The five minute MBA according to Wayne Brown: the very words will either send shivers up your spine or have you reaching out to grab this little book. True to form, Brown's advice is in-your-face, abrasive common sense.
He delivers the guts of an MBA translated into plain language. (Or his idea of the guts of an MBA.)
Brown is a stirrer full of energy and determination. His credentials for giving advice are solid: millions made through enterprises as diverse as engineering, property development, and clothing manufacture. More, he has15 years' experience sorting out health boards riddled with petty squabbles and waste.
This cut-to-the-chase MBA begins by ridiculing both the conventional MBA and the mature students' powers of concentration. Then away he goes with ten perfectly sensible rules of thumb that could save many an enterprise from constipation and many an executive from an embarrassing day in court.
So here's the 10-second MBA, to give you a taste.
- Always get on with the person with the money.
- Do something straight away, and fix mistakes now.
- Realistically accept where you are now, and agree where you want to be
- Behave as you expect staff to behave.
- When put in charge, take charge.
- Do the right thing.
- Constantly challenge everything, and ask any and every question.
- Devolve responsibility and accountability.
- Do whatever you have to do to deliver what you said you would deliver.
- Always ask, at all levels, 'How would this sound in court?'
3 comments
Apr 29, 2007 • Posted by rachel
Yes, this is certainly a case of having his cake and eating it too.
Apr 29, 2007 • Posted by Mike
Whilst the MBA in itself will not ever provide a silver bullet, I find it interesting and disappointing that a lot of older, baby boomer generation business men in NZ are so disparaging of the MBA. I’m unsure if Wayne has an MBA but if he does then perhaps he needs to bring himself up to speed with the current course content. Business has changed, we are now trading across national borders with ease and our competitors are increasingly global, not local. Perhaps the issue is not the qualification but the individuals that do it and their reasons why. As far as the content of Waynes book, interesting reading, however I find it equally interesting that he has chosen to make money off a title that trades upon the name of the qualification that he belittles. If he is right, that an MBA is more about running and managing a business than growing one, then he is in the right place in a government department. If he had spent more time ‘managing’ ADHB and less time writing a book about managaing, then perhaps the lab tests tender process would have been done properly.
Apr 28, 2007 • Posted by 52 »
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