petzinger's understanding of systems theory and its links to corporate business practices make this a throughly enjoyable read. I was particularly interested in his stories of how chaos was utilized in a manufacturing envirnoment. I recommend this book to anyone who has an interest in postmodernism and how it affects business.

(Adapted from an article I wrote in December, 1999, issue of Ventures magazine.)

What if business isn't what you think it is? And you're in it. Oops.

Two recent books deliver that message right between the eyes: Tom Petzinger's The New Pioneers and Cliff Havener's Meaning: The Secret of Being Alive.

Tom and Cliff know each other only by e-mail. They started out in different places for different reasons. Yet they came to the same quite startling conclusions. That alone suggests it's worth stopping to read what they have to say.

Cliff spent thirteen years in marketing and new product development at three major corporations - General Foods, M & M Mars, and Pillsbury. He was in business. Something wasn't right; he kept seeing "leaping, screaming, pole-vaulting nonsense" long before Dilbert was born. He noticed a repeating pattern: "Every time I solved a problem of any substance, I found myself in disfavor with management." He started asking, "How come my best stuff gets me into the most trouble?"

Tom wasn't in business; he observed and reported it. One "bracing late-winter morning" he walked into "a tiny storefront called Philadelphia Pharmacy" and "awoke to the existence of an altogether new economy in America." Philadelphia Pharmacy was successful far beyond its right to be - and seemed to have broken every business rule.

What insights have they turned up?

-- Almost everything we believe about what makes business work is just plain wrong;

-- We don't need a different morality - but a different reality;

-- "Making money" is effect, not cause;

-- Companies are small frogs in a vibrant universe, not mighty broadcasting towers;

-- "New science" and "systems theory" aren't just trendy metaphors for leadership and learning organizations. Rather, they redefine what we need to learn. As Tom puts it, "One is tempted to say that business isn't like nature, business is nature."

The entire model of commerce changes - every operating principle, every process, every "how to" - just as surely as when Copernicus and Galileo said, "Guess what, guys? The Earth's not running the show." Oops.

Why should we care? To bring it to the good old bottom line, because our chances of success, of making money, are a whole lot greater. It's tough jamming square pegs in round holes all the time - damn hard work.

Why should you care? One of the newspapers, very possibly Tom's Wall Street Journal, carried a little filler paragraph a few weeks ago. Over half of US executives and managers said their lives feel empty and meaningless. Cliff comments, "Think about it. How much sense and meaning could anyone find in a system that has the wrong idea about why it exists?" Chickens come home to roost; they don't stay at the office.

The two books complement each other. The New Pioneers offers story after case study of people and companies that did things differently and got unexpected, outstanding results. Meaning explains why they got such startling results, with clear, basic pictures of what "systems" really are and vivid descriptions of how companies destroy both themselves and people in them when they close their doors to essential reality.

Petzinger does an excellent job of describing what real success -- financial, production, morale and moral -- will look like in the marketplace of the future, by citing companies that have created such successes today. I rarely read beyond the first 25 pages of business books, because they tend to be long on sloppy theory and bad prose, and short on intelligent application. By contrast, Petzinger's theses are concise and informative, his writing is clean, and his examples both demonstrate what works and warn of what can go wrong when the best intentions meet real-life complications. I've given copies of this book to my boss, to our company's strategic planning department, and to every person who reports to me. It's that good.

The late 1990's were hit by a surge of entrepreneurialism in the United States. This was entrepreneurial drive was fueled by technology, the internet, a booming economy and "can do" attitude that emerged among US citizens. The US are still benefiting from this entrepreneurial boom, in spite of the stock market crash in 2000, over 20 million jobs have been created in entrepreneurial organisations in the US in the past 15 years.

In the late 1990's Tomas Petzinger, a Wall Street Journal columnist, set out to uncover the motivation and drivers of the individuals that were establishing exciting new businesses. He uncovers a series of engaging stories about courageous and pioneering entrepreneurs who transformed their personal situations by creating intriguing new jobs and enterprises to meet the needs of the new economy.

These are real stories of real people overcoming real challenges to create real opportunities. These stories generate a ray of hope & inspiration for South Africans wishing to establish an entrepreneurial venture to benefit from the economic boom that this country is experiencing. The stories in the book do not provide a text book model for exactly how things should be done but they are a source of insightful ideas and engaging metaphors to inspire and guide would be entrepreneurs. The stories in this book are also not the common stories that we have heard time and time again. Petzinger has purposefully ignored the Starbucks, Google, Amazon.com and eBay stories so that he could uncover tales of individuals who have done extraordinary things outside of the limelight.

Petzinger illustrates how technology creates new opportunities for start-up niche players to establish profitable businesses. He explores what motivates and drives generation X entrepreneurs and he examines how a new venture with social meaning brings purpose and profit. Although the book was written seven years ago, it can still serve as a guiding light and foundation for inspiration, especially for South Africans wishing to pioneer new ways of doing things to make a meaningful impact in this country and abroad.