Overview

“This is the management book of the year. Clear, powerful and urgent, it's a must read for anyone who cares about where they work and how they work.”  —Seth Godin, author of This is Marketing   “This book is a breath of fresh air. Read it now, and make sure your boss does too.”  —Adam Grant, New York Times bestselling author of Give and Take, Originals, and Option B with Sheryl Sandberg When fast-scaling startups and global organizations get stuck, they call Aaron Dignan. In this book, he reveals his proven approach for eliminating red tape, dissolving bureaucracy, and doing the best work of your life. He’s found that nearly everyone, from Wall Street to Silicon Valley, points to the same frustrations: lack of trust, bottlenecks in decision making, siloed functions and teams, meeting and email overload, tiresome budgeting, short-term thinking, and more. Is there any hope for a solution? Haven’t countless business gurus promised the answer, yet changed almost nothing about the way we work? That’s because we fail to recognize that organizations aren’t machines to be predicted and controlled. They’re complex human systems full of potential waiting to be released. Dignan says you can’t fix a team, department, or organization by tinkering around the edges. Over the years, he has helped his clients completely reinvent their operating systems—the fundamental principles and practices that shape their culture—with extraordinary success. Imagine a bank that abandoned traditional budgeting, only to outperform its competition for decades. An appliance manufacturer that divided itself into 2,000 autonomous teams, resulting not in chaos but rapid growth. A healthcare provider with an HQ of just 50 people supporting over 14,000 people in the field—that is named the “best place to work” year after year. And even a team that saved $3 million per year by cancelling one monthly meeting. Their stories may sound improbable, but in Brave New Work you’ll learn exactly how they and other organizations are inventing a smarter, healthier, and more effective way to work. Not through top down mandates, but through a groundswell of autonomy, trust, and transparency. Whether you lead a team of ten or ten thousand, improving your operating system is the single most powerful thing you can do. The only question is, are you ready?

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9780525536208

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Reviews

This is the management book of the year. Clear, powerful and urgent, it's a must read for anyone who cares about where they work and how they work. --Seth Godin, author of This is Marketing I am now a convert. Aaron sums up all the crazy ideas about how to create teams and companies that maximize their potential by decentralizing their power--a once idealist notion that is now possible and essential. For a book that might start a revolution, it's surprisingly practical and undogmatic. There's no fluff--it's all meat, and real news. I could think of dozens of people I know who I now want to read and study it. --Kevin Kelly, author of The Inevitable, and cofounder, Wired magazine This book is a breath of fresh air. Aaron Dignan offers a bold, ennobling vision for a world of work that enhances our dignity and freedom rather than degrading and constraining us. Read it now, and make sure your boss does too. --Adam Grant, New York Times bestselling author of Give and Take, Originals, and Option B with Sheryl Sandberg The one-size-fits-all monoculture is a thing of the past. Brave New Work shows us how to embrace the oh-so-human complexity of our organizations--and discover a new way of working that makes room for the many styles, perspectives, needs, and gifts trapped inside them. --Susan Cain, author of Quiet and Quiet Power, curator of Quiet Revolution Complexity conscious. People positive. These words from Aaron's book keep ringing in my ears as I work. He reframes the way we see companies and the way we see each other inside them, and gives us practical tools to transform ourselves and our environments. Whether you lead a company, work at one, or imagine yourself founding one someday, read this book immediately and start an evolution. --Miguel McKelvey, cofounder, WeWork If you're trying to create a world-changing culture, reading Brave New Work should be your next move. Aaron's simple, counterintuitive approach will help you get out of your own way, eliminate bureaucracy, and awaken the humanity within. --Scott Harrison, founder, charity: water, and author of Thirst Human beings can't thrive in a work culture that uses burnout and 'being always on' as proxies for dedication and success. In Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan shows us that, in fact, workplaces that empower people to take care of themselves are far more likely to deliver sustainable performance and happiness. --Arianna Huffington, Founder & CEO, Thrive Global We tend to look for answers by looking reflectively backwards--it's what we've all been taught in school. But Dignan insists that the best practices of the past no longer work because the bureaucracies of existing organizations have been defeated by new technologies. Instead we can only find those answers by living in the now the way a new breed of organization is already beginning to master. --John Maeda, Head of Computational Design & Inclusion, Automattic I really never believed in any of this organizational stuff until I saw Aaron Dignan at work. He can help almost any dysfunctional group find common purpose, discern the simple patterns underlying the most complex situations, and guide wayward organizations back to their core values. Most impressively, he can translate all that into language even a businessperson can understand and enjoy. --Douglas Rushkoff, author of Team Human and Present Shock This book will teach you to wrestle and win against workplace bureaucracy. Aaron cuts to the core of what makes teams successful by realigning hearts, minds, and egos. He always sparks better outcomes, and his book will be just the spark you need to get started. --Beth Comstock, author of Imagine It Forward, and former Vice Chair, GE

This is the management book of the year. Clear, powerful and urgent, it's a must read for anyone who cares about where they work and how they work. --Seth Godin, author of This is Marketing I am now a convert. Aaron sums up all the crazy ideas about how to create teams and companies that maximize their potential by decentralizing their power--a once idealist notion that is now possible and essential. For a book that might start a revolution, it's surprisingly practical and undogmatic. There's no fluff--it's all meat, and real news. I could think of dozens of people I know who I now want to read and study it. --Kevin Kelly, author of The Inevitable, and cofounder, Wired magazine This book is a breath of fresh air. Aaron Dignan offers a bold, ennobling vision for a world of work that enhances our dignity and freedom rather than degrading and constraining us. Read it now, and make sure your boss does too. --Adam Grant, New York Times bestselling author of Give and Take, Originals, and Option B with Sheryl Sandberg The one-size-fits-all monoculture is a thing of the past. Brave New Work shows us how to embrace the oh-so-human complexity of our organizations--and discover a new way of working that makes room for the many styles, perspectives, needs, and gifts trapped inside them. --Susan Cain, author of Quiet and Quiet Power, curator of Quiet Revolution If you're trying to create a world-changing culture, reading Brave New Work should be your next move. Aaron's simple, counterintuitive approach will help you get out of your own way, eliminate bureaucracy, and awaken the humanity within. --Scott Harrison, founder, charity: water, and author of Thirst Human beings can't thrive in a work culture that uses burnout and 'being always on' as proxies for dedication and success. In Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan shows us that, in fact, workplaces that empower people to take care of themselves are far more likely to deliver sustainable performance and happiness. --Arianna Huffington, Founder & CEO, Thrive Global We tend to look for answers by looking reflectively backwards--it's what we've all been taught in school. But Dignan insists that the best practices of the past no longer work because the bureaucracies of existing organizations have been defeated by new technologies. Instead we can only find those answers by living in the now the way a new breed of organization is already beginning to master. --John Maeda, Head of Computational Design & Inclusion, Automattic I really never believed in any of this organizational stuff until I saw Aaron Dignan at work. He can help almost any dysfunctional group find common purpose, discern the simple patterns underlying the most complex situations, and guide wayward organizations back to their core values. Most impressively, he can translate all that into language even a businessperson can understand and enjoy. --Douglas Rushkoff, author of Team Human and Present Shock This book will teach you to wrestle and win against workplace bureaucracy. Aaron cuts to the core of what makes teams successful by realigning hearts, minds, and egos. He always sparks better outcomes, and his book will be just the spark you need to get started. --Beth Comstock, author of Imagine It Forward, and former Vice Chair, GE

Author Information

Aaron Dignan is the founder of The Ready, an organization design and transformation firm that helps institutions like Johnson & Johnson, Charles Schwab, Kaplan, Microsoft, Lloyds Bank, Citibank, Edelman, Airbnb, Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum, and charity: water change the way they work. He is a cofounder of responsive.org, an investor in purpose-driven startups, and a friend to misfit toys. He lives in Colorado with his wife and son.

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