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Featured Faculty Books: What Were They Thinking

Jeffrey Pfeffer, Thomas D. Dee II Professor of Organizational Behavior; Spence Faculty Fellow for 2006-07

 


What Were They Thinking: Unconventional Wisdom About Management
by Jeffrey Pfeffer. Harvard Business School Press, 2007

• Table of Contents [ PDF 17KB]
• Professor Bob Sutton's praise
• Ten Questions with Jeffrey Pfeffer - from Guy Kawasaki's Blog

 

Every day companies and their leaders fail to capitalize on opportunities because they misunderstand the real sources of business success.

Based on his popular column in Business 2.0, Jeffrey Pfeffer delivers wise and timely business commentary that challenges conventional wisdom while providing data and insights to help companies make smarter decisions. The book contains a series of short chapters filled with examples, data, and insights that challenge questionable assumptions and much conventional management wisdom. Each chapter also provides guidelines about how to think more deeply and intelligently about critical management issues. Covering topics ranging from managing people to leadership to measurement and strategy, it's good organizational advice, delivered by Dr. Pfeffer himself.

About Jeffrey Pfeffer:

 

Jeffrey Pfeffer is the Thomas D. Dee II Professor of Organizational Behavior in the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University, where he has taught since 1979. He is the author or co-author of ten books including: Managing with Power, Competitive Advantage Through People, The Human Equation, The Knowing-Doing Gap and Hidden Value. He has also published more than 110 articles and book chapters.

 

Pfeffer has served on the faculties of the business schools at the University of Illinois and the University of California at Berkeley. During the 1981-1982 academic year, he was the Thomas Henry Carroll-Ford Foundation Visiting Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School. He currently serves on the board of directors of several companies. Pfeffer writes a monthly management column called "The Human Factor" for Business 2.0, a leading business magazine. He is a member and Fellow of the Academy of Management and a member of the Industrial Relations Research Association and has won the Richard D. Irwin award for Scholarly Contributions to Management as well as several awards for books and articles.
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