tom peters

Learning English   The Handy Guide to the Gurus of Management Charles Handy was, for many years, a professor at the London Business School. He is now an independent writer and broadcaster. He describes himself, these days, as a social philosopher.   Episode 4: Tom Peters   Listen to the radio programme in full   Download the complete script (pdf)     (Can't read pdf file? Get free Acrobat Reader) Highlights: Tom Peters is not a philosopher or a social historian like Peter Drucker. He no longer has any all-embracing theories of the world of organisations nor any formulas for change but he gets under the skin of an organisation. His first big book, 'In Search Of Excellence' came out in 1982 and made Tom a fashionable guru. The book looked at 43 successful companies and analysed the reasons for their success over twenty years. Peters and Waterman came up with: eight characteristics of excellence: - they were do-ers - they understood their clients' needs - they were independent and innovative - they believed in productivity through people - they were hands-on and value-driven - they only did what they did best - had a simple form and lean staff - and had a tight-loose structure and seven checkpoints for analysis, the Seven S Framework: Strategy, Structure and Systems, the so-called hard S's and Staff, Style, Shared Values and Skills, the so-called soft S's The trouble was that the 43 excellent companies did not stay excellent for long. Many, including the star of the book, the computer company IBM, faltered soon after. Peters apologised in his later books. The whole world of work, he realised, was changing. Ninety per cent of jobs, were likely to be completely transformed or eliminated in the next ten to twenty years and each of us would have to take control of our own destiny and look after ourselves. Peters predicted that women would be more and more important to organisations because they were better at the softer S factors in Peters' S Framework. Our next guru is a good friend of Tom Peters and shares his belief in the need to harness the talents and enthusiasms of the individual to the mission of the organisation. His name is Warren Bennis. Read Tom Peters' biography     Some useful business words: all-embracing including or covering every aspect of something gets under the skin understands the essential characteristics of something fashionable popular at a certain time do-ers people or organizations who do things or are active hands-on having practical experience, not just dealing with theory value-driven their main aim was to increase profits tight-loose structure they used tight control where necessary, and loose control where they could give people autonomy faltered became weak take control of our own destiny to decide and make things happen in one's life shares his belief he also believes in harness to use something     Links: BBC World Business Business Words in the News Other gurus The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites