Reviews and Comments

Honestly, I wasn't overwhelmed by this book at first, since I expected something different, maybe "more acedemic", but this first impression changed fast. Russell L. Ackoff offers a wide variety of stories and perspectives on the topic and in the context of "systemic thinking", from fundamental essays to exemplary ones. Ackoff's thoughts are profound and inspiring, and it still is a mystery to me why his work is not more prominent to many managers and leaders I met (the same can be said of people like Deming or Drucker, of course). The content of this book is often more than 35 years old, but still seems to be ahead of our times.

»Die Grenzen meiner Sprachen bedeuten die Grenzen meiner Welt.« ~ Ludwig Wittgenstein

Der junge David Foster Wallace, wortgewaltig virtuos. Ein unsinnig tiefschürfendes Versteck- und Verwirrspiel, eine Kampfansage mit Augenzwinkern.

»Dies ist sein erster Roman. Gnade uns Gott, wenn der Mann erst mal etwas Übung hat.« ~ Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, 1987.

Word.

Goldratt's "Theory of Constraints" bears some real gems, like diving deeper into the Socratic approach and the Evaporating Clouds method, or by elaborating a bit more on the psychology of change per se. Nevertheless, I did not overly enjoy the read, which is both due to the unstructured presentation and the TOC sales show covering nearly the second half of this edition. I heavily doubt this book would've been of any use for me at all if I hadn't read The Goal beforehand, as I always had the feeling I'm just dealing with some secondary literature to it. This was a rather strange experience.

At first, I was not sure if this book is my cup of tea, and I got a bit tired of the "here's your all knowing mentor approach" every other author seems to take, maybe reading too many business novels in a row. Nevertheless, Goldratt's Theory of Constraints is one of the most important concepts to grasp if you're thinking about managing flow and throughput in goal oriented production systems. Although this story is set within a manufacturing environment, its vocabulary can be easily abstracted to todays IT organisations. Rest assured: Reading this piece and looking at how Kanban is frequently implemented might give you some eye-opening moments…

"Turn the Ship Around!" is an easy but incredibly inspiring read. The way Captain L. David Marquet describes the transition from a Leader-Follower to a Leader-Leader paradigm on board the USS Santa Fe seems simple but effective: »The steps were evolutionary. The result was revolutionary.«

Based on the three legs "control, competence and clarity", Marquet develops manyfold learnings and insights that are valuable to the US Navy leadership, and certainly beyond. Things that resonated strongly with me, among others, were questioning the usual connotation of "empowerment", introducing the idea of "acting and talking ourselves into a new way of thinking", the concept of "deliberate action", and what it really means to take care of your people.

A truly encouraging book.

I finally read this book for a second time, and find myself being a fan of its entertaining (and yes, of course oversimplified and exaggerated) approach to introduce ideas that are still not fully understood or internalised by the majority of organisations nowadays.

The content of the book itself has been discussed more than once, so I spare you with that. The writing style gets the message delivered, but there's certainly nothing to rave about. Also, this is not a cook book by any means, so there's no recipe for you to follow blindly, but it will give you more than only one thought to reflect upon.

Having read the "The Phoenix Project", it's worth to dive into the works of W. Edwards Deming or Eliyahu M. Goldratt for a deeper and better funded understanding, if you didn't already do so.

This book is pointing out five dysfunctions that many teams struggle with, at least at times, and gives ideas on how to observe and overcome them. Many of those ideas are worth consideration, and highlighting these dysfunctions in a structured context is certainly helpful.

A book that is written with good intention.

Nevertheless, I can't really digest the old narrative of a wise and superior leader who knows what's best for his or her subordinates, and would love to have read the same story with a team that's more at an eye level.