Organization-chart

This is a text book, not a breezy read. It is also a cook book, where the authors tell you not only what needs to be done (common) but how to do it (rare). We are a process improvement consulting company and go through three or four copies a year. We loan them to clients who don't want to give them back.

Hugh Schmidt, Vice President, Process Flow Specialists, Inc.

Excellent book. This is a must read for anyone looking to implement process improvement. Very good examples and an easy to read format.

Long before James Champy made "Reengineering" a buzz-word, then a management fad, then finally a tired cliche, Rummler & Brache broke the code on how businesses can do work better. Instead of looking at the jobs people do, they focused their attention on the work being done, and how those work objects meander through different departments and functional organizations in most companies.

What Rummler & Brache might have lacked in marketing prowess, they more than made up for in insight. "Improving Performance" is short on jargon and the evangelical fervor many other works on Reengineering, Business Process Management, and Third Wave(or fourth wave or whatever wave we're up to) seem to revel in. It is focused and pragmatic, giving both the theory of process management and how to apply it. Very basic and very useful diagrams help illustrate their concepts throughout, making this a field guide for anyone involved in process management in the real world, be they consultants or internal change agents.

After 15 years in the space, it's still one of the best I've found. Could not recommend more highly.

Very interesting book, I think needs more practical cases.

This is a small, information-packed book that contains a collection of tools and techniques, and an overreaching method.

The tools are standard TQM and process improvement implements, and are augmented by forms and templates that anyone who is tackling process improvement can quickly put to good use. These tools are classified by use: problem identification, analysis, brainstorming and consensus, etc. The author shows not only when, but how to effectively use the tools, and gives clear examples.

The overreaching method that is communicated in this book is: (1) when possible perform improvement activities in parallel, (2) activities that are sequenced can often be improved by examining the sequence and determining if it can be changed to promote greater efficiency (and reduce cycle time), and (3) pay attention to process flow and look for barriers and interruptions that need to be removed.

I like this book because it is short and to the point, is densely packed with information (even if a lot of it has been published elsewhere), and the author's approach which is to pay attention to seemingly minor details and perform rigorous analysis using the easy-to-use tools he provides in this book.

This book is a very important tool for any organization chart designer. It provides organization charts of a vast number of businesses and organizations. There is a significant oppportunity that you will find a benchmark to what your company is doing. One word of caution - this book is only one of a number of tools that should be used in desigining (or redesigning) an organization chart: it does not provide full explanations on what each department is responsible for and what staffing levels are appropriate.

This book is so ridiculous it's not funny. A religious look on certain CD's and really pathetic reviews of them. It seems the writers will condemn a CD if one single lyric in the whole darn thing says something about a beer or a bar. You get the picture. This book is more damaging than it is helpful. Great work by great artists are slammed and dismissed because they speak the truth and talk about the real world. Real world with real, normal, everyday things. The authors obviously expect everything to be safe and to be perfect in the cookie cutter, Leave It To Beaver, delusional fantasy world they seem to be living in. I'm not knocking anything about religion here, but these guys are way off the mark here!. The reasons they give that slams a CD are sophmoric and juvenile. It's also a slap in the face insult to any teenager out there. They write like they are total dimbulbs who can't think on their own. Like they need to be saved from some evil they think is in some of these CD's. These kids are smarter than the authors give them credit for. They don't need anybody to hold their hand to cross the street. As a young person myself, I was really offended by it. I don't know who wouldn't. It also appeared that these guys used this book to promote other christian artists. At the end of a bad review, they recommend some artist. This book is ridiculous in every sense of the word. I understand parents wanting to monitor some stuff, and some stuff out there should be monitored by parents, but the stuff in this book is too far gone. It's almost a joke of epic proportions. I would skip this book at all costs. It's too preachy that doesn't give music, or talent, a fair chance. A big stinker that makes decisions for you instead of making your own.

I would beware of the messenger. This is an author who says the Bible endorses the 2nd Amendment! The author's religious views are too much intertwined into the writings. Blaming tragedies like Columbine on the media without assigning blame where it really lies, guns, is to render your own point moot. And what do they mean by "godly" music anyways? Anything that doesn't mention any sort of non-American Christian religions? If it means listening to Michael Bolton and Amy Grant all day, then no thanks. And thank God for the real Christians out there who would laugh off anything these people have to say about music.

If I had read this book before buying some of the stuff my kids have I would of been able to get exactly what I wanted them to see before their young minds got warped with so much violence. Since Littleton, CO, I really want to be aware of what is going on in music,entertainment, tv, videos, games, computers, etc. This book helps me know what the product is all about before I buy for them, and helps me make a good judgment before I lay out the big bucks.