Customer Reviews

You're in Charge--Now What?: The 8 Point Plan

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

"Writing a book is not that hard. You take the first 11 books on the subject and then you write the 12th". The Danish Philosopher Soren Kierkegaard said this already 150 years ago. And it's apparently still true.

Only in this case, the authors seem to have gotten their inspiration from one key source ... and that is Harvard professor Michael Watkins, who published "THE FIRST 90 DAYS - CRITICAL SUCCESS STRATEGIES FOR NEW LEADERS AT ALL LEVELS" in 2003. In that book, Watkins outlines 10 strategies for all leaders about to take up a new leadership position. By the way, Watkins' book is well written without any academic flavour.

What is Neff and Citrin's 8 POINT PLAN? The fundamental idea is: Get set to learn, listen well, set proper expectations, read the culture, build trust, lead by example, set the appropriate direction, and communicate effectively. These ideas are transformed to become the 8 steps for building your foundation towards great performance as a new manager:
1. Prepare Yourself During the Countdown
2. Align Expectations
3. Shape Your Management Team
4. Craft Your Strategic Agenda
5. Start Transforming Culture
6. Manage Your Board/Boss
7. Communicate
8. Avoid Common Pitfalls

If you read my online review of "The First 90 Days", you'll see that both books focus on exactly the same issues. But Neff and Citrin generously allow 100 days for new managers. Just like Machiavelli suggested for politicians...

I've read this book because I'm very interested in being better at taken on a new leadership position (a situation that I've tried five times in 15 years). Since I enjoyed "First 90 Days" a lot, I thought this book would add further to my knowledge on the subject. Unfortunately, it didn't. However, I do appreciate the concise 10 guidelines for each of the eight steps. And the appendices also offer practical advice. These contributions earned the two stars rating.

By the way, to complete the "cut-and-paste" issue, please take a look at Gerald M. Czarnecki's book from 2003: "You're in charge ... what now? - Seven essential steps for work leader success". Same title. Same topic. Only different authors...

Being a reader, I obviously do not care much about who owns the intellectual rights to the ideas. It's just that I do not like to buy a new book on a favourite topic just to learn that I've read all the ideas before in another book on the subject. At least, I would expect an online reviewer to tell me. Well, that's why I wrote this piece...

Peter Leerskov,
MSc in International Business (Marketing & Management) and Graduate Diploma in E-business

I bought two books on the first 100 days--this one and "The First 90 Days" by Michael Watkins. I found this book the most useful, and it quickly and immediately inspired me to prepare a succinct 100 day plan broken down into 10 day blocks, for a new $2 billion a year agency. Hence, I completely disagree with those that trash this book and recommend "The First 90 Days" instead of this book. I do find both books useful--read this one first, then cherry pick from Watkins.

Sure, anyone can cook a meal with the same ingredients, and sure, there are a number of books on this topic. For me, this book has exactly the right combination of white space, font size, lay-out, progressive structure, and inspiring snippets (including the all-important advocacy for having an in-house revolutionary).

I recommend this book be read in conjunction with Robert Buckman's "Creating a Knowledge-Driven Organization," Margaret Wheatley's "Leadership and the New Science" (which Buckman told me inspired his own work), and Clayton Christensen's "The Innovator's Solution" (or you can just read my short summative reviews of those three books).

Why would two headhunters want to write a book about best practices starting their jobs among new CEOs? Based on reading this book, I can only conclude that they wanted to show off the CEOs they had recruited for client companies in order to garner more business from those companies and to obtain CEO search assignments from new clients.

Having read many books on this subject, I can only assure you that this one adds nothing to the literature beyond some new cases. On the other hand, this book is no worse than any other book on the subject.

Those who will be most disappointed are readers who wanted to learn something new who have read other books on this subject. The next most disappointed group will be those who are taking on leadership jobs that will not involve heading companies or divisions. Those readers will find little specific information aimed at those needs.

With a natural market of 150 U.S. CEOs a year, why does a book like this sell many more copies? It's really a book that appeals to those who hope to be CEOs of large public companies someday, which will mostly be MBAs who are fairly young. Such readers can dream about how they would handle these same situations. While that can be fun, the time would be better spent on developing a new skill for your current and next job.

As I have noted before, best practices can be misleading. Best practices can suggest that there is no better route available.

That thought led me to think about what's missing from a book like this. Here are a few of the many examples I could list:

1. A description of what on-going measurements to put in place in order to understand where the company is today, how it needs to change and what its most realistic opportunities are.

2. A process for creating a premium-priced stock price based on a realistic understanding by investors of the company's situation and where it is going in the future.

3. A way of monitoring how well the CEO is performing in terms of each of the 8 points in the plan described in the book.

4. What to do differently after the first 100 days.

Now, if those areas seem fundamental to you, they are. Why are they missing? I have to assume that the authors lack the expertise to work on those areas. They are, after all, just headhunters.

If you are still interested in the book, what do the authors tell you to do?

1. Prepare before you start the job.
2. Encourage low expectations of what you will accomplish.
3. Pick and brief your management team.
4. Determine your strategic focus.
5. Improve the corporate culture.
6. Develop your relationship with the board.
7. Communicate what you are doing.
8. Avoid making common mistakes.

Did you really need to read a book to figure that out? If so, I'm not sure you are ready to be a CEO.

I would like to comment that when I coach new CEOs of major companies I find that NO ONE takes point 6 seriously enough. So if you do read the book, pay particular attention to that point.

Good luck!

I bought "The First 90 days" by Michael Watkins and this book. I found this book to be a stronger and more practical guide. Both offered excellent guidance however Neff & Citrin produced a more interesting and readable (less text-book like) book with real life examples and a road map. Word of warning in that the book is written for senior business management and less applicable for lower levels of management or line positions.

If you are a brand new CEO and need to know how to run your organization, buy this book. If you are at any lower level, this book is not meant for you.

The authors state directly from the beginning that they focus more on CEOs than most other positions but the lessons learned are applicable to anyone. This is not true. The author focus too much on the role of a CEO. The examples and suggestions are unique to that role. In one section the book describes how to find your management blind spots such as research and development, marketing, etc. If you are a software development manager in a large firm, your knowledge of marketing or R&D will most likely do little for your career. Yet this book highlights that as areas you should improve.

Another example on how the book focuses too much on CEO is displayed in the how-to-work-with-your-boss chapter. They entire chapter discusses how you should interact with the board of directors! This is a complely different relationship than what 99.9% of workers engage in. The relationship you have with your boss is possibly the most important relationship in your career. To focus this chapter on working with the board makes it absolutely useless to anyone who is not an officer or anyone that does not work for a private firm.

It is important to also look beyond the 8 points of this book to its overall meta messages:
*Today, the CEO on-board process is a relative manageable and predictable process
*During this process a variety of individuals have specific roles and objectives to ensure the CEO's success
*There are specific, transferable skills and experiences to get in preparation for the CEO job
*More Boards then ever are flexing their newly acquired, legislative muscles. This has resulted in a tremendous amount of CEOs firings. A more cost effective solution would be for Boards to prevent these firings by providing the CEO adequate pre- and on-boarding support.

It is correct that, in their most summarized form, these eight points have been written about in literature since centuries. Yet, messages such as these are worth repeating two hundred fifty million times (that is approximately how much it has cost to replace seven top CEO in the last three months) as long as this keeps occurring:
*New CEOs make unnecessary mistakes
*Boards fire CEOs they only hired a year ago for mistakes which could have been prevented with adequate guidance and counsel
*Boards react ("Well, we needed to fire him/her because of mistakes") instead of plan and execute pre-emptive solutions

This is a controversial book, as the ideas are by no means unique and have been expolated previously. When you write so many articles and books on the same subject, there is bound to be reiteration but the similarity to another management guide is unreal.

Between tomorrow's dream and yesterday's regret is today's opportunity for the reader to learn how to manage expectations and strive to reach his full potential. These top executive recruiters, Thomas J. Neff and James M. Citrin of the Spencer Stuart firm, explains how to go about 'dissing' your predecessor; it is about the problem of filling the shoes of the person you replaced, and shows the difficulty of the savior syndrome when setting unrealistic expectations. They advise the reader, as a beginning manager, to avoid misreading the true sources of power and to learn the steps as you walk the ladder to success. "Don't try to come across as smarter than you are." But don't play dumb, either; that is a major downfall of so many young executives who still have a thing or two to learn.

You're in Charge-Now What? is a fun read and the magic elixr for anyone about to start a new job; The are clear and entertaining anecdotes about real business leaders, such as Jeff Imelt CEO of GE, Paul Pressler CEO of the Gap, Bob Nardelli CEO of Home Depot, Patricia Russo CEO of Lucent, Ed Zander CEO of Motorola, and Larry Summers President of Harvard University among many more. The advice is wrapped up in a compelling 8 point plan for the first 100 days culminating with the top traps to avoid in starting a new position. When you need advice on how to hit the ground running, this is the perfect book for you.

When I saw the "Recommended for You" email, I thought Gerald Czarnecki had come out with a sequel. Instead, I find a not as elegant knock-off.

Czarnecki offers a much better, more digestible plan for those who are newly appointed in positions of management. His "Seven Essential Steps for Work Leader Success" are useful and proven techniques for those who need it the most: the everyday people in an organization who get the job done, not the Stanford-grad CEOs who have already spent years in management and academia learning the ropes. I have recommended his book to friends in just about every industry, from IT to the military. I, myself, found Czarnecki's book extremely useful as a new senior non-commissioned officer in dealing with people who became my subordinates overnight. Unfortunately, this book did not address that sort of issue.

This book isn't a terrible book by any means, and perhaps for a CEO or high-level manager it is something good. As I am neither, I didn't find it appealing. It's essentially the same information you can find elsewhere, and as a previous reviewer pointed out, the tips and techniques are more for those already in the boardroom. Go back to Czarnecki's original if you are a new manager, especially one who was promoted from within, or looking for a gift for the grad or newly promoted.
You're In Charge...What Now?

Thomas Neff and James Citrin's "You're In Charge -- Now What?" offers an 8-point plan for starting a new leadership post. Written with the CEO as the intended audience (though useful for lower leadership levels as well), the book offers a comprehensive checklist of strategies, as well as helpful real-life anecdotes from past CEO's making the transition.

Of particular help are the stories, top ten list of mistakes to avoid, and the emphasis on building consensus (with the board, with the real power players you take care to identify). There is a lot of repetition which helps reinforce the subject or bores you, depending on your point of view.

One piece of conflicting advice that I struggled with was the time allocation advice. According to Neff and Citrin, the new leader has less than 1200 hours, (calculated as 14 hours per day and a 6-day work week), so exercise and family time are likely to fall off the radar (they mention several times the value of leaving family behind for the first few months of a relocation situation. Kudos to Neff and Citrin for providing both male AND female examples of this). Yet, they also talk about how there are many first 100 days over the course of a career, implying that there are many instances where you need to drop health and family and focus all or nothing on the job. While I agree wholeheartedly that there are crunch times throughout a career (and family crunch times as well), the implied start and stop made me wonder if there is a better way. Given Neff and Citrin's extensive experience watching careers via their work with executive search firm Spencer Stuart, I hope a more balanced long-term approach might be part of a follow-up book!

All in all it's a great book for the reference shelf.