Book Review: What They Teach You at Harvard Business School

It is not often that I have felt compelled to email the author of a book after reading it, but that was the case today: a compulsion to connect with someone who spoke tons of truth and wisdom into an environment that contains so much folly.

Philip Delves Broughton worked as a journalist for most of his life, before deciding to uproot with his wife and child to study his MBA at Harvard full time. Reading a business book written by a writer was like lifting the cup to my lips expecting water and getting Grapetizer. How refreshing to have someone skilled with the pen using well crafed words to keep you excited and interested in what the numbers were saying.

In addition to this, I loved Philip's very balanced view on what it means to be weathly. Graduating as a 2% minority in his final year as graduates not going to pre-placed jobs, you get wrapped up in the turmoil that became his own: Do you get sucked into the Capitalist system, though you know better than most it's inner workings and the strain you will put on all other factors of your life, or do you place your faith in your ability to carve the future you design for yourself?

Along Philip's journey, the reader gets exposed to so much economic and financial insight and wisdom, but these lessons are so perfectly wrapped into a meta-narative that you hardly feel like you are learning much. For this reason I read the book slowly, and used a pen to underline the juice that I will re-read many times in the next few years.

If business and enreprenurship is your thing too, then don't hesitate to give this one a read. I found it quite novel.

dead dragonflies

Have you ever seen a dragonfly hovering over a pool of water, relentlessly dipping its bum onto the surface? I watched a bright orange one doing so this morning. Being the curious person that I am, I looked into why they do this: they are dropping eggs on the water surface. It's a necessary activity for the survival of their species, I guess.

Yesterday there was a dead dragonfly floating on the pool's surface. And I figured that it is dangerous business having translucent wings flapping millimetres from liquid. One misjudgement and they drown.

And I wondered how dangerous my life is.

That's all I wondered.

by my side

in the turmoil of heart i bring to You pieces
creases in me that straight
when my soul reaches for You
you find me here

‘i never left’, He says

ashamedly i realise
though i knew already

crystal ball

man's fascination with the future is amplified by the fact that he can't change his past

stanger

there's something sensational about talking to a stranger
when you know nothing you have to assume the best

new relationships are forests of leaves that turn as new winds blow

comfort

I find that the more comfortable I make my life, the less motivated I
feel for daily challenges that come my way. Comfort can so easily lead
to laziness.

You

in need of grace
in need of peace
in need of things that only You can give to me

Book Review - A Class With Drucker by William Cohen

Four years ago I read a 4 page article on "the Effective Executive" by a man called Peter Drucker. At the time of reading it I was unaware that the 4 page document I was holding was a summary of one of the most popular management books ever written. And I was not aware of who Peter Drucker was. One thing I was sure of was that finding this article was like finding a piece of gold. I read and memorised the article only a month before leading a ministry team around Southern Africa at the age of 20. Knowing precious little about leadership then, at times I wonder if the crash course that this article gave me was the reason for any success that I might have enjoyed that year.

It was mainly due to this reason that I decided to buy what looked like a promising book. "In A Class with Drucker, Cohen shares many of Drucker's teachings that never made it into his countless books and articles, ideas that were offered to his students in the classroom or informal settings." (Quoted from the back cover).

The author had used Drucker's name as a launchpad to credibility and there is nothing wrong with this if it were to be a book about Peter Drucker. However the majority of the pages were filled with the author's own accomplishments and details of his own thinking. I was disappointed in this regard. It seems that humility was the one Drucker trait that never quite rubbed off on Mr. Cohen.

Despite this ongoing theme of self-absorption, there were a few heart stopping moments when I got a glimpse into the thinking and method of the greatest management teacher of the last century and for that reason I am very grateful. Unfortunately I had to shake each chapter through a sieve to let the two of three Drucker thoughts land in my mind and let the rest of Cohen's best intentions fall by the wayside.

A few great chapters included:
- Approach Problems with your Ignorance - not your Experience
- Develop Expertise outside your field to be an Effective Manager
- Base Your Strategy on the situation, not on a Formula

It is clear that Cohen has a deep and unmoving respect for Peter Drucker and that Drucker changed the course of his life and his career.

Despite my negative comments I am keeping this book in a special 'refer back here' section on my bookshelf. There are thoughts that I would like to think again. And again after that.

drucker

"Management is about human beings.Its task is to make people capable of joint performance, to make their strengths effective and their weaknesses irrelevant."

Peter F. Drucker

when the world was smaller

i used to think more
when it was just me.

when i didn’t know who else knew more, I liked to believe that my thinking was changing the world.
if anything, the world has changed my thinking.

i used to think more
when it was just me.

now i meet people who think better.
they talk faster.
with unmatchable eloquence they describe the cloud i didn’t even notice.
with happy fingers they capture the picture i didn’t see.
they write the poem i didn’t think of.
they sing the song i didn’t write.

so i think in my head and not on the page.
i sing in the shower and not on the stage.

it’s nice to hide, to be silent, to dream
to be what i am and not what i seem...

the morning ponder

do we hope even if by hoping we make ourselves able to be disappointed?

worship

worship is man’s best efforts where God gets the glory

on ode to dragon

so swift is he that glides the black tar
so far is it he goes: very far
so alive is he, he is no car
more than spare parts he has a heart
his name is dragon

i saw a man

a saw a man sitting with his own father and with 3 kids having breakfast this morning. i couldn’t see his car, i didn’t know his title and i didn’t catch the colour of his credit card- but he was the richest man i have seen for a very long time

culture of availability

“the reality of our engagement with society is less interesting than the story we will tell about it later.” - Renny Gleeson

I have just listened to a 3 minute talk by Renny Gleeson on mobile-phone usage which i found highly enjoyable. The best things about the talks on ted.com is how efficient the communicators are at being concise. If Jacob Zuma battles to say anything significant given an hour on stage, I am sure he would not manage to say absolutely anything at all given only 2 or 3 minutes. He’s our next president by the way. In case anyone from outside of South Africa stumbles upon this remote part of the online world. Speaking in summaries seems to be the age we are living in. People still want narrative and people still enjoy hearing another person speak above reading something, but where before someone had two minutes to say something interesting, now we expect interesting and funny every few seconds.

Anyway, back to the topic- the talk was on the way that mobile devices have re-shaped social interaction. Having said what I did above I realise that my time is limited and that I have to say something interesting quickly or else you will close this window. So i’ll summarise with these scary thoughts to add to the collection:

1. When you allow yourself to interact with your device in a social context (even just a one on one context) you are saying that literally ANYTHING that comes up on your phone from any source is more important than the person(s) you are with.
2. We are looking for narrative - personal narrative is not enough... we desire shared narrative as that is what creates a culture. Sending is loneliness, sharing is social. That is why being able to comment on pretty much anything on facebook has now become the new hit thing to do. We want shared narrative.
3. If taken to an exaggerated conclusion, we are perhaps existing in reality only to have to have a story to blog later, a status to update with something funny or a friend to invite on facebook after the party, when the real party starts.

a great web find

so i have heard people talking about ted.com but i have never been to check it out... i have spent most of my morning looking at the most interesting video’s of intellectual people talking about interesting stuff. at last, an online haven of real intelligence rather than merely bored people looking to be entertained.

this one is for the bookmark toolbar.

the song again

she makes me want to sing again
there is a new melody

and that is all i know right now
that is all i care to sing

promises promises but cape town here i come

turning right in my rental
good friend by side
laughing, happy
the unexpected summit in front of me

anything but flat
the change is more than welcome
i say to the friend by my side:
before the year is up i will climb it

to climb it means i have to return
a promise i enjoy making

backgammon

triangular paradise
i face myself
the greatest opponent

mercy paid for me

my pulse rises
i buy
consumed by the thought of what i want
consumption began before i paid

my wallet is my power
if my world is this one only
if i am the judge then more is more

the fool looks to money
as the thirsty looks to water
money does not satisfy
drinking it makes you thirstier still

only fools look to money
the way the runner sees the finish
there is no limit, no end
the finish line ever advancing

"the economy of mercy
is where my soul began" - Switchfoot

the solution

last night i was going through my top draw looking for a pen or something. could have been a pencil. i noticed a tube of ointment. its fancy name as adco acyclovir- well at least that is how i say it. this particular ointment is a remedy for fever blisters. cold sores. the ugly things some people get on their lips. i remember thinking about the ointment for a good ten seconds before continuing to look for a pen. or pencil.

this morning i woke up with a fever blister. i find this ironic. but it also makes me wonder if sometimes the disease only becomes apparent once you have glimpsed the solution.

love

if love is letting go, then love we must
if love is holding tight, then love we must
oh God, to know your heart
to know You
to know wisdom
to know what love means