Accountability

Book description

Using a wealth of real-world examples, this breakthrough book offers a new freedom-based management paradigm that radically improves every aspect of business-from how we hire, compensate, and motivate people to how we address quality issues, serve customers, review employees, and more. Accountability tells the story of Pete Williams, a hard-charging CEO, who meets Stan "Kip" Kiplinger, a retired businessman, during a cross-country train trip. Pete's manufacturing business is in critical condition; productivity is falling. He's tried all the popular management approaches, but he can't get his people to be accountable for meeting their goals.
Kip points out that every management system Pete has used is ultimately based on controlling people. Rather than encouraging people to be accountable, control-based systems discourage accountability by destroying people's sense of ownership of their job. Kip introduces Pete to a new way of leading people based on freedom-giving people the freedom to make their own choices and to do it their way. This doesn't mean anarchy; it means leadership expects everyone to act like an adult and take responsibility for his or her actions and their outcomes. Accountability details how this new approach yields a consistent flow of creative innovations and organizational improvements impossible under the old, coercive systems.

Table of contents

  1. Cover Page
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright Page
  4. PROLOGUE A NEW JOURNEY BEGINS
  5. PART ONE
    1. 1 I’m Pedaling as Fast as I Can, But It’s Not Fast Enough!
    2. 2 The Courage to Make the Change
    3. 3 Which Would You Rather Work In—A Freedom-Based or a Control-Based Work Environment?
    4. 4 Do Incentives Really Motivate People? Or Are They Just a Quick Fix?
    5. 5 Is Job Security Related to a Corporate Culture’s Bottom Line?
      1. Negative Effects of Extrinsic Motivation
      2. Attributes of High-Performance Freedom-Based Operations
      3. “F” Cultures Generate the Big Bucks!
    6. 6 Do You Want to Be Controlled?
    7. 7 Can We Overcome Human Nature by Trying to Control People?
    8. 8 Three Activities That Establish a Freedom-Based Workplace
  6. PART TWO
    1. 9 The Transformation of National Stores: A Journey from the Old Control-Based Environment to the New Freedom-Based Workplace
      1. WELCOME TO NORDSTROM
    2. 10 The Wise Counsel
      1. The Two Major Roles of the Wise Counsel
      2. Great People
    3. 11 Creating the Right Conditions
    4. 12 Taking Personal Responsibility Is a Challenge for Everyone!
      1. Task Force Accomplishments
    5. 13 Transformation Begins with a Visionary Leader
    6. 14 The Freedom-Based Philosophy Is Adopted One Person at a Time
    7. 15 Owning Your Job Means No Excuses— The First Step to Freedom
    8. 16 Designing Your Job Means You Have the Power to Choose!
      1. Designing Flexible Systems
    9. 17 Finding Great People
  7. EPILOGUE PETE WILLIAMS: A NEW JOURNEY BEGINS
  8. THE FREEDOM SURVEY™ (FS™)
    1. Scoring the Freedom Survey™
    2. Interpreting Your Freedom Survey Score
  9. NOTES
  10. GLOSSARY
  11. INDEX
  12. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  13. ABOUT THE AUTHORS
  14. ABOUT THE COMPANY
  15. Berrett-Koehler Publishers

Product information

  • Title: Accountability
  • Author(s): Rob LeBow, Randy Spitzer
  • Release date: July 2002
  • Publisher(s): Berrett-Koehler Publishers
  • ISBN: 9781605096100