10 books like Designing Organizations

By Jay R. Galbraith,

Here are 10 books that authors have personally recommended if you like Designing Organizations. Shepherd is a community of 8,000+ authors sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Competing for the Future

By Gary Hamel, CK Prahalad,

Book cover of Competing for the Future

Dave Ulrich Author Of Reinventing the Organization: How Companies Can Deliver Radically Greater Value in Fast-Changing Markets

From the list on how to improve organizations.

Who am I?

Dave Ulrich is the Rensis Likert Professor at the Ross School of Business and a partner at the RBL Group, a consulting firm focused on helping organizations and leaders deliver value. He has published over 200 articles and book chapters and over 30 books. The organizations where we live, work, play, and worship affect every part of our lives. Organizations turn individual competencies into collective capabilities, isolated events into sustained patterns, and personal values into collective values. In short, organizations matter in our lives. By adapting their answer to “what is an organization,” leaders, employees, customers, and investors will be better able to improve their organization's experiences.

Dave's book list on how to improve organizations

Discover why each book is one of Dave's favorite books.

Why did Dave love this book?

This is another classic in that it redefines the organization less as morphology and structure and more as a set of capabilities. Capabilities represent what an organization is known for and good at doing. Creating the right organization is less about roles and rules, but more about identifying and creating the right capabilities.

Competing for the Future

By Gary Hamel, CK Prahalad,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Competing for the Future as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

New competitive realities have ruptured industry boundaries, overthrown much of standard management practice, and rendered conventional models of strategy and growth obsolete. In their stead have come the powerful ideas and methodologies of Gary Hamel and C.K. Prahalad, whose much-revered thinking has already engendered a new language of strategy. In this book, they develop a coherent model for how today's executives can identify and accomplish no less than heroic goals in tomorrow's marketplace. Their masterful blueprint addresses how executives can ease the tension between competing today and clearing a path toward leadership in the future.


Humanocracy

By Gary Hamel, Michele Zanini,

Book cover of Humanocracy: Creating Organizations as Amazing as the People Inside Them

Dave Ulrich Author Of Reinventing the Organization: How Companies Can Deliver Radically Greater Value in Fast-Changing Markets

From the list on how to improve organizations.

Who am I?

Dave Ulrich is the Rensis Likert Professor at the Ross School of Business and a partner at the RBL Group, a consulting firm focused on helping organizations and leaders deliver value. He has published over 200 articles and book chapters and over 30 books. The organizations where we live, work, play, and worship affect every part of our lives. Organizations turn individual competencies into collective capabilities, isolated events into sustained patterns, and personal values into collective values. In short, organizations matter in our lives. By adapting their answer to “what is an organization,” leaders, employees, customers, and investors will be better able to improve their organization's experiences.

Dave's book list on how to improve organizations

Discover why each book is one of Dave's favorite books.

Why did Dave love this book?

This book does a very nice job highlighting the costs of traditional bureaucracy and shows that bureaucracy costs the economy trillions of dollars. The authors then review how to create an organization where people feel empowered to accomplish all that they can. By fulling engaging the hearts, minds, and actions of people, organizations are more successful over time.

Humanocracy

By Gary Hamel, Michele Zanini,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Humanocracy as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A Wall Street Journal Bestseller

In a world of unrelenting change and unprecedented challenges, we need organizations that are resilient and daring.

Unfortunately, most organizations, overburdened by bureaucracy, are sluggish and timid. In the age of upheaval, top-down power structures and rule-choked management systems are a liability. They crush creativity and stifle initiative. As leaders, employees, investors, and citizens, we deserve better. We need organizations that are bold, entrepreneurial, and as nimble as change itself. Hence this book.

In Humanocracy, Gary Hamel and Michele Zanini make a passionate, data-driven argument for excising bureaucracy and replacing it with something better. Drawing…


The Agility Factor

By Christopher G. Worley, Edward E. Lawler, Thomas D. Williams

Book cover of The Agility Factor: Building Adaptable Organizations for Superior Performance

Dave Ulrich Author Of Reinventing the Organization: How Companies Can Deliver Radically Greater Value in Fast-Changing Markets

From the list on how to improve organizations.

Who am I?

Dave Ulrich is the Rensis Likert Professor at the Ross School of Business and a partner at the RBL Group, a consulting firm focused on helping organizations and leaders deliver value. He has published over 200 articles and book chapters and over 30 books. The organizations where we live, work, play, and worship affect every part of our lives. Organizations turn individual competencies into collective capabilities, isolated events into sustained patterns, and personal values into collective values. In short, organizations matter in our lives. By adapting their answer to “what is an organization,” leaders, employees, customers, and investors will be better able to improve their organization's experiences.

Dave's book list on how to improve organizations

Discover why each book is one of Dave's favorite books.

Why did Dave love this book?

Ed Lawler has a lifetime of melding academic theory and organization practice. In this research based book, he and his colleagues not only recognize that agility matters, but they do research to validate processes that create organization agility. Agility is one of the emerging capabilities for a successful organization in today’s changing world. Anything El Lawler works is well thought out, researched, and usable.

The Agility Factor

By Christopher G. Worley, Edward E. Lawler, Thomas D. Williams

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Agility Factor as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A research-based approach to achieving long-term profitability in business What does it take to guarantee success and profitability over time? Authors Christopher G. Worley, a senior research scientist, Thomas D. Williams, an executive advisor, and Edward E. Lawler III, one of the country's leading management experts, set out to find the answer. In The Agility Factor: Building Adaptable Organizations for Superior Performance the authors reveal the factors that drive long-term profitability based on the practices of successful companies that have consistently outperformed their peers. Of the 234 large companies across 18 industries that were studied, there were few companies that…


Competing by Design

By David Nadler, Mark B. Nadler, Michael Tushman

Book cover of Competing by Design: The Power of Organizational Architecture

Dave Ulrich Author Of Reinventing the Organization: How Companies Can Deliver Radically Greater Value in Fast-Changing Markets

From the list on how to improve organizations.

Who am I?

Dave Ulrich is the Rensis Likert Professor at the Ross School of Business and a partner at the RBL Group, a consulting firm focused on helping organizations and leaders deliver value. He has published over 200 articles and book chapters and over 30 books. The organizations where we live, work, play, and worship affect every part of our lives. Organizations turn individual competencies into collective capabilities, isolated events into sustained patterns, and personal values into collective values. In short, organizations matter in our lives. By adapting their answer to “what is an organization,” leaders, employees, customers, and investors will be better able to improve their organization's experiences.

Dave's book list on how to improve organizations

Discover why each book is one of Dave's favorite books.

Why did Dave love this book?

In doing organization diagnosis, it is important to have a framework for thinking about and designing organizations. Like an architect, organization and management practitioners can become architects who build blueprints for creating the right organization. The Nadler/Tushman model is one of the most insightful and comprehensive frameworks for organization diagnosis and improvement.

Competing by Design

By David Nadler, Mark B. Nadler, Michael Tushman

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Competing by Design as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

If the defining goal of modern-day business can be isolated to just one item, it would be the search for competitive advantage. And, as everyone in business knows, it's a lot harder than it used to be. On the one hand, competition is more intense than ever-technological innovation, consumer expectations, government deregulation, all combine to create more opportunities for new competitors to change the basic rules of the game. On the other hand, most of the old
reliable sources of competitive advantage are drying up: the hallowed strategies employed by GM, IBM, and AT&T to maintain their seemingly unassailable positions…


Book cover of The Anticipatory Organization: Turn Disruption and Change into Opportunity and Advantage

Joey Havens Author Of Leading with Significance: How to Create a Magnetic, People-First Culture

From the list on creating a people-first workplace culture.

Who am I?

I am passionate about giving people the benefit of good intentions and my faith calls me to care and serve others. Today, I believe my purpose is to help inspire leaders to trust in the inherent good in people while caring and serving them in intentional ways that leads to high performance. I have been blessed immensely and want to give back to others so their journey can be one of significance. As former CEO of my company, I had no roadmap which made our journey even more difficult. Now, I have experienced the joy, the fulfillment, and the abundance of building a people-first culture.  Together we can make a difference for so many people.

Joey's book list on creating a people-first workplace culture

Discover why each book is one of Joey's favorite books.

Why did Joey love this book?

We are in an exponential world today and we grew up in an incremental world for businesses. 

Daniel not only helps us understand how to anticipate more of the future, he teaches us how to anticipate which is one of the most important skills for business leaders today. After reading his book, I also worked through his anticipatory leader course. 

By understanding the power of being anticipatory, I have used his techniques to lead our firm to bigger opportunities. In the future of work, anticipating what people will want and need, provides a distinctive advantage. 

The Anticipatory Organization

By Daniel Burrus,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Anticipatory Organization as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Technology-driven change is accelerating at an exponential rate, but moving fast in the wrong direction will only get you into trouble faster! Reacting to problems and digital disruptions, no matter how agile you and your organization are, is no longer good enough. The Anticipatory Organization teaches you how to separate the Hard Trends that will happen, from the Soft Trends that might happen, allowing you to jump ahead with low risk and the confidence certainty can provide. Accelerate innovation and actively shape the future - before someone else does it for you! Digital transformation has divided us all into two…


Excellence Dividend

By Thomas J. Peters,

Book cover of Excellence Dividend: Meeting the Tech Tide with Work That Wows and Jobs That Last

Joey Havens Author Of Leading with Significance: How to Create a Magnetic, People-First Culture

From the list on creating a people-first workplace culture.

Who am I?

I am passionate about giving people the benefit of good intentions and my faith calls me to care and serve others. Today, I believe my purpose is to help inspire leaders to trust in the inherent good in people while caring and serving them in intentional ways that leads to high performance. I have been blessed immensely and want to give back to others so their journey can be one of significance. As former CEO of my company, I had no roadmap which made our journey even more difficult. Now, I have experienced the joy, the fulfillment, and the abundance of building a people-first culture.  Together we can make a difference for so many people.

Joey's book list on creating a people-first workplace culture

Discover why each book is one of Joey's favorite books.

Why did Joey love this book?

So many insights for leaders in one book and they are summarized one after one.

The power of connecting is stressed over and over. Diversity of teams tops the expertise of individuals. The power of investing in the soft edge (people). This book is a must-read for anyone wanting to lead others.

Excellence Dividend

By Thomas J. Peters,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Excellence Dividend as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Brilliantly simple, actionable guidelines for success that any business leader can immediately implement. 

“Tom Peters' new book is a bundle of beautiful dynamite. While I've been a CEO for 30 years, I still learned much worth knowing from The Excellence Dividend.  You will too.”
—John C. Bogle, founder, Vanguard

For decades Tom Peters has been preaching the gospel of putting people first, and in today's rapidly changing business environment, this message is more important than ever. With his unparalleled expertise and inimitable charisma, Peters provides a roadmap for you and your organization to thrive amidst the tech tsunami, and he…


The 12 Week Year

By Brian P. Moran, Michael Lennington,

Book cover of The 12 Week Year: Get More Done in 12 Weeks Than Others Do in 12 Months

Curtis Jenkins Author Of Vision to Reality: Stop Working, Start Living

From the list on accelerating your success.

Who am I?

During a meeting in Fall 2020, a fellow business owner shared that they were about to lose everything and that no one would help them financially to get over this setback. This struck a chord with me, as I come from North Philadelphia and saw many small business owners struggle and ultimately lose their businesses. Thus, my personal goal is to help 1000 small businesses annually, giving them the gift of time, realizing their vision and mission, and leaving a legacy of prosperity. By supporting small businesses, I hope to make a positive impact on families, friends, and communities, creating a world of successful small business owners.

Curtis' book list on accelerating your success

Discover why each book is one of Curtis' favorite books.

Why did Curtis love this book?

If you want to achieve your goals faster and accelerate your productivity, The 12 Week Year should be at the top of your list.

This book teaches you how to get more done in less time by compressing your goals into 12-week cycles. By doing this, you can experience a full year of experiences in 12 weeks, accelerating your ability to grow your business or achieve your goals.

The book’s core message is that time is your most valuable asset, and you should use it wisely to achieve your desired lifestyle. Reading this book can help you develop a mindset that focuses on achieving your goals faster and enjoying more of life’s experiences. 

The 12 Week Year

By Brian P. Moran, Michael Lennington,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The 12 Week Year as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The guide to shortening your execution cycle down from one year to twelve weeks Most organizations and individuals work in the context of annual goals and plans; a twelve-month execution cycle. Instead, The 12 Week Year avoids the pitfalls and low productivity of annualized thinking. This book redefines your "year" to be 12 weeks long. In 12 weeks, there just isn't enough time to get complacent, and urgency increases and intensifies. The 12 Week Year creates focus and clarity on what matters most and a sense of urgency to do it now. In the end more of the important stuff…


The Lean Startup

By Eric Ries,

Book cover of The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses

Muhammad Mashhood Alam Author Of Transforming an Idea Into a Business with Design Thinking: The Structured Approach from Silicon Valley for Entrepreneurs and Leaders

From the list on design thinking, innovation, and entrepreneurship.

Who am I?

I've been driving innovation in various capacities with world’s leading companies and start-ups for the last 23 years in Silicon Valley. I've been granted six US patents, won two prestigious design awards including the Red Dot award, and published a book on transforming an idea into a business using Design Thinking. What I've learnt is that at the core of any successful business lies the value to the end user who uses the solutions. As I got exposed to Design Thinking earlier on in my career, I realized its immense power in delivering human-centered innovations. I regularly speak at several industry & entrepreneurial events and various business schools around the world. 

Muhammad's book list on design thinking, innovation, and entrepreneurship

Discover why each book is one of Muhammad's favorite books.

Why did Muhammad love this book?

The Lean Startup is a book that presents a new approach to entrepreneurship and innovation that focuses on creating products that meet the needs of customers while minimizing waste and maximizing efficiency.

Ries argues that many startups fail because they spend too much time and resources building products that customers don't want, and that a better approach is to quickly develop and test ideas using a process of continuous improvement.

Ries outlines a framework for implementing a lean startup approach, which includes identifying the target customer, creating a minimum viable product, and using rapid experimentation and feedback to improve the product.

He also emphasizes the importance of metrics and data analysis in guiding decision-making and measuring progress.

I have found it a practical and informative book that offers valuable insights and strategies for entrepreneurs and innovators looking to create successful and sustainable businesses.

The Lean Startup

By Eric Ries,

Why should I read it?

6 authors picked The Lean Startup as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLING SENSATION

'The Lean Startup changes everything.' - Harvard Business Review

----------

Most new businesses fail. But most of those failures are preventable.

The Lean Startup is a new approach to business that's being adopted around the world. It is changing the way companies are built and new products are launched.

Essential reading for any ambitious entrepreneur, The Lean Startup will teach you to identify what your customers really want. You'll learn how to test your vision continuously, adapting and adjusting before it's too late.

With over a million copies sold across the globe, now is your time…


Book cover of The Ultimate Sales Machine: Turbocharge Your Business with Relentless Focus on 12 Key Strategies

Raymond Fong Author Of Growth Hacking: Silicon Valley's Best Kept Secret

From the list on becoming a well-rounded entrepreneur.

Who am I?

I am an entrepreneur and an investor with a background in engineering from Harvey Mudd College and University of Southern California. I co-founded Deviate Labs, a boutique growth marketing agency with my business partner, Chad Riddersen. Our growth marketing agency leverages my engineering pedigree and my business partner’s investment pedigree for a unique approach to marketing that we lend to our consulting engagements and our own initiatives. Together, we co-authored the book, Growth Hacking: Silicon Valley’s Best Kept Secret. I am passionate about investing in and developing both people and businesses and these books I recommend have helped me become better at doing so.

Raymond's book list on becoming a well-rounded entrepreneur

Discover why each book is one of Raymond's favorite books.

Why did Raymond love this book?

I appreciate foundational books that can stand the test of time and this book is one such book in the realm of business. Not only does it lay out insightful business-building strategies that help create efficiency and longevity in your business, you’ll also find golden nuggets of insights that apply to marketing as well. Some of the systematic approaches outlined in the book provided inspiration for our own boo.

The Ultimate Sales Machine

By Chet Holmes,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Ultimate Sales Machine as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

NEWLY REVISED AND UPDATED

The bestselling business playbook for turbocharging any organization, updated for modern audiences with new and never-before-seen material

Every single day 3,076 businesses shut their doors. But what if you could create the finest, most profitable and best-run version of your business without wasting precious dollars on a thousand different strategies? When The Ultimate Sales Machine first published in 2007, legendary sales expert Chet Holmes gave us the key to do just that. All you need is to focus on twelve key areas of improvement—and practice them over and over with pigheaded discipline.

Now, a decade later,…


The Ten Faces of Innovation

By Jonathan Littman, Tom Kelley,

Book cover of The Ten Faces of Innovation: IDEO's Strategies for Beating the Devil's Advocate and Driving Creativity Throughout Your Organization

Rupert Scofield Author Of Default to Bold:  Anatomy of a Turnaround

From the list on learning how to survive as an entrepreneur.

Who am I?

Rupert Scofield is the President & CEO of a global financial services empire spanning 20 countries of Latin America, Africa, Eurasia and the Middle East, serving millions of the world’s poorest families, especially women. Scofield has spent the better part of his life dodging revolutions, earthquakes and assassins in the Third World, and once ran for his life from a mob in Mogadishu, Somalia.

Rupert's book list on learning how to survive as an entrepreneur

Discover why each book is one of Rupert's favorite books.

Why did Rupert love this book?

This is the follow up to The Art of Innovation which describes the strategies of the world-famous design firm, IDEO, which has dissected the process of innovation and, in this book, identified the types of “personas” a CEO should attract in order to tackle big, difficult problems with novel, creative approaches.  I could definitely relate to the first persona described, The Anthropologist, who spends an inordinate amount of time with the clients, listening and observing, in order to understand what they really desire and what has prevented them thus far from achieving or obtaining it.  I also found The Cross-Pollinator interesting, which argued that you should sometimes involve people from other sectors or countries which may at first glance seem irrelevant to the job at hand but, if given the chance to be “heard”, could lead to a solution.  The author makes the case for another eight personas, who may…

The Ten Faces of Innovation

By Jonathan Littman, Tom Kelley,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Ten Faces of Innovation as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A brilliant guide to fostering creativity and business innovation, The Ten Faces of Innovation shows how any individual can become an experienced architect, storyteller, caregiver or cross-pollinator...just four of the ten characters that can be adopted in different situations to create a broader range of solutions to business problems. At the start of the creative process you might be the 'anthropologist', going into the field to see how customers use and respond to products; later you might be the 'hurdler', who overcomes obstacles on the way to the finished product. The book explains with examples from business how adopting these…


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