How do businesses go beyond the prescriptive policies and make the shift from the 'low road' of cost to the 'high road' of innovation and value? This book presents an analysis of the context and the challenges, and offers managers and consultants a range of ideas that are helpful to their companies.

PART 1: SETTING THE SCENE ; 1. Making a Difference ; 2. Building on the National Context ; PART II: THE BUILDING BLOCKS ; 3. Transforming Strategy ; 4. Managing Employment Relations ; 5. Innovating Beyond the Steady State ; 6. Measuring Performance in Innovative Firms ; PART III: KEY ISSUES ; 7. Adopting and Adapting Promising Practices ; 8. Learning in Organizations ; 9. Making Intelligent Decisions ; 10. Cooperating across Boundaries ; 11. Overcoming Busyness ; 12. Taking the First Steps

`Conventional wisdom suggests that economic competitiveness is assured simply through deregulation and getting government out of the economy. The evidence suggests, however, that what organizational leaders do matters a great deal for both countries and companies. This book speaks to the necessary mind set and activities of managers who want to see their organizations thrive in a world of increasing global competition around innovation and ideas. ' Jeffrey Pfeffer, Professor, Stanford Business School and co-author of Hard Facts, Dangerous Half-Truths, and Total Nonsense: Profiting from Evidence-Based Management `Clarity and good sense are surprisingly rare qualities in a book on corporate management. This book combines both, and will help managers to think more clearly about what they are trying to achieve, and policy-makers to understand better why some companies thrive and others fail.' Frances Cairncross, Chair, Economic and Social Research Council and Rector, Exeter College, Oxford `Managers make less difference to businesses than they - or the public - think. This book explains why - and what can be done about it.' John Kay, author of The Foundations of Corporate Success `'The book is a lucid and powerful exposition of how the exceptional manager of its title should go about this task.'' Robert Bruce, Accountancy `packed with constructive ideas' Director

The Exceptional Manager is the latest thinking from leading management and economics scholars on how management practice can improve international economic performance Encourages managers to go beyond policy prescription to make a difference Focuses on employment relations, managing innovation, measuring performance, organizational learning, decision-making, time management, and strategy

Rick Delbridge is Professor of Organizational Analysis at Cardiff Business School. His research areas include work organization, workplace and inter-organizational relations and the management of innovation. His most recent projects include 'High performance manufacturing and the learning factory' (funded by the EPSRC), 'Trade unions and the representation of non-standard workers' (funded by the ESRC) and 'Learning companies: developing innovative potential of Welsh manufacturing SMEs' (funded by the European Regional Development Fund). He is the author of Life on the Line in Contemporary Manufacturing (OUP, 1998), co-editor of the Routledge book series Studies in Employment Relations and Associate Editor of the journal Organization. Lynda Gratton is Professor of Management Practice at the London Business School where she directs the school's executive programme, 'Human Resource Strategy in Transforming Organisations'. Between 1992 and 2002 Lynda led The Leading Edge Research Consortium, a major research initiative involving companies such as Hewlett Packard, Citibank, BT and GlaxoSmithKline. The results of this research were published in Strategic Human Resource Management: Corporate Rhetoric and Human Reality (OUP, 2000). In 2002 she published Living Strategy: Putting People at the Heart of Corporate Purpose (FT Prentice Hall). This book was voted one of the 20 most influential books by American CEOs and has been translated into eight languages. Her most recent book is The Democratic Enterprise (FT Prentice Hall, 2004). She is a member of the board of The American Human Resource Planning Society, and sits on the advisory board of two American companies. Gerry Johnson is Professor of Strategic Management at the University of Strathclyde Graduate School of Business in Glasgow. His research interests focus on management processes of strategy development and strategic change. Past research has included work on the links between strategy development and organizational culture and cognition; and micro aspects of institutional change. Current work is increasingly concerned with the links between major strategic issues and everyday, often routine, activities and practices in organisations; and the development of an international network of scholars addressing this agenda. He has published a number of books and written numerous papers in the field of Strategic Management. Exploring Corporate Strategy (FT Prentice Hall, 2004), of which he is co-author, is the best selling text on Strategy in Europe and regularly appears in the Top 10 Business Books in the UK.

The Exceptional Manager is the latest thinking from leading management and economics scholars on how management practice can improve international economic performance Encourages managers to go beyond policy prescription to make a difference Focuses on employment relations, managing innovation, measuring performance, organizational learning, decision-making, time management, and strategy