Amazon.ca:Customer reviews: The Art of Action: How Leaders Close the Gaps between Plans, Actions and Results

Sort by

Filter by

249 total ratings, 56 with reviews

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Translate all reviews to English

From Canada

David Bellerive

Read this book

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on May 7, 2015

Verified Purchase

Written exactly as he prescribes; clear simple direction to move you forward. This is the best leadership book I have ever read. The lessons can be applied to business as a whole, but I also see some great opportunities in day to day work.

Helpful

sojv

Good

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on June 9, 2016

Verified Purchase

Good book.

Helpful

Ovidiu Nanuti

Un excellent livre de stratégie en combinant la stratégie d'affaires avec ...

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on March 30, 2016

Verified Purchase

Un excellent livre de stratégie en combinant la stratégie d'affaires avec la stratégie militaire et l'histoire.
Je le recommande fortement !!!

Helpful

From other countries

Amazon Customer

Most imporant leadership book in years

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on April 16, 2011

Verified Purchase

This book is remarkable. The author's breath of reading and research is amazing. Almost every important author or management book of the 20th century is referenced here - in refreshing and often critical candor. From fads like 'Blue Ocean Strategy' to serious works like 'Balance Scorecard' The Art of Action looks at a wide range of material and distills down what works for actually accomplishing something.

However what made this book so significant is the practical advice and implementable ideas. This isn't another ivory tower theory from on high book, but a practical solution that every manager or leader can get results from.

That said it isn't a handbook. More 'how to' should have been included. Illustrations are small. Footnotes are numerous (and without chapter heads). There are no summaries, no easy to read or follow instructions. They exist but thy are not as useful as the author intended. You have to do the work of reading, digesting the material, and thinking through a practical application for your business.

But oh how worthwhile you'll find that process. Of the dozens of books I read annually The Art of Action is one I'll keep at hand, re-read, and use.

Like in war when a business strategy encounters the real world 3 gaps appear (gaps in terms of expected results and reality: outcomes, actions, plans). They are:

1. The knowledge gap - the difference between what we would like to know and what we actually know.

2. The Alignment Gap - the difference between what we want people to do and what they actually do.

3. The Effects Gap - the difference between what we expect our actions to achieve and what they actually achieve.

The Art of Action is about filling those gaps. Stephen Bungay uses the lessons of war and military theorists to figure out how to really create a "learning organization." The mechanical view of workers as learning tasks and slavishly performing them won't work in dynamic situations like war or competitive business environments. People need to know the goals (intentions) of a business and then have the skill sets to proactively and creatively find their own solutions to accomplish them. We provide the strategy, again goals and intentions along with tactical resources but the people think and act independently to accomplish the goals. A tall order however The Art of Action explains how.

Simply a great book that will save you tons of time from reading the hundreds of books this author has read and gleaned the gold from.

"We have a strategy, we have long-term objectives, we all have budgets...meanwhile our people are asking, 'so, what is it exactly that you're asking me to do?'"

"Generating activity is not a problem; in fact it is easy. The fact that it is easy makes the real problem harder to solve. The problem is getting the right things done - the things that matter, the things that will have an impact, the things a company is trying to achieve to ensure success. A high volume of activity often disguises a lack effective action."

15 people found this helpful

Andy R

Theoretic

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on October 8, 2022

Verified Purchase

More scientific version of 'turn the ship around'. Lots more detail on history and the theory as you would expect with turn the ship around being more practical and easier to pick up

Jason

A truly brilliant book!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on December 8, 2021

Verified Purchase

An in-depth analysis of, basically, how to get good results in what we do: whether in business, command or just everyday life. If you are in a hole, and need to get out, this book will give you some principles of how to get good “outcomes” from bad situations.
You may find the terminology easier to understand than some management books. In fact, this book is more about leadership, and effective leadership, than management.
There are some chapters which I found more difficult than others. But the military terminology, and the adaptation of strategy, was absolutely spot on. It explains that strategy is something that evolves and cannot always be planned for.
It’s not cheap, but that will reflect the potential value of such a book. It may very well change your life. It’s certainly a clear guide to help deal with the problems that life throws at us.
Invest in this book if you want to be a good leader.

2 people found this helpful

A reviewer from London

Can you apply Auftragstatik to Business?

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on September 21, 2011

Verified Purchase

Although it is not very clear from the cover of the book and the blurb (particular there is no Look Inside) this book is about applying the Prussian-German Army Auftragstatik (Mission Command) to business. Mission command these principles are being applied to a greater or lessor extent in the US and British Army and the Israeli Defence force (see Eitan Shamir Transforming Command for this.

Strangely enough there I couldn't find a definition for Mission command in Bungay's book so I am borrowing the definition from from Shamir: it is decentralised leadership .. a philosophy that requires and facilitates initiative on all levels of command ....it encourages subordinates to exploit opportunities by empowering them to take the initiative and exercise judgement in pursuit of their mission; alignment is maintained through adherence to the commanders intent"

The book is is essence three parts, although they are intermingled throughout the book.:

- How the Auftragstatik developed and and what is is intended to solve.
- A brief critic of existing theories on strategy
- Applying Auftragstatik to the business, essentially through mini cases.

These ideas are not new, I came across them originally in Mike Davidson's The Grand Strategist.

I thought that the description of how Auftragstatik was developed and what is is designed to solve very clear, from the defeat of the Prussian army at Jena, through Clausewitz, Moltke the elder and to its success at the unit level in WWII, although I admit I am interested in military history. Bungay uses the three gaps identified by Von Moltke, which he calls the alignment gap, the knowledge gap and the effects gap, as the basis for the bulk of the book. I think the description here is far easier to understand than the comparative section in Shamir's book. My only regret is he mentions Nelson used a mission command system but did not provide more details. However, if I am wondering if this level of information is really required for a business book.

This is because I found the part where he applied the principles to business weaker and not as convincing. One reason is that in most of the cases the companies were not named or the cases are composites. Although he briefly mentions SAP and how it imposes a standardized set of operating procedures on a company, it didn't answer the question I had on how you can apply a system that allows people to make individual decisions within in line with intent to a business environment that is constrained by a centralized IT system, tight regulatory environments, and last but not least tight profit margins. In fact Shamir shows that these are some of the factors why Mission command has not been fully successfully adopted in the US and British Army.

One of the examples is of Tracey, a desk agent for BA in 1995, leaving her desk to sort out a gold card customer who had arrived at the desk late for check in, so that he got on the flight. This was based on her training to put the Gold card customer first. This example does of course illustrate Auftragstatik in action. However 1995 is along time ago, my experience is that BA doesn't demonstrate this level of service today so what went wrong.

I think the book is worth reading, hopefully you will not be as pessimistic about applying it as myself.

8 people found this helpful

Phillip Malcho

A highly addictive book

Reviewed in Germany 🇩🇪 on March 30, 2022

Verified Purchase

Having heard Stephen speak, I quickly bought the book.
And it has served as a great reminder in times of chaos as to how to ensure that we as leaders follow through.

If you want to help yourself to a good read that will give you great ideas and great influence on your day. I highly recommend this book.

Mariano Apuya Jr

In a gendre full of drivel, "The Art of Action" delivers

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on February 27, 2012

Verified Purchase

"The Art of Action" is a great book. I can't say that there's ever been a business book based of maneuver warfare. I don't exactly know the precise time when the maneuver warfare craze hit the United States Military (US Marines were first, synthesized by USAF Col. John Boyd), but it happened long enough ago that the once polemic idea is now accepted corpus of military strategy. "Prussian envy" was a phrase coined to describe this type of thinking, with impressive sounding words like Auftragstaktik or Coup d'oeil.

There are many types of strategic formulation, you analyze your yourself and your industry and pounce on opportunities; you can ask the different functions and find out what driving the your business as in "driving forces"; you can look at your processes and improve them; etc. What I take away from this book is that the implementation phase of strategic process can in itself generate strategies in a kind of iterative way. Which by the way is how textbooks describe them.

In these times we live in, management is in love with networks. Networks are not even mentioned in "Art of Action" but if you do work on a network, then "Art of Action" is the way you would thrive in such a world.

Tidbits I found profound in this book are: Competencies are built on top of another; don't make a decision on things you don't know.

5 people found this helpful

Schoeni

Empfehlenswert

Reviewed in Germany 🇩🇪 on April 13, 2022

Verified Purchase

Sehr intensive Recherchearbeit, kurzweilig und komprimiert zusammengefasst, mit sehr interessanten Hintergrund- & Begleitinformationen, die so nicht (öffentlich) zugänglich sind. Sehr interessante und lohnenswerte Führungs- und Organisationsansätze.

Translate review to English

Need customer service? Click here

‹ See all details for The Art of Action: How Leaders Close the Gaps between Plans, Actions...

5 star		72%
4 star		20%
3 star		7%
2 star 0% (0%)		0%
1 star		1%

Amazon Music Stream millions of songs	Amazon Advertising Find, attract, and engage customers	Amazon Business Everything for your business	Amazon Drive Cloud storage from Amazon	Amazon Web Services Scalable Cloud Computing Services

Book Depository Books With Free Delivery Worldwide	Goodreads Book reviews & recommendations	IMDb Movies, TV & Celebrities	Amazon Photos Unlimited Photo Storage Free With Prime	Shopbop Designer Fashion Brands

Warehouse Deals Open-Box Discounts	Whole Foods Market We Believe in Real Food	Amazon Renewed Like-new products you can trust	Blink Smart Security for Every Home

The Art of Action: How Leaders Close the Gaps between Plans, Actions...

›

Customer reviews

Customer reviews

The Art of Action: How Leaders Close the Gaps between Plans, Actions and Results

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

From Canada

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

From other countries

The Art of Action: How Leaders Close the Gaps between Plans, Actions... › Customer reviews

Customer reviews

The Art of Action: How Leaders Close the Gaps between Plans, Actions and Results

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

From Canada

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

From other countries

The Art of Action: How Leaders Close the Gaps between Plans, Actions...

›

Customer reviews