High Output Management

I run a small business with about 50 employees. I have made this book our management “bible” there is no handbook for life but there can be one for your business

This is not a review, rather some thoughts that occurred to me while reading the book. As manager of a small team I found the book to be full of very practical advice. In particular, the Part 4 - The Players contains very useful processes which are immediately applicable to my daily activities as a manager. Grove's main accomplishment in this book, is the simplification of very complex organizational concepts and processes into simple steps that anyone can follow and manage. Grove is clearly a decisive individual, this also emerges clearly from the text. He lays out a dilemma, lists the pros and cons and then makes a decision, for better or worse. The book is also a very frank account of the ups and downs of management, the author shares his mistakes and moments when his judgement was not accurate. You get the feeling, that he wrote the book, had it proof read and published, and was not at all concerned with the politics or how he would be perceived. Grove's dedication to Intel and its employees is also abundantly clear, it must have been a real privilege to work with a manager to that caliber.

I'm a Vice President at a small public company, and I've been managing people for over ten years, and have an MBA from a top ranked business school. Still, I wish I had read this book when I first started managing people. This certainly appears to me to be a book written by Andy Grove for his own managers at Intel, and I found it interesting to see how he thinks about management. Not surprisingly, he has a very pragmatic, operational view of what good managers do, and he presents a comprehensive guide for all the basics. His whole orientation is that managers are responsible for the total output of their teams, and his focus is always on accomplishments and outputs, not activities. Topics that are included - Looking at your operations and finding the bottle necks - How to monitor and check your processes for high quality and high output - How managers should spend their time, run team meetings, and stay in touch with subordinates through one on ones - How to hire, coach, and provide feedback to build your team What you won't find in this book - How to think about strategy - Competitive advantage - Building a brand - Competitive analysis The book has been around for a while, and it's not a trendy management book. There is no new catch phrase or research based on fMRI or paradigm shift. There is nothing sexy or trendy. But it is a very solid introduction from someone who has proven to be among the best at managing. This is one of the great CEOs of our times, and I brilliant mind, passing along what he wants his managers to know. I think that many managers could vastly improve their performance if they studied and mastered the basics covered here rather than the nifty new concept from the latest HBR.

High Output Management provides a comprehensive overview of a managers role and purpose. The book focuses around a central thesis that a manager's objective is to increase the output of the work of those below and around him. A manager should therefore choose high-leverage activities that have a multiplicative impact on the overall output of his subordinates and peers. For example, providing clear direction to a team may only require a small amount of the manager's time, but yields tremendous value in terms of the output of the team. This book is great for both new and experienced managers since it provides valuable frameworks and strategies for all kinds of common managerial tasks. Below are the core topics covered in this book: * Delegation - In order to maximize leverage, a manager needs an optimal number of subordinates to whom he can delegate to. Successful delegation provides lots of leverage, whereas poor delegation ends up netting no leverage since it turns into errors and micro-management. * Meetings - Meetings are extraordinarily expensive to a company. There are three types of recurring meetings: one-on-one's, staff meetings, and operational reviews. Each of these meetings should have a clear framework for maximizing value and minimizing time-waste. There are also one-off meetings centered around making a particular decision - such meetings should be especially carefully planned and executed since they are often scheduled ad-hoc without a clear purpose and with too many participants. * Making decisions - When making decisions, there's a fragile power dynamic that needs to be carefully handled. Managers should facilitate free and open discussion amongst all parties until a consensus emerges. In cases where a consensus does not emerge naturally, the manager should push for a decision. * Dual reporting - Dual reporting is inevitable in most large organizations. Consider advertising: should each division of a company decide and pursue its own advertising campaign, or should all of it be handled through a single corporate entity? The optimum solution calls for the use of dual reporting where each division controls most of their own advertising messages but a coordinating body of peers consisting of the various divisional marketing managers chooses the advertising agency and creative direction. * Motivating employees - Our society respects someone's throwing himself into sports, but anybody who works very long hours is regarded as sick or a workaholic. Imagine how productive our country would become if managers could endow all work with the characteristics of competitive sports? Eliciting peak performance means going up against something or somebody, and turning the workplace into a playing field where subordinates become athletes dedicated to performing at the limit of their capabilities. * Performance reviews - Performance reviews are easily mistaken as simply a way to assess performance and evaluate compensation. The fundamental goal of a performance review is to improve the subordinates performance. A review will influence a subordinate's performance for a long time, which makes the activity one of the manager's highest-leverage activities. Thus great care needs to be taken in the preparation and delivery of a performance review.

My career coach recommended this, and I’m glad I picked it up. While it’s an older title, the core concepts and frameworks are still incredibly relevant. Grove’s approach to management is practical, clear, and surprisingly applicable to modern teams. A worthwhile read for anyone in leadership or aiming to grow into it.

Came recommended. Thank you

I am such an admirer of Intel the company, in particular Robert Noyce. Gordon Moore also. I viewed Grove as a grouchy old curmudgeon and never paid too much attention to his perspective because of his temperament. Boy was I missing out. I have new found respect for Mr Grove. I purchased this after reading Ben Horowitz's book, "The Hard Thing About Hard Things.' In which Mr Horowitz calls this best management book ever written. This book reads like a text book. There is ZERO fluff in it. I believe that would accurately describe Andy Grove, all substance and no fluff. Mr Grove is so smart and thorough and topics covered so dense that it took me a few times reading certain parts to fully understand the concepts. I can't recommend this book enough. I have purchased many copies and i hand them out to friends of mine who I believe will read and put into practice the advice from this seminal work.

Intel is one of the must successful technology corporations of our time. Under the leadership of Andy Grove, it has done stupendous. The question everyone wants to know is: how? The books goes through the process of creating an organization that creates more. Grove covers just about everything; from meetings to being friends with employees (yes, it is possible). He also walks us through a typical day of us and shows us an intimate view of his thinking process. Grove's writing is characteristically technical and direct. He goes through many personal examples. Many people might ask: is this book intended for leaders at big companies, or small? Perhaps both. There are a lot of insights about how Intel, a Fortune 500 company, runs and organizes itself. It can also help a small business get tactics it can implement in its organization. Modern day entrepreneurs have gotten tremendous value from Grove. Ben Horowitz, in his book, credits a lot of lessons from Andy Grove. Google is probably the most famous company that embraces management by objective (MBO), which is today known as Objectives and Key Results (OKRs). The MBO system Intel explains a lot of its success, but is only talked about for 4 pages. Since the book was written in 1983 (updated in 1995), the writing comes across as a bit dated. Almost every chapter has a chart or graph. I can imagine Grove sharing these principals with his staff on an overhead. The writing is very logical, and analytical. I was surprised to see how procedural Grove's thinking was. I was expecting to see more branding and company culture theories. Perhaps those weren't popular to write about in the 80's, but still a big reason for the company's success. Although a great intro to management for most, it's very basic. It has good points, but not the flare you would expect from one of the world's most successful tech firms. If you're looking for fireworks, they aren't here.

One of the best business books I've read in a long time. Short book, common sense and to the point. Written by Andrew Grove former CEO of Intel. I would challenge anyone to review their own workplace, their own work practices using some of Grove's ideas. Liked the simple idea on the manager's preparation for decision making: What decision needs to be made? English: Portrait of Andrew Grove. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) When does it have to be made? Who will decide? Who will need to be consulted prior to making the decision? Who will ratify or veto the dcision Who will need to be informed of the decision? Pity it does not happen more often. On meetings I think he is right: two types. Are we talking of a process oriented meeting (one-on-one, staff meetings, operations reviews) or a mission-oriented meeting? The discussion of hybrid organisations and dual reporting is straightforward and recognises the reality of how many businesses need to be structured. Liked the honesty of his section on performance appraisal. And his clarity on the importance of this process, the need for preparation and the rationale for the process in the first instance. Not sure I fully agreed with him on his views on trying to retain people who say they are going to leave. Finally - he is very clear on the manager's role and responsibility for training - including preparation and delivery of training. I would see this as a major failing with many managers in industry. And a major missed opportunity.

One of the best books I’ve read on Management. It was tipped to me by a great entrepreneur and leader. A must read for everyone who is trying to get more understanding and thus more knowledge to put in practice. I loved the checklist in the back of the book. I’ve read the Kindle edition!

I came at this book from a different book and should have read this book first. The way Andy explains business is based in common sense and as a result it is so easy to understand. I can certainly recommend this book and once you have read this book try “Measure what matters” by John Doerr because it follows on from this book to explain about OKR’s, a tool that Andy Grove gave birth to!

Yes as most would mention the ideas come from a system based machine metaphor kind of thinking. Its how an Engineer and scientist works. However all the ideas are thought provoking and fully applicable in the current environment. I have used most of the ideas in the book and can vouch they work in my case. It is a constant process of doing, testing and improving. Hope you will find it practical and useful as well

Andrew Grove hat als CEO von Intel 1987-1997 den Marktwert des Chip-Herstellers von 4 auf 197 Milliarden $ gesteigert. Auch heute ist Intel ein Top-Unternehmen. In diesem immer noch lesenswerten Buch von 1983 erklärt Grove seine Denkweise und Arbeitsmethoden. Grove ist ein Holocaust-Überlebender, der Ungarn 1956 im Alter von 20 Jahren verließ. Die Staatswirtschaft ist ihm verhasst, er will das Leistungsprinzip durchsetzen und macht Karriere in den USA. Das Buch ist klar und logisch gegliedert und verständlich geschrieben. Im ersten Teil, "The breakfast factory" erklärt Grove einfache Grundlagen der Betriebsorganisation. Aus seiner Sicht gibt es drei entscheidende Erfolgsfaktoren für eine erfolgreiche Produktion, die dann in den drei folgenden Abschnitten genauer erklärt werden - Teamwork, d.h. Zusammenarbeit für bessere Ergebnisse - Steuerung des Gesamtunternehmens, "Teams von Teams" - Motivation für Spitzenleistungen wie beim Sport, mit Kontrolle und Feedback Wer Peter Druckers Bücher wie z.B. "Praxis des Managements" kennt, das den Führungsstil der 1960er und 1970er Jahre beschreibt, kann diesem Buch den Führungsstil amerikanischer Unternehmen in den 1980er und 1990er Jahren entnehmen. Das heißt, E-Mail, Smartphones und Web spielten noch keine Rolle. Die Autoritäten in den Firmenhierarchien waren herausgefordert und mussten sich legitimieren, indem sie ihre Herrschaft mit dem Wettbewerbsdruck rechtfertigten. Groves Argumentation ist schlüssig und für seine Verhältnisse plausibel. So kämpft er gegen Statussymbole "If we don't link or engineers with our managers in such a way as to get good decisions, we cannot succeed in our industry" (S 93). Grove wägt das richtige Maß von Ordnung gegenüber Chaos und Eigeninteresse vs. Gruppeninteresse gegeneinander ab (S. 149) Wenn ein Manager versagt, prüft er, ob dieser die Aufgabe hätte lösen können, wenn dessen Leben davon abgehangen hätte. Wenn ja, handelte es sich um ein Motivationsproblem, ansonsten eine Frage der Kompetenz (S. 157, Kapitel 11). Auf der Basis von Maslows berühmter Psychologie macht sich Grove Gedanken zur Motivation (164) und empfiehlt drei L für Personalgespräche: "Level, Listen and Leave yourself out" (188). Für die besonders schwierigen Konfliktgespräche hat er wichtige Ratschläge (194). Trotz aller intellektueller Brillanz ist das Buch aus heutiger Sicht veraltet. Denn die Herangehensweise zur Leistungsbeurteilung fördert kurzfristiges Denken und Arschkriecherei. Wer ein Jahr lang keine sichtbaren Ergebnisse bringt, kommt nach Groves Schema in Schwierigkeiten. Daher überrascht es nicht, dass Intel dem langfristigen Aufstieg von ARM und Risc-Prozessoren bei mobilen Geräten wenig entgegenzusetzen hat: iPhone und Android kommen im Gegensatz zu PCs weitgehend ohne Intel aus, Arduino und Raspberry auch. Dennoch ist dieses glänzend geschriebene Buch eine wertvolle Lektüre für jeden, der sich für Management-Methoden interessiert.