A Bias For Action: How Effective Managers Harness Their Willpower, Achieve Results, And Stop Wasting Time

Does your job seem like an endless `to-do' list that never gets you or your company anywhere? You know what you're supposed to focus on: cutting costs, improving efficiency, encouraging innovation. So why do critical goals consistently get eclipsed by fighting fires, answering emails, and other routine `busywork'? In this surprising and frame-changing book, management experts Heike Bruch and Sumantra Ghoshal argue that while the usual suspects overwhelming workloads, tight budgets, and unsupportive bosses play a role in managerial ineffectiveness, most of the blame lies in how managers approach their jobs. Based on a ten-year study of managerial behaviour in industries from banking to software to airlines to consulting, A Bias for Action reveals that only 10 per cent of managers work purposefully to get important work done. Bruch and Ghoshal show that the most effective managers succeed not because they possess unique characteristics or excel at motivating others but because they harness personal willpower through a potent combination of energy and focus.