Buy New

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
or
Amazon Prime Free Trial required. Sign up when you check out. Learn More
Buy Used
Used - Good See details
$8.22 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
 
   
More Buying Choices
Have one to sell? Sell yours here
Topgrading: How Leading Companies Win by Hiring, Coaching, and Keeping the Best People, Revised and Updated Edition
 
 
Tell the Publisher!
I'd like to read this book on Kindle

Don't have a Kindle? Get your Kindle here, or download a FREE Kindle Reading App.

Topgrading: How Leading Companies Win by Hiring, Coaching, and Keeping the Best People, Revised and Updated Edition [Hardcover]

Bradford D. Smart Ph.D. (Author)
3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (72 customer reviews)

List Price: $29.95
Price: $19.77 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details
You Save: $10.18 (34%)
o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com. Gift-wrap available.
Want it delivered Friday, February 17? Choose One-Day Shipping at checkout. Details

Formats

Amazon Price New from Used from
Hardcover $19.77  
Paperback $11.95  

Book Description

April 7, 2005

Great companies don’t just depend on strategies—they depend on people. The more great people on your team, the more successful your organization will be. But that’s easier said than done. Statistically, half of all employment decisions result in a mishire: The wrong person winds up in the wrong job. But companies that have followed Bradford Smart’s advice in Topgrading have boosted their successful hiring rate to 90 percent or better, giving them an unbeatable competitive advantage.

Now Smart has fully revised his 1999 management classic to reintroduce the topgrading concept, which works for companies large and small in any industry. The author spells out his practical approach to finding and managing A-level talent—as well as coaching B players to turn them into A players. He provides intriguing case studies drawn from more than four thousand in-depth interviews.

As Smart writes in his introduction, “All organizations, all businesses live or die mostly on their talent, and any manager who fails to topgrade is nuts, or a C player. . . . Those who, way deep down, would sooner see an organization die than nudge an incompetent person out of a job should not read this book... Topgrading is for A players and all those aspiring to be A players.”

On the web: http://www.topgrading.com/


Frequently Bought Together

Topgrading: How Leading Companies Win by Hiring, Coaching, and Keeping the Best People, Revised and Updated Edition + Who: The A Method for Hiring + Mastering the Rockefeller Habits: What You Must Do to Increase the Value of Your Fast-Growth Firm
Price For All Three: $47.94

Show availability and shipping details

Buy the selected items together
  • In Stock.
    Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
    Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details

  • Who: The A Method for Hiring $13.99

    In Stock.
    Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
    Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details

  • Mastering the Rockefeller Habits: What You Must Do to Increase the Value of Your Fast-Growth Firm $14.18

    In Stock.
    Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
    Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details



Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

The key to building a superior company, an increasing number of observers now agree, is the ongoing ability to recruit and retain superior personnel. In Topgrading, industrial psychologist and global consultant Bradford Smart expands upon this idea by examining in great detail exactly how today's premier organizations have assembled such top-level employees, and then showing precisely how others can do it, too. "Simply put, topgrading is the practice of packing the team with A players and clearing out the C players," Smart writes. "'A players' is defined as the top 10 percent of talent available at all salary levels--best of class. With this radical definition, you are not a topgrader until your team consists of all A players. Period." Essentially a best-practices manual for developing this outstanding personnel pool, the book is based on more than 4,000 interviews and case studies conducted by Smart at major corporations like General Electric as well as fast-growing high-tech companies and small family-owned firms. He further bolsters its effectiveness by including his extensive "Chronological In-Depth Structured Interview Guide," along with other assessment tools and hands-on strategies for assembling an ideal work team. --Howard Rothman --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

Topgrading is the definitive manual for becoming an A player and for recognizing those traits in others. -- Larry Bossidy, coauthor of Execution

Product Details

  • Reading level: Ages 18 and up
  • Hardcover: 592 pages
  • Publisher: Portfolio Hardcover; Revised edition (April 7, 2005)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 1591840813
  • ISBN-13: 978-1591840817
  • Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 1.7 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 3.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (72 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,737 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Authors

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

 

Customer Reviews

72 Reviews
5 star:
 (44)
4 star:
 (6)
3 star:
 (4)
2 star:
 (6)
1 star:
 (12)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.9 out of 5 stars (72 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
Share your thoughts with other customers:
Most Helpful Customer Reviews

85 of 90 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars "OK", with reservations, May 16, 2006
"Topgrading" does have some insights, that are of some value, but keep in mind that this book is also a marketing tool for the author's services. The ideas here are not necessarily new; they're certainly not earth-shattering. The 'tool' for interviewing is most unlikely to be used by people in the real world, in HR or in the position of making a hiring decision. It is unweildy, excessivly long, and absolutely dependent on the ability of the interviewer to accurately evaluate the responses of the candidates. It is absurd to presume or assume that everyone -maybe even anyone- who reads this book will come away with that talent. I certainly would not want to make my company's growth and/or survival dependent on someone's consistent ability to accurately evaluate qualifications -and "quality"- over the course of using this 2-1/2 hour-long interview tool.

I also question whether or not the best candidates wouldn't get up and leave in disgust, or run as fast as they can from a company that would use this kind of interviewing tool.

The tone of the interviewing methodology seems, to me, to be adversarial and condescending, which will not generate the most accurate eveidence of talent of fit with a given organization. This is tedious, and excessive. It would not take a genius to BS his or her way into giving impressive answers. I question whether or not candidates, the best candidates especially, would not be offended at being asked these questions. I can imagine that candidates who are desperate would be happy to sit through this 'therapy session', but real professionals would more likely determine that a company using this method would not be a good fit. If you believe in making your candidates run a gauntlet of pain and fire, then be honest: set that up. The tool that is touted in "Topgrading" is at least equally as difficult for the interviewer as for the interviewee, especially given that the interviewer is expected to conduct multiple such interviews, while a candidate will endure only one interview. Can you really rely on the accuracy of the last interview of the day as compared to the first or second?

Despite claims for gaining special insight through use of this process, there is nothing special or unique here, other than the mass of what amounts to typical HR questions piled into one interview. The real 'secret' and value is in the ability, again, of the interviewer to assign purely subjective qualitative judgements to the answers. That's scary. It's not any more reliable, nor any more safe than any other systematic hiring approach that takes a little care and a little common sense.

I think most people who find themselves initially impressed are those who have not put much thought into hiring (the interview process) before now, and there is, therefore, a level of excitement at "discovering" a systematic approach. Anyone looking for a magic bullet for interviewing and hiring will think this is it for awhile, but they probably would have thought the same thing if they'd picked up 'that other book' instead.

The general ideas can best be adapted to specific needs, and can best be reduced in size. Add this to your library (or don't), and find the seeds of value in the book (or just bypass it altogether), but don't believe that this is the one true way. It isn't.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 
Was this review helpful to you? Yes No


27 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars Stop looking for magic bullets, June 8, 2007
While Brad Smart offers some good advice for the hiring manager, we must keep in mind that the purpose of TogGrading is to make money for, uh, Brad Smart. It is every hiring manager's responsibility to select the best candidate for a position. Some instinctively do a good job at this, while others are simply clueless. Dr. Smart presents his methodology with a zen-like religious furvor. He insists that if everyone in the organization adopts his methodology and becomes a zealot, the organization will become wildly successful. Isn't pretty to think so. My company jumped on the TogGrading bandwagon three years ago, because we had high turnover in a two departments. Now our hiring process is adruous, time-consuming and expensive. The results? Those managers who had low turnover rates still have low turnover rates. Those who had high turnover rates still have high turnover rates. The bottom line: TopGrading doesn't work any better than any other of the various magic bullet methods hawked to managers over the years. There is no one-size-fits-all methodology for selecting top performers. If your company is failing at attracting and retaining "A players" you'd do better to carefully examine your corporate culture than to jump on the latest fad method. If one manager excels at hiring and retaining good employees, allow him to mentor the managers who don't. This is cheaper and far more effective than turning your HR process upside down and hoping for a miracle cure.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 
Was this review helpful to you? Yes No


35 of 41 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars Beware, July 11, 2001
By 
Greg (Dearborn, MI USA) - See all my reviews
Be very careful using some of the information in this book or you risk creating an HR nightmare for your company. Ford Motor Company is in the process of defending itself against law suites brought on by employees who have been exposed to the "A, B, and C, Player," environment. The Top Grading system is viewed by many as arbitrary, unfair, and discriminatory. Even the most vocal practitioners of this system, General Electric, will admit the process can destroy moral.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 
Was this review helpful to you? Yes No

Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
 
 
 
Most Recent Customer Reviews











Only search this product's reviews



Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
How dramatically can topgrading improve talent? Read the first page
Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
moral approach, competency questions, virtual technology, topgrading professionals, topgraded companies, topgrading case studies, topgrading companies, topgrading assessments, midyear career review, career history forms, topgrading practices, fifty competencies, tandem interviewer, assimilation coaching, grading interview, dozen competencies, hiring success rate, career derailer, player candidates, talent meetings, competency interview, player standard, justifying dismissal, premier companies, external hires
Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Topgrading Interview, United States, Career History Form, Avoiding Legal Problems, Individual Development Plan, Only Fair, Human Resources, Hayes Lemmerz, Case Studies, Very Poor, General Electric, Tom Brock, Candidate Assessment Scorecard, Jack Welch, Work History, Very Good, Topgrading Calculator, The Topgrading Platinum Standard, Travelers Express, Fix Weaknesses, William Bradford, American Heart Association, Merrill Lynch, United Kingdom, Hillenbrand Industries
New!
Books on Related Topics | Concordance | Text Stats
Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Search Inside This Book:





Tags Customers Associate with This Product

 (What's this?)
Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
 
(2)

Your tags: Add your first tag
 

Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store

If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store. Learn more

Customer Discussions

This product's forum
Discussion Replies Latest Post
No discussions yet

Ask questions, Share opinions, Gain insight
Start a new discussion
Topic:
First post:
Prompts for sign-in
 

Search Customer Discussions
Search all Amazon discussions
   





Look for Similar Items by Category


Look for Similar Items by Subject