Preview
  • Why Smart Executives Fail

  • And What You Can Learn from Their Mistakes
  • By: Sydney Finkelstein
  • Narrated by: Don Hagen
  • Length: 12 hrs and 14 mins
  • 4.3 out of 5 stars (27 ratings)

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Why Smart Executives Fail

By: Sydney Finkelstein
Narrated by: Don Hagen
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Publisher's summary

A definitive study of executive failures - why they happen and how to prevent them.

There's a scenario that keeps repeating itself in today's business climate. A company is voted one of the most admired in the world. Then three or four years later, it's in dire financial trouble. A CEO is celebrated on the covers of BusinessWeek, Forbes, and Fortune. Soon after, the company is in the midst of a disastrous merger or some other fiasco. What goes wrong in these cases?

Usually it seems that the top management made some incredibly stupid mistake. But the people responsible are almost always remarkably intelligent and usually have terrific track records. Even more puzzling than the fact that brilliant managers can make bad mistakes is the way they so often magnify the damage. Once a company has made a bad misstep, it often seems as though it can't do anything right. How does this happen? Instead of rectifying their mistakes, why do business leaders regularly make them worse?

To answer these questions, Sydney Finkelstein has carried out the largest research program ever devoted to business breakdowns. In Why Smart Executives Fail, he uncovers - with startling clarity and unassailable documentation - the causes regularly responsible for major business breakdowns. Why Smart Executives Fail relates the stories of great business disasters and demonstrates that there are specific, identifiable ways in which many businesses regularly make themselves vulnerable to failure. The result is a truly indispensable, practical, must-have audiobook that explains the mechanics of executive breakdowns, how to avoid them, and what to do about them if they happen.

©2003 Sydney Finkelstein (P)2016 Gildan Media LLC
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What listeners say about Why Smart Executives Fail

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Right in time

This book is surprisingly good. It has very few reviews but I kind of liked it after it was mentioned in another audiobook I listened.

The stories are real and the explanations are interesting and based, according to the writer, on research and interviews.

I think every business executive should listen to this audiobook.

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Old references

The thinking and examples are too old to be relevant now. A new version with post GFC would be far more useful

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