cover image Managing at the Speed of Change: How Resilient Managers Succeed and Prosper Where Others Fail

Managing at the Speed of Change: How Resilient Managers Succeed and Prosper Where Others Fail

Daryl R. Conner. Random House, $28 (320pp) ISBN 978-0-679-40684-6

In this clinical study cum management guide, psychologist and business lecturer Conner discusses change as an inevitable, often disorienting element of the modern worker's business life. Citing the dysfunction likely to occur among employees facing corporate-merger upheavals or new high-tech equipment, he defines ``resilience'' as essential to viewing change as an ``understandable and manageable process.'' Conner charts a system of ``support patterns'' for achieving transitions at ``appropriate'' speed. Also essential to successful navigation of change, he observes, is ``interdependent synergy,'' exemplifed by the cooperation of a foxhole gunner and his ammo-toting partner, at every corporate level. In his book of wise counsel, Conner also points out that true resilience means ``never being surprised that you are surprised.'' 25,000 first printing. (Jan.)