Research Catalog

What America does right : learning from companies that put people first

Title: What America does right : learning from companies that put people first / Robert H. Waterman, Jr.
Author: Waterman, Robert H.
Publication: New York : Norton, ©1994.

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Status	Format	Access	Call Number	Item Location
Request for On-site Use Request Scan How do I pick up this item and when will it be ready?	Text	Use in library	HD70.U5 W38 1994	Off-site

Details

Description

318 pages; 24 cm

Summary

True or false? "America is falling behind in world competition." The surprise answer is "false." Recent research on industrialized nations shows that American workers outproduce workers in Germany and France by 20 percent, workers in Britain by over 30 percent, and Japanese workers by over 60 percent. The reason has nothing to do with technology, worker attitude, or worker skill. In this incisive, anecdotal book Robert H. Waterman, Jr., looks at some of the best American firms and concludes that the key to strategic advantage is organization: they are organized to focus on the things that motivate their own people, and organized to anticipate customer needs. Waterman's crisp case studies give us an insider's view of why these firms are so good. For example, we'll see how Procter & Gamble gets a productivity advantage of 30-40 percent through a work force that's essentially self-managing. (Procter & Gamble developed this system over thirty years ago and considered it so strategic that they wouldn't talk about it until now.) We'll see how a set of strongly held, shared values - not strategy - built the AES Corporation from a start-up eleven years ago to a company whose market value today is close to $1.7 billion. Waterman also gives us an in-depth look at how companies such as Merck and Rubbermaid maintain a strategic edge through raw innovation. In 1993 Rubbermaid invented 365 new products, one for every day of the year. How did they manage it? Waterman's argument is firmly grounded in specific details and in firsthand observation. But his message about American competitiveness transcends any particular case history or industry. All of us can learn from the example of these firms that in one way or another strike out into new frontiers of excellence.

Subject

Genre/Form

Case studies.
Études de cas.

Bibliography (note)

Includes bibliographic references (pages 303-306) and index.

Contents

1. Organizing for Success: Linking People, Strategy, Organization, and Customers -- 2. Everyone a Leader: Giving Up Control to Gain Control -- 3. A Learning Organization: The Team System at P & G, Lima, Ohio -- 4. Two Great Coaches: Management Lessons from the Bronx and Vail, Colorado -- 5. Systems That Set Us Free: People First at Federal Express -- 6. Values from the Start: Culture Is Strategy at the AES Corporation -- 7. Something to Believe in: At Levi Strauss & Company Managers Make Meanings as Well as Money -- 8. Sustainable Competitive Edge: A New Product Every Day at Rubbermaid -- 9. High-Tech Soap: Great Products Make for Great Marketing -- 10. Designer Molecules: Merck Invests and Invents ... Big Time -- 11. "Our Quality Stinks": Muddling, Anticipating, and Committing at Motorola -- 12. Match the Potential Within -- App. 1. Surprise -- America's Economic Strength -- App. 2. Don't Put Profit First -- App. 3. Excerpt from Federal Express Manager's Guide -- App. 4. Levi's Manifesto.

ISBN

0393035972
9780393035971

LCCN

93028837

OCLC

ocm28549187
28549187
SCSB-1794904

Owning Institutions

Princeton University Library