Organizing Genius: The Secrets of Creative Collaboration

Rating:
Summary: Great Groups are Great!! Don't You Agree?!!
Review: As I read I steadily I lost interest in the book because of the feeling that the authors were trying to "sell" me on how great "Great Groups" were. I already want to find out about "Great Groups" - that's why I'm reading the book. Although the stories are interesting and sometimes fascinating, the persuasive tone of the book is annoying.

Rating:
Summary: Best Organization Book I've Ever Read!
Review: Hands down the best Organizational Behavior book I've read (OB used to be a hobby of mine in college). This book delves into some of the greatest organizations in our history and tries to figure out why they were successful. I highly recommend this book -- especially to anyone who runs a start-up. Tom Peters raves about this book (his raving convinced me to buy it. The book details great groups like Skunk Works, Disney animation teams, Clinton/Gore 1992 campaign, Macintosh team, Manhattan Project, Xerox PARC, and more. I give this book my highest recommendation.

Rating:
Summary: Really Great Insights
Review: I got tremendous value out of this book. While I did not see or connect with all the Great Groups that Bennis used as case studies, there are powerful ideas and insights in every one of them. I have summarzied his 15 "Take Home Lessons" in a one page handout and include it in the materials for our School for Innovators and on operational Thinking Expeditions. I also got a video of "Fat Man & Little Boy" - the Manhattan Project (which is cited in the book) and have referenced it often as an example of a powerfully urgent Great Group coalesces and collabortes differently. For anyone trying to not just launch a fastforward team, but who also wants to inspire that team to greatness, this is a must read. Caution: this is not a "how to do it" book - rather it tells the story and paints the picture, and its up to the reader to take his or her own learnings and how to out of it (iontuitively).

Rating:
Summary: Really Great Insights
Review: I got tremendous value out of this book. While I did not see or connect with all the Great Groups that Bennis used as case studies, there are powerful ideas and insights in every one of them. I have summarzied his 15 "Take Home Lessons" in a one page handout and include it in the materials for our School for Innovators and on operational Thinking Expeditions. I also got a video of "Fat Man & Little Boy" - the Manhattan Project (which is cited in the book) and have referenced it often as an example of a powerfully urgent Great Group coalesces and collabortes differently. For anyone trying to not just launch a fastforward team, but who also wants to inspire that team to greatness, this is a must read. Caution: this is not a "how to do it" book - rather it tells the story and paints the picture, and its up to the reader to take his or her own learnings and how to out of it (iontuitively).

Rating:
Summary: E Pluribus Unum
Review: If you were to look up the word "leadership" in any reputable dictionary, it would probably suggest that you contact Warren Bennis. No one has written more and more enlightening commentary on the subject of leadership than has he. In Organizing Genius: The Secrets of Creative Collaboration, he and Patricia Ward Biederman examine a number of what the authors call "Great Groups." Perhaps the most important point is introduced in the first chapter: "None of us is as smart as all of us."

That is to say, the "Great Man" theory is invalidated by the achievements of truly creative teams such as those at the Disney studios which produced so many animation classics; at Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) which developed the first personal computer; at Apple Computer which then took it to market; in the so-called "War Room" which helped to elect Bill Clinton President in 1992; at the so-called "Skunk Works" where so many of Lockheed's greatest designs were formulated; at Black Mountain College which "wasn't simply a place where creative collaboration took place. It was about creative collaboration"; and at Los Alamos (NM) and the University of Chicago where the Manhattan Project eventually produced a new weapon called "the Gadget."

Bennis and Biederman conclude Organizing Genius by providing 15 "Take-Home Lessons." Each is directly relevant to any organization which aspires to accomplish what Steve Jobs once described as being "insanely great."

With all due respect to the command-and-control skills of great leaders in the past (including most of those enshrined in the "Business Hall of Fame"), such skills simply are not effective today. "None of us is as smart as all of us." A group can become "great" only if and when it possesses both genius in each member and the leadership necessary to achieve creative collaboration by those members. With rare exception, "Genius" in isolation simply cannot accomplish what "genius" in creative collaboration can.

Rating:
Summary: disappointing and rambling, with interesting tid bits
Review: It never ceases to astonish me how little substance there is to most business books: they tend to take a few ideas, puff them up with facts and stories, and then paste them together into a book when a single article - or indeed the flap of the book - would more than suffice. Alas, though Bennis is a brilliant man and great expert on leadership, his book fails on many counts.

First, throughtout the text, the ideas are not that well delineated. So you get lots of stories that are often intersting and fun, but you wonder why all the details are included. Second, I didn't see what the book really adds: sure leaders can be both remarkable and difficult; sure, some teams are extraordinary; sure, we could use more great teams. But how do you do it? THe book doesn't provide much on that as a practical guide (its third failing).

Nonetheless, I thought this book was very well written, which is almost certainly Bierderman's contribution. ALso, it is fun to read the stories on their own. Finally, the sumup chapter has useful ideas (and frankly, it - just 15 pages - is all that you would need to read if you don't find the stories inherently interesting).

Tepidly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Nice examples, no substance
Review: Like in many business books the authors present their message in a number of examples, each describing how a group managed to do something clearly outstanding. The problem of the book is that the authors do not manage to come up with anything like a coherent framework to explain the success of these groups. Examples are only useful if they show the working of some underlying general principle. In this book, however, examples simply stand for themselves. The stories are nicely written and it is fun to read, but it certainly does not present a theory of successful teams. But maybe, as an academic economist, I am too demanding in this respect.

Rating:
Summary: Some great points dissolved in useless text
Review: This book explores common treats of what author calls a "Great Group". The book tells the stories of a dozen groups creating breakthroughs in many different domains from creation of Disney's first animated feature film, to the development of the first Apple computer.
The author uncovers and shows characteristics of Great Groups using numerous and at times repetitive examples. The last chapter summarizes the lessons.
I have a mixed feeling about this book. Even though I found that messages contained in this book are extremely valuable, I don't think authors found the best way to present them. Most of the volume of the book is taken by numerous stories about how a particular group worked. Many of the tales add little to the core message of the book and merely dissolve them in irrelevant material. My advice the author: the title of this book should have been "Organizing Genius. Stories of creative collaboration". Or even better - instead of writing a book the author could have written fantastic article that spells out all the same messages without wasting reader's time. Pretty much every chapter digests of other sources, so if you're interested in each particular group, I think you'll find much better accounts elsewhere.
See my weblog (just google it) for a more detailed review.

Rating:
Summary: Packed with Knowledge!
Review: Warren Bennis and Patricia Ward Biederman describe the qualities that generate "Great Groups," capable of meaningful creative collaborations. Despite the myth of individual achievement and heroic leadership, the authors delve into major breakthroughs accomplished by group effort. Often Great Groups unite around the vision of a charismatic leader and work toward that leader's goal with obsessive commitment. Bennis and Biederman spend much of the book describing the workings of a half dozen such groups - from the Manhattan project to the founders of the Disney Studio to Bill Clinton's campaign team. These case histories read like individual short stories, but they each tell the saga of a driven creative collaboration. The authors conclude with lessons you can apply to bring the dedication of Great Groups to bear within your organization. We recommend this clearly written, logically organized book to leaders and collaborators in any industry, with two caveats. First, acquiring the requisite charisma is up to you. And, second, as to the authors' fulsome praise of obsessive work habits, well, that's so '90s.