
The Decision Maker
Unlock the Potential of Everyone in Your Organization, One Decision at a Time
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed

Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $23.36
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Scott Pollack
-
By:
-
Dennis Bakke
About this listen
Who makes the important decisions in your organization? Strategy, product development, budgeting, compensation - such key decisions typically are made by company leaders. That's what bosses are for, right? But maybe the boss isn't the best person to make the call.
That's the conclusion Dennis Bakke came to, and he used it to build AES into a Fortune 200 global power company with 27,000 people in 27 countries. He used it again to create Imagine Schools, the largest non-profit charter-school network in the U.S.
As a student at Harvard Business School, Bakke made hundreds of decisions using the case-study method. He realized two things: Decision-making is the best way to develop people; and that shouldn't stop at business school. So Bakke spread decision-making throughout his organizations, fully engaging people at all levels. Today, Bakke has given thousands of people the freedom and responsibility to make decisions that matter.
In The Decision Maker, a leadership fable loosely based on Bakke's experience, the New York Times bestselling author shows us how giving decisions to the people closest to the action can transform any organization.
The idea is simple.
The results are powerful.
When leaders put real control into the hands of their people, they tap incalculable potential. The Decision Maker, destined to be a business classic, holds the key to unlocking the potential of every person in your organization.
©2013 Dennis Bakke (P)2013 Pear PressListeners also enjoyed...
-
The Coaching Habit
- Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever
- By: Michael Bungay Stanier
- Narrated by: Daniel Maté
- Length: 3 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Michael Bungay Stanier's The Coaching Habit, coaching becomes a regular, informal part of your day so managers and their teams can work less hard and have more impact. Drawing on years of experience training more than 10,000 busy managers from around the globe in practical, everyday coaching skills, Bungay Stanier reveals how to unlock your peoples' potential. He unpacks seven essential coaching questions to demonstrate how - by saying less and asking more - you can develop coaching methods that produce great results.
-
-
What's on your mind?
- By A. Yoshida on 08-11-16
-
Going Infinite
- The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon
- By: Michael Lewis
- Narrated by: Michael Lewis
- Length: 9 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Michael Lewis first met him, Sam Bankman-Fried was the world’s youngest billionaire and crypto’s Gatsby. CEOs, celebrities, and leaders of small countries all vied for his time and cash after he catapulted, practically overnight, onto the Forbes billionaire list. Who was this rumpled guy in cargo shorts and limp white socks, whose eyes twitched across Zoom meetings as he played video games on the side?
-
-
really expected more rigor from Michael Lewis
- By Wowhello on 10-04-23
By: Michael Lewis
-
Vivid Vision: A Remarkable Tool for Aligning Your Business Around a Shared Vision of the Future
- By: Cameron Herold
- Narrated by: David DeVries
- Length: 2 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Many corporations have slick, flashy mission statements that ultimately do little to motivate employees and less to impress customers, investors, and partners. But there is a way to share your excitement for the future of your company in a clear, compelling, and powerful way, and entrepreneur and business growth expert Cameron Herold can show you how.
-
-
Unremarkable.
- By Ashley on 03-10-20
By: Cameron Herold
-
The Second in Command
- Unleash the Power of Your COO
- By: Cameron Herold
- Narrated by: Cameron Herold
- Length: 4 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As founder and CEO, you know you need to hire a COO. You need a COO who can help you build the company you don’t know how to build on your own. As founder and CEO, you know you need to hire a COO. You need a COO who can help you build the company you don’t know how to build on your own.
-
-
Great author, average reader
- By Zachary Ryan Pettis on 02-18-24
By: Cameron Herold
-
The Boys in the Boat
- Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics
- By: Daniel James Brown
- Narrated by: Edward Herrmann
- Length: 14 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The number one New York Times best-selling story about American Olympic triumph in Nazi Germany, the inspiration for the PBS documentary The Boys of '36, broadcast to coincide with the 2016 Summer Olympics and the 80th anniversary of the boys' gold medal race. Out of the depths of the Depression comes an irresistible story about beating the odds and finding hope in the most desperate of times - the improbable, intimate account of how nine working-class boys from the American West showed the world at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin what true grit really meant.
-
-
Dear Publishers of Audio Books
- By Lynn on 08-04-14
-
Life from the Top of the Mind
- By: Bill Crawford PhD
- Narrated by: Bill Crawford PhD
- Length: 5 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Everyone has heard the statistics...75 percent of people today describe their lives as “very stressful” and with the pace of change and globalization, almost everyone predicts it’s just going to get worse. In his fourth book, psychologist Dr. Bill Crawford addresses this problem by first explaining why this level of stress and frustration is so prevalent, and then why so much of the advice about how to deal with these problems will never work.
-
The Coaching Habit
- Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever
- By: Michael Bungay Stanier
- Narrated by: Daniel Maté
- Length: 3 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Michael Bungay Stanier's The Coaching Habit, coaching becomes a regular, informal part of your day so managers and their teams can work less hard and have more impact. Drawing on years of experience training more than 10,000 busy managers from around the globe in practical, everyday coaching skills, Bungay Stanier reveals how to unlock your peoples' potential. He unpacks seven essential coaching questions to demonstrate how - by saying less and asking more - you can develop coaching methods that produce great results.
-
-
What's on your mind?
- By A. Yoshida on 08-11-16
-
Going Infinite
- The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon
- By: Michael Lewis
- Narrated by: Michael Lewis
- Length: 9 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Michael Lewis first met him, Sam Bankman-Fried was the world’s youngest billionaire and crypto’s Gatsby. CEOs, celebrities, and leaders of small countries all vied for his time and cash after he catapulted, practically overnight, onto the Forbes billionaire list. Who was this rumpled guy in cargo shorts and limp white socks, whose eyes twitched across Zoom meetings as he played video games on the side?
-
-
really expected more rigor from Michael Lewis
- By Wowhello on 10-04-23
By: Michael Lewis
-
Vivid Vision: A Remarkable Tool for Aligning Your Business Around a Shared Vision of the Future
- By: Cameron Herold
- Narrated by: David DeVries
- Length: 2 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Many corporations have slick, flashy mission statements that ultimately do little to motivate employees and less to impress customers, investors, and partners. But there is a way to share your excitement for the future of your company in a clear, compelling, and powerful way, and entrepreneur and business growth expert Cameron Herold can show you how.
-
-
Unremarkable.
- By Ashley on 03-10-20
By: Cameron Herold
-
The Second in Command
- Unleash the Power of Your COO
- By: Cameron Herold
- Narrated by: Cameron Herold
- Length: 4 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As founder and CEO, you know you need to hire a COO. You need a COO who can help you build the company you don’t know how to build on your own. As founder and CEO, you know you need to hire a COO. You need a COO who can help you build the company you don’t know how to build on your own.
-
-
Great author, average reader
- By Zachary Ryan Pettis on 02-18-24
By: Cameron Herold
-
The Boys in the Boat
- Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics
- By: Daniel James Brown
- Narrated by: Edward Herrmann
- Length: 14 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The number one New York Times best-selling story about American Olympic triumph in Nazi Germany, the inspiration for the PBS documentary The Boys of '36, broadcast to coincide with the 2016 Summer Olympics and the 80th anniversary of the boys' gold medal race. Out of the depths of the Depression comes an irresistible story about beating the odds and finding hope in the most desperate of times - the improbable, intimate account of how nine working-class boys from the American West showed the world at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin what true grit really meant.
-
-
Dear Publishers of Audio Books
- By Lynn on 08-04-14
-
Life from the Top of the Mind
- By: Bill Crawford PhD
- Narrated by: Bill Crawford PhD
- Length: 5 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Everyone has heard the statistics...75 percent of people today describe their lives as “very stressful” and with the pace of change and globalization, almost everyone predicts it’s just going to get worse. In his fourth book, psychologist Dr. Bill Crawford addresses this problem by first explaining why this level of stress and frustration is so prevalent, and then why so much of the advice about how to deal with these problems will never work.
-
Measure What Matters
- How Google, Bono, and the Gates Foundation Rock the World with OKRs
- By: John Doerr, Larry Page - foreword
- Narrated by: John Doerr, full cast, Julia Collins, and others
- Length: 7 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Measure What Matters, Doerr shares a broad range of first-person, behind-the-scenes case studies, with narrators including Bono and Bill Gates, to demonstrate the focus, agility, and explosive growth that the Objectives and Key Results system has spurred at so many great organizations. This book will help a new generation of leaders capture the same magic.
-
-
Last chapter covers what matters most
- By Dan Richards on 06-08-18
By: John Doerr, and others
-
The Hard Thing About Hard Things
- Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers
- By: Ben Horowitz
- Narrated by: Kevin Kenerly
- Length: 7 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ben Horowitz offers essential advice on building and running a startup - practical wisdom for managing the toughest problems business school doesn’t cover, based on his popular ben’s blog. While many people talk about how great it is to start a business, very few are honest about how difficult it is to run one. The Hard Thing About Hard Things is invaluable for veteran entrepreneurs as well as those aspiring to their own new ventures, drawing from Horowitz’s personal and often humbling experiences.
-
-
For large company managers, not startups
- By Thomas on 03-18-14
By: Ben Horowitz
-
Turn the Ship Around!
- A True Story of Turning Followers into Leaders
- By: L. David Marquet, Stephen R. Covey - foreword
- Narrated by: L. David Marquet
- Length: 6 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Since Turn the Ship Around! was published in 2013, hundreds of thousands of readers have been inspired by former Navy captain David Marquet’s true story. Many have applied his insights to their own organizations, creating workplaces where everyone takes responsibility for his or her actions, where followers grow to become leaders, and where happier teams drive dramatically better results.
-
-
Creating Leadership and Competence at All Levels
- By Matthew on 05-04-21
By: L. David Marquet, and others
-
10x Is Easier than 2x
- How World-Class Entrepreneurs Achieve More by Doing Less
- By: Dan Sullivan, Dr. Benjamin Hardy
- Narrated by: Dan Sullivan, Dr. Benjamin Hardy
- Length: 9 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Dan Sullivan, the world's leading coach for highly successful entrepreneurs, wants you to know that achieving 10X growth is exponentially easier than striving for 2X growth. Most find this idea confusing at first because simply imagining 10X growth causes them to think they need to do 10X more work to achieve it. However, being a 10X entrepreneur is nothing like what most people think.
-
-
Best Book of the year for me!!!
- By Trenton on 05-15-23
By: Dan Sullivan, and others
-
Think Again
- The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know
- By: Adam Grant
- Narrated by: Adam Grant
- Length: 6 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Intelligence is usually seen as the ability to think and learn, but in a rapidly changing world, there's another set of cognitive skills that might matter more: the ability to rethink and unlearn. In our daily lives, too many of us favor the comfort of conviction over the discomfort of doubt. We listen to opinions that make us feel good, instead of ideas that make us think hard. We see disagreement as a threat to our egos, rather than an opportunity to learn.
-
-
Only Good if you've never questioned anything.
- By Victor Alvia on 02-10-21
By: Adam Grant
-
Drive
- The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us
- By: Daniel H. Pink
- Narrated by: Daniel H. Pink
- Length: 5 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Most people believe that the best way to motivate is with rewards like money - the carrot-and-stick approach. That's a mistake, says Daniel H. Pink (author of To Sell Is Human: The Surprising Truth About Motivating Others). In this provocative and persuasive new book, he asserts that the secret to high performance and satisfaction - at work, at school, and at home - is the deeply human need to direct our own lives, to learn and create new things, and to do better by ourselves and our world.
-
-
Not as good as A Whole New Mind
- By Michael O'Donnell on 04-30-10
By: Daniel H. Pink
-
Leaders Eat Last
- Why Some Teams Pull Together and Others Don't
- By: Simon Sinek
- Narrated by: Simon Sinek
- Length: 9 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Too many workplaces are driven by cynicism, paranoia, and self-interest. But the best ones foster trust and cooperation because their leaders build what Sinek calls a "Circle of Safety" that separates the security inside the team from the challenges outside. Sinek illustrates his ideas with fascinating true stories that range from the military to big business, from government to investment banking.
-
-
Very Disappointed
- By Jackson F. on 10-16-20
By: Simon Sinek
-
The Five Dysfunctions of a Team
- A Leadership Fable
- By: Patrick Lencioni
- Narrated by: Charles Stransky; introduction by Patrick Lencioni
- Length: 3 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In keeping with the parable style, Patrick Lencioni begins by telling the fable of a woman who, as CEO of a struggling Silicon Valley firm, took control of a dysfunctional executive committee and helped its members succeed as a team. Story time over, Lencioni offers explicit instructions for overcoming the human behavioral tendencies that he says corrupt teams. Succinct yet sympathetic, this guide will be a boon for those struggling with the inherent difficulties of leading a group.
-
-
Clear Headed Guidance on Building Teams
- By Mark on 01-18-03
By: Patrick Lencioni
-
Good Strategy/Bad Strategy
- The Difference and Why It Matters
- By: Richard Rumelt
- Narrated by: Sean Runnette
- Length: 11 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Developing and implementing a strategy is the central task of a leader. A good strategy is a specific and coherent response to - and approach for - overcoming the obstacles to progress. A good strategy works by harnessing and applying power where it will have the greatest effect. Yet, Rumelt shows that there has been a growing and unfortunate tendency to equate Mom-and-apple-pie values, fluffy packages of buzzwords, motivational slogans, and financial goals with “strategy”.
-
-
Good but thin
- By G. London on 01-04-20
By: Richard Rumelt
-
The Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive
- A Leadership Fable
- By: Patrick Lencioni
- Narrated by: Charles Stransky; introduction by Patrick Lencioni
- Length: 3 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As CEO, most everything that Rich O'Connor did had something to do with at least one of the four disciplines on his famed "yellow sheet." Rich never suspected that it would become the blueprint of an employee's plan to destroy the firm. Best selling author Lencioni brings us a fable that focuses on a leader's crucial role in building a healthy organization.
-
-
A great reminder about the important basics.
- By Joel Ordesky on 03-08-03
By: Patrick Lencioni
-
Who Not How
- The Formula to Achieve Bigger Goals Through Accelerating Teamwork
- By: Dan Sullivan, Dr. Benjamin Hardy
- Narrated by: Dan Sullivan, Dr. Benjamin Hardy
- Length: 5 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The world's foremost entrepreneurial coach shows you how to make a mindset shift that opens the door to explosive growth and limitless possibility - in your business and your life.
-
-
Valuable information - poor performance
- By LeAnn on 06-02-21
By: Dan Sullivan, and others
-
Leadership and Self-Deception: Getting Out of the Box
- By: The Arbinger Institute
- Narrated by: Steve Carlson
- Length: 6 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This third edition of an international best-seller - more than two million copies sold worldwide and translated into 33 languages - details how its powerful insights on motivation, conflict, and collaboration can benefit organizations as well as individuals.
-
-
Biggest waste of time in my life
- By Richard on 04-29-19
What listeners say about The Decision Maker
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Anonymous
- 02-18-18
Feels like an ABC Family broadcast
Love the ideas, but the story and narrator are way too vanilla. I recommend Teams of Teams in its place.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Charity Stone
- 05-31-16
Enjoyable, inspiring, and informative
best business book read more like a novel. It created enjoyable read while at the same time setting down the principles the author desired to communicate. It did not take long to finish, it was an easy read, and it has cast a vision for me concerning my organization.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Sean Morgan
- 06-30-16
Very easy listen!!
I like how the book used the characters to bring home the points about delegation is not abdication.
Very easy listen! Enjoyed it so much - I wish there was a part 2!!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- kirschi
- 09-14-21
An insightful fable about running a tech business
The ideas behind the decision maker process are excellent.
Being a fable, the book is lacking the theoretical ideas behind the process. The story is also a little naïve to reflect real life situations.
The flow of dialogues is, at times, awkward. And there are too many irrelevant data to my liking, such as the appearance of persons and such.
The reading has many pauses. It worked for me when I upped the speed to 1.8 to get a better sense of the flow of the story.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!