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Title: First Among Equals: How to Manage a Group of Professionals by Patrick J. McKenna, David H. Maister ISBN: 0-7432-2551-1 Publisher: Free Press Pub. Date: 09 April, 2002 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $26.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.42 (12 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: weLEAD Book Review
Comment: FIRST AMONG EQUALS is more than a catchy title of a book promoted as a guide to managing others in professional environments. When you finish reading this book and the depth of knowledge presented by its authors, you will agree that it is first among equals. Often times books written by two authors come across as disjointed or unconnected. However, McKenna & Maister seem to complement each other's skills very well and the end result is clearly evident.
FIRST AMONG EQUALS was written to fill a large need in most modern organizations. Its premise is how to manage a group and lead them to peak performance without possessing formal authority. Today, it is common to be leader of a group of individuals without possessing any real power or authority over the embers of the group. Wise leaders also know that even if they do have formal authority over others, the high performance leader doesn't act like they do. Instead, the way to get the most out of the individuals we serve with is to be primus inter pares, the first among equals. The authors then boldly take you step by step through an enlightened process of how to interact with and manage groups as an individual group leader. McKenna & Maister state in the introduction that, This is a book about "doing." It is not concerned primarily with theories, concepts, or insights. It's a book we wish we had read when we were first given the challenge of leading a group!" This is achieved by providing frank observations, stirring questions, and wise advice from two respected consultants. FIRST AMONG EQUALS is also replete with quizzes, sidebars and checklists to enhance your personal growth as a group leader.
Part one of the book deals with the issue of how to prepare or "get ready" for your role as a group leader. It discusses how you add value to the group as its leader, and your rights and responsibilities within this important role. It discusses how you can build valuable relationships with other members and examine your essential people skills. It also deals with the question of what it means to be an inspirational leader.
Part two is a section dedicated to help you to learn to be a superior personal coach. It shows you how to get others to accept your guidance. Why unscheduled, informal "one-on-one" coaching is the most powerful way to improve a group's success. It deals with issues of building support for change, helping the underperformers who need assistance and dealing with the proverbial "prima donnas" or difficult people.
Part three of FIRST AMONG EQUALS moves on to the skills needed to coach the team. This part of the book deals with diverse team leadership topics such as developing group rules & goals, building trust among members, presenting an exciting challenge and how to energize group gatherings with good meeting discipline. This part of the book concludes with a discussion of how to resolve interpersonal conflicts and how to respond to a group crisis!
Part Four of the book looks to the future and how to prepare for it. It will show you how to nurture the next generation of junior staff and insure the success of newly hired personnel. It also discusses problems associated with group size, and how to properly measure the groups' success. The final chapter in the book entitled "Why Bother" concludes with a summery of the various lists provided throughout the text grouped by category in an effort to help you implement and synthesize much of the material.
If you are involved with managing or leading groups you should buy this book! No matter what level of experience or expertise you possess, FIRST AMONG EQUALS is a winner and is guaranteed to broaden your perspective on leading your group to peak performance.
Rating: 4
Summary: Leading from the middle
Comment: Managing professionals is often likened to herding cats. Intelligent professionals are free agents, accustomed to having the autonomy to work on gruelling assignments with little supervision. They are relentlessly demanding of themselves and others, and the best are often are prima donnas, quick both to take offence and to give it. Many companies believe that their professionals are unmanageable, and some have given up trying.
The group leaders within a practice have to act as player-coaches. They are responsible for their own performance but also that of their peers. They must manage their peers but with limited authority. They must encourage individuals; yet somehow forge them into a cohesive team. They are expected to lead as the primus inter pares, the first among equals.
In First Among Equals, McKenna and Maister write the book they wish they had read when first given the challenge of leading a group. The first part helps the leader clarify his/her role. The second part deals with the activities required to coach, lead, inspire, and guide the individual members. The third part turns to team management. The fourth discusses building for the future: managing juniors, monitoring success and problems of size.
The book is written like a series of seminar presentations. The authors take care to tell you what they will tell you, then to tell you, and finally to tell you what they told you. They use lists, which are then unpacked and dissected in detail. Even if this style does not appeal to you, you will find the advice practical and easy to reference.
David Maister's classic, Managing the Professional Services Firm, has long been compulsory reading for senior partners in professional practices. First Among Equals should be given to each of their managers.
Rating: 5
Summary: Some great material that I can share & use as a refresher
Comment: Gripe no. 1 : I hope its not going to become a common occurrence in business books, but there were 7 pages of 35 advance reviews (but 5 of them were only 2 lines which said little). Let me decide for myself if the book is any good - show me the product. Also, I work in IT, but there didn't seem to be a single reviewer with an IT background?
The book looks at the leader/manager/coach of a disparate group of professionals, assuming a mix of seniors & juniors.
I think the book isn't just for the leader/manager/coach - because in many such groups today, there can be rotation (time-based or task-based) where any of the group of professionals might be called upon to perform the leadership / coaching / mentoring role. So the book should be read by all members of the team. Also the leader is human - they might not be 'doing it right as per the book', and it could be useful for the others (they are all equals after all) to be informed to provide that guidance/correction.
The Sections are laid out well : getting ready; coaching the individual; coaching the team; building for the future.
It classes individuals into 4 styles : amiable, analytical, driver, expressive (I tend more towards the expressive), and how to work with each.
I also like the way it addressed underperforming members, how to correct the problem rather than try to rationalise it out of existence.
Because professionals jealously guard their autonomy, reserving the right to work as they see fit, professional groups have a greater-than-average tendency to become ill-disciplined - and thus a whole chapter is dedicate to how to run a meeting of such individuals.
I work in such a group, where there are 20 of us, probably 50:50 seniors & juniors (though we don't refer to ourselves in those terms).
Gripe no. 2 : However, one thing missing explicitly from the book is if there are any strengths, weaknesses, opportunities & threats from a geographically disparate or culturally diverse group?
My group is spread across 2 continents, 5 different timezones, with only 2 hours in the day when our extended workday (8am-6pm) coincides. We comprise at least 5 different nationalities & religions, and it seems many more political viewpoints. But time and time again, this material seemed to assume that this was a relatively homogeneous group, everyone was coming together physically in the same room, or at least, didn't even consider that people might be in the same geographical locations but be on the phone, and thus unable to see each others body language. My group only get together in the same room twice a year. We've evolved techniques over the 7 years we've been together to accommodate this, but I would have appreciated it more if this modern reality had been addressed?
I also liked the discussion on the maximum size of the group, and one correspondents rule of thumb that the group is too big if he can't tell you the name of everyone's spouse/significant other & what that person does for a living (assuming its OK culturally to ask for that information - in some cultures it's a no-no).
There's an excellent wrap-up where the dozens of checklist (don't let the apparent volume put you off - it's not that bad) are summarised and classified, and you are reminded in which chapters they are to be found.
Overall I think my group is doing quite well 80% of what is in the book, with maybe 10% that we wouldn't agree with, leaving us 10% that we could improve upon. I'm going to recommend it to everyone else.
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Title: Managing The Professional Service Firm by David H. Maister ISBN: 0684834316 Publisher: Free Press Pub. Date: 09 June, 1997 List Price(USD): $25.00 |
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Title: Leading Geeks: How to Manage and Lead the People Who Deliver Technology by Paul Glen, David H. Maister, Warren G. Bennis ISBN: 0787961485 Publisher: Jossey-Bass Pub. Date: 01 November, 2002 List Price(USD): $26.95 |
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Title: Developing Knowledge-Based Client Relationships, The Future of Professional Services by Ross Dawson ISBN: 0750671858 Publisher: Butterworth-Heinemann Pub. Date: 15 January, 2000 List Price(USD): $27.95 |
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Title: Aligning the Stars by Jay W. Lorsch, Thomas J. Tierney ISBN: 1578515130 Publisher: Harvard Business School Press Pub. Date: 26 April, 2002 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
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Title: Rain Making: The Professional's Guide to Attracting New Clients by Ford Harding ISBN: 1558504206 Publisher: Adams Media Corporation Pub. Date: September, 1994 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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