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The Manager¹s Toolkit: The 13 Skills Managers Need to Succeed by Robert Morris

The Manager¹s Toolkit: The 13 Skills Managers Need to Succeed
Richard Luecke with Christopher Bartlett
Harvard Business School Press

Credit Richard Luecke with pulling together a wealth of information and counsel from various sources. He is also the author of several other books in the Harvard Business Essentials Series. In this instance, he was assisted by a subject advisor, Christopher Bartlett, the Thomas D. Casserly, Jr. Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration. Together, they have carefully organized the material as follows. Part I "addresses five basic but essential skills needed to build the the foundation of a powerful and high-performing manager" (e.g. setting goals that others will pursue). Part II moves on to more challenging skills (e.g. creating and supervising effective team-based initiatives). Then in Part III, Luecke and Bartlett focus on the specific financial tools that every mid- to higher-level manager should understand and learn to apply (e.g. budgeting, the ability to read and interpret financial statements, net present analysis and internal rate of return). I also urge readers to pay close attention to the "For Further Reading" section which can be found at the end of this book. In it, they are provided with references to recent books and articles -- many of them "classics" -- which offer additional material and unique insights into the various topics covered in the previous 16 chapters. I especially appreciate the "Key Topics Covered in This Chapter" and "Summing Up" sections which precede and follow each of the chapters. Luecke and Bartlett are to be commended for covering such a wide range of subjects and for doing so in depth. For most executives as well as for those now embarked on preparation for a career in business, this may well prove to be the single most valuable volume in the Harvard Business Essentials Series.