We were given the award April 12 in the Banqueting House of Whitehall Palace in London, the site of the beheading of Charles I. The main hall where we were feted is the ancient throne room. High overhead is a fresco by Peter Paul Rubens.
People have asked me why us. My guess is that Booz-Allen & Financial Times wanted to soak up as much of the limelight for themselves as possible -- it was their money, after all. So I suspect they bypassed the really big names in business writing, and lifted up a handful of relative unknowns, like Harvey and me. A Drucker or Peters would have swamped the publicity boat with their own fame. Or, maybe they are losing their touch! In either case, we are terrifically complimented, and will do our part to make BA&H and FT look good.
So thank you, Andrea Pedolsky, editor, agent, and friend. And thank you Harvey, good buddy, collaborator, and team member. And thanks to all of you who encouraged us along the way.
The bad news is that Peterson's is giving up the idea of publishing trade books like ours, in the wake of being acquired by Thomson International. Thomson promises to deal fairly with our books, including next fall's WHY CHANGE DOESN'T WORK, which will rip the lid off organizational reinvention initiatives.
To order WHY TEAMS DON'T WORK, call Peterson's toll-free at 1-800-338-3282, or click here and order online.
And this is us. Mike on left.
Booz-Allen & Hamilton is an international management and technology consulting firm committed to helping senior management solve complex problems. This commitment has shaped the firm's values and professional practices since the firm was founded in 1914. Today, Booz-Allen & Hamilton provides services in strategy, systems, operations, and technology to clients on a global scale. This integrated service base, combined with specialized expertise in more than 20 industry practices, helps clients solve problems, seize opportunities, and achieve their objectives. One of the world's largest consulting firm, Booz-Allen & Hamilton serves clients in more than 75 countries. Clients include most of the largest industrial and service corporations in the world, the departments and agencies of the US federal government, and major institutions and government bodies around the globe.
Mike: "It was an incredible scene. We were led upstairs to the throne room of Whitehall Palace.
The ceiling was an amazing sixteen-part fresco by Rubens. I can not tell you what it was about, but
it had lots of the chubby cherubs, etc. The main speaker at lunch was Ad Artzt,
who earned quite a reputation as a driving executive as CEO and Chairman of Procter & Gamble. When the
global awards were given, people around us kept chatting. They didn't realize we didn't know if we won or not. My heart felt like it was about to pop."Harvey: "I met a lot of people from Booz-Allen & Hamilton. One of them told me that BAH was trying to move beyond the model of the consultant as a dazzling presenter, which had been their reputation for many years. The new model was of a consultant who really got involved with the problems of the client's organization -- a helper, a coach, someone who cared. And that was the message in WHY TEAMS DON'T WORK that resonated for them."
Mike: "If you think about it, the whole event was an interesting example of team dynamics. Here you had organizations with two very different cultures, teaming together to create something of mutual benefit, a business book award series. Here were the writing teams who had created the books, sitting around the tables, passing business cards around and making connections with one another's agents and publishers. And in the middle of it all was our book, WHY TEAMS DON'T WORK."
Harvey: "My greatest memory was after the ceremony. We had all been interviewed and photographed, and it was time to leave, but our limos hadn't shown up. It was raining. Noboru Konno, one-half of the team that wrote Intellectualizing Capability, the global winner in the management category, was standing out at the curb in the rain, trying to flag down a taxi with his award held high in the rain."
Mike: "We're hoping for great things from this. Since we're the only American book in print with living authors -- David Packard passed away the day he was awarded his regional prize -- we want to be of service to the award, while we promote our book."
Thank you, Booz-Allen & Hamilton!
Thank you, Financial Times!
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