Review of In Praise of Good Business: How Optimizing Risk Rewards Both Your Bottom Line and Your People (Hardcover)

I am a corporate strategy consultant and business book author.Many companies that I work with would benefit from reading and applying this book.Companies flourish when they take on tougher challenges, using theright tools.In some companies, great rewards are provided for "belowaverage" performance.One of the things that impressed me about thisbook is that Judith Bardwick has changed her philosophy since DANGER IN THECOMFORT ZONE.I thought that book was a little unrealistic.She haslearned from her experiences since then that giving companies maximumcurrent earning's performance makes leaders arrogant and unresponsive insome cases.This can lead to problems later.She now suggests thatcompanies operate with a little less profits in the near term, and a littlemore anxiety.In a sense, she is suggesting something closer to the AndyGrove model in ONLY THE PARANOID SURVIVE.Anyone who is interested inimproving corporate performance should read this book and apply itslessons.I look forward to her next book to see what new lessons she willhave learned since writing this book.

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"Judith Bardwick really dishes it out in this challenging book and does it in her own unique style. She...brilliantly illuminate[s] the darkness around innovation and risk and its enemy, entropy. What shines through is a seminal achievement of how organizations can maintain a delicate balance between risk and recklessness."-Warren Bennis, author of Organizing Genius

"...an excellent resource for any CEO faced with transforming a 'no-consequence' culture into one of 'reality-driven action.' Her insights ring true and are tremendously reassuring to those of us facing intense and/or very different competition for the first time."-Erroll B. Davis, Jr. President and CEO, Alliant

"Judy Bardwick here sets out a bold new management paradigm, where employees learn to take risks and accept accountability. A powerful and long overdue message."-David G. Robinson, President, CSC Index

"Insightful, thought-provoking insights into human behavior and leadership...a must-read book."-Ned Barnholt, Executive Vice President, General Manager, Test and Measurement Organization, Hewlett-Packard

"...offers a pathway to instill the confidence required for success through positive consequences and accountability. It offers examples, guidelines, and actions that engender success in both people and profits. Managers who want practical advice to overcome real problems will revel in the book and find many nuggets which can be immediately applied."-David Ulrich, Professor of Business Administration, University of Michigan and Editor, Human Resource Management Journal

"Every living system, including human beings, needs a certain amount of tension to operate at its best. People achieve the highest levels they're capable of, and feel more vividly alive, when they're challenged by risks."-Judith Bardwick

In Praise of Good Business celebrates the great business turnaround of the 1990s. But it does more than that. It shows the management skills needed to continue the management revolution. In her 1991 international bestseller, Danger in the Comfort Zone, Judith Bardwick showed the basis for the hard management decisions that provided the framework for the American economic resurgence. She now cautions us not to rest on our success and lays out very specifically how we need to manage in the new economic environment.

Drawing on her work both as a psychologist specializing in management psychology and her 25 years as a consultant to the Fortune 500, Dr. Bardwick explains how and why the benefits of today's best business practices-those forged in the crucible of a global marketplace-extend well beyond a healthy balance sheet. Human beings thrive on manageable risk, and, by compelling employees to take more risks, accept more responsibility and succeed, business is not only achieving record profits, but it is also helping to create psychologically healthier people and a more resilient society.

To more vividly illustrate her points, Dr. Bardwick presents fascinating and instructive case studies of uniquely successful companies across North America. From these she extracts valuable object lessons and action steps, and she develops a revolutionary new management model based on the principle of productive insecurity. A style of management pitched to the demands of a "borderless economy," her prescriptive approach entails steering a middle path between the macho, show-no-mercy downsizing approach and the "no-consequences" model of too much security and too little accountability. Both, she contends, are a leading cause of company failures.

In Praise of Good Business presents a very positive message. Offering an elegant, highly doable prescription for creating more courageous, self-reliant employees ready to meet the challenges of today's supercompetitive global economy, In Praise of Good Business is an invaluable working resource for executives and managers in organizations of all sizes. Far-reaching and grounded in the very nature of the human psyche, this is the only management book you'll ever need.

In her more than two decades as a consultant and speaker, Dr. Bardwick has researched and contributed much to broaden business's understand-ing of the key contributing factors to human and organizational effectiveness. Her client list includes dozens of Fortune 500 companies, including Hewlett Packard, Champion Paper, IBM, Andersen Consulting, and National Steel.

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