12 Stories of Big Decisions and the Teams that Got Them Right
By Thomas H. Davenport and Brooke Manville
Harvard Business Review
288 pages; $30
Everyone knows how critical decision-making is in an organization. And, the person who makes those decisions in any given company is even more critical. Too often, that responsibility falls to one team, just a few people—or sometimes—to a single person. That's a big mistake, Thomas H. Davenport and Brooke Manville argue in their new book, Judgment Calls: 12 Stories of Big Decisions and the Teams that Got Them Right. Davenport and Manville say organizational leaders should expand, not limit, the number of people involved in important decisions to take advantage of the collective genius of the entire organization. Sure sounds simple enough, right? But, in fact, this type of decision making is often more difficult. Good thing, then, Davenport and Manville offer a dozen best practices and case studies to illustrate just how top organizations are doing it successfully right now. Turns out, it's not as difficult as one might imagine, and the business benefits are far reaching and lasting.
