You'll learn when and how to strategically recalibrate and balance performance and growth; new ways to promote accountability; how to use performance metrics without burying your people in trivia; and how to promote real discipline without creating bureaucracy. You'll also discover which critical capabilities are keys to performance breakthroughs.

Along the way, the author presents case studies of leading companies that have used these strategies to overcome stalled performance. Baxter, Novartis, Honeywell, IBM, Cisco, and more--all different, yet all unified by one common element: ruthless execution.

• What to do when you ""hit the wall""--Beyond ""rude awakenings"" to effective action--and new success
• Seeing the realities for what they are--Accurate, objective assessments of your enterprise and your marketplace
• Breaking through to new growth: three core strategies--Strategies based on productivity, talent management, and M & As
• Ruthless execution at work--Leadership, strategy, cost control, governance, and more
• Cisco: Surviving catastrophe and trying to come back stronger--Retaining market dominance through the dot.com/telecom collapse
• Mass layoffs and other sure-to-fail strategies--What doesn't work--and what to do instead

Using adversity to lay the groundwork for breakthrough success

Today’s business leaders need a radically different skill from their recent predecessors: they must know how to know how to manage through adversity while preparing their companies for a new rebirth of success. In Ruthless Execution, Amir Hartman, author of the bestselling NETREADY, identifies the central ingredients that help certain companies to get beyond the wall and thrive-and show how to instill these ingredients in your organization. You will learn when and how to recalibrate the balance between performance and growth; how to define a coherent, tightly-drawn business philosophy that maps to specific actions; new ways to promote accountability and business alignment; and how to use performance metrics without burying people in meaningless trivia. Also discover how to promote real discipline: the ability to get the job done quickly, efficiently, and effortlessly--without bureaucracy. Next, you learn how to develop stronger "critical capabilities" for understanding and managing complexity. Along the way, the authors present case studies of world-class enterprises that have used these strategies to achieve breakthrough success. Watch John Chambers maneuver Cisco through the telecom collapse; Lou Gerstner impose powerful new discipline at IBM; Harry Kraemer realign Baxter with transformed markets; Dan Vasella transform Novartis through mergers; and many more...all unified by one central factor: ruthless execution.

This is the eBook version of the printed book. If the print book includes a CD-ROM, this content is not included within the eBook version.

Today's business leaders need a radically different skill from their recent predecessors: they must know how to know how to manage through adversity while preparing their companies for a new rebirth of success. In Ruthless Execution, Amir Hartman, author of the bestselling NETREADY, identifies the central ingredients that help certain companies to get beyond the wall and thrive--and show how to instill these ingredients in your organization. You will learn when and how to recalibrate the balance between performance and growth; how to define a coherent, tightly-drawn business philosophy that maps to specific actions; new ways to promote accountability and business alignment; and how to use performance metrics without burying people in meaningless trivia. Also discover how to promote real discipline: the ability to get the job done quickly, efficiently, and effortlessly--without bureaucracy. Next, you learn how to develop stronger "critical capabilities" for understanding and managing complexity. Along the way, the authors present case studies of world-class enterprises that have used these strategies to achieve breakthrough success. Watch John Chambers maneuver Cisco through the telecom collapse; Lou Gerstner impose powerful new discipline at IBM; Harry Kraemer realign Baxter with transformed markets; Dan Vasella transform Novartis through mergers; and many more...all unified by one central factor: ruthless execution.