As we enter a new millennium of leadership, the rules of the game have not only changed they are constantly changing. How can an organization hope to survive when the environment in which it is doing business is continually confronted by broadening competition, shorter product cycle times, old paradigm/new paradigm leadership questions, and an increasingly high premium on available time? The answer is surprisingly not about working more, harder, or faster. It is actually conveyed in the title of this book. The secret of a winning culture is the building of high-performance teams. Is that a secret? Probably not. The real secret this book reveals, then, is in how to make it happen.

The Secret of a Winning Culture: Building High-Performance Teams sets forth a proven series of principles and processes that ensures an organization's success when leaders change, mergers and acquisitions join cultures, change initiatives are introduced, and faster simply isn't enough. Putting these ideas into action unlocks the power of high performance teams, which in turn, produces high performance organizations.

The secret to building high-performance teams ultimately lies in the health of the organizational culture. Are people throughout the company feeling energized, motivated, able to grow personally and professionally? Or are they overstressed, overworked, focused solely on numbers and results?

This book outlines how to realize a set of healthy working principles for organizational change and life-effectiveness that both produces results and is inherently fulfilling. Change is not about to go away, which is why the message of The Secret of a Winning Culture: Building High-Performance Teams is so valuable —to ensure today's corporate cultures are still thriving tomorrow.

Leaders on Leading: Insights from the Field by Senn, Larry
Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don't by Collins, James
Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes are High by Patterson, Kerry
First, Break All the Rules: What the World's Greatest Managers Do Differently by Buckingham, Marcus

Practical, wise, comprehensive and infused with clear vision
This slim volume has packed so many practical and wise ideas, examples and tools gleaned from "20 years of consulting with hundreds of organizations and over 200,000 managers." It is worth repeated readings and reference. The authors have focused on the key components of building winning culture and high-performance teams. Many other approaches to management change fall short because they failed to integrate or align strategies, structures with culture. Different phases in reshaping the corporate culture are clearly explained and illustrated. There are many useful questions, measurement tools, quotes, lists of attributes, guiding behaviors for teamwork and tables of comparison. The listing of "Ineffectual Organizational Habits (old culture) in contrast to "High Performance Behaviors (desired culture) on p. 51, the "high-performance pyramid" chart on p. 136 and the table of "Transitions Toward Leadership in 21st Century" on p. 172 alone are already worth the price of the book. There is much more. For example: a quote from Jack Welch, CEO of GE, General Electric. "Our job is to provide a culture in which people can flourish and reach their dreams--in which they can be all they want to be." (p. 92)