People Succession: Lessons from Forward Thinking Executives in Middle-Market Companies

This book offers readers something they can’t find in today’s most popular business books: a practical, tested perspective and strategic planning process that works for the legions of companies that don’t have the resources of an Apple, GE, or P&G. Readers will gain a deep understanding of what strategy and strategic planning is; why it’s critical to their organization and their own success; and how to create, implement and sustain a strategy that literally turns vision into reality.

Executive teams are searching for the magic elixir of success. The appeal of such alchemical magic is obvious. If a company’s managers do just this one simple thing, or follow this simple, easy plan, they too can enjoy profit margins and stock prices just like the “it” company of the moment.

The process of successfully growing an organization is like mixing chemicals together to create a reaction. Ask the typical executive to name the most valuable tool in the process of creating a chemical reaction, and they’ll offer such answers as the quantity of certain chemicals, the quality of the lab facility, the combination of two or more elements and so on. That’s because we tend to be so rooted in tactical thinking that we miss the larger equation.

The reality is that the most important tool in creating the desired chemical reaction – or growing a company – is the formula that describes its “big picture” results.

The primary formula for strategy is simple enough:

(What + Why + How) → The Future
What do we want the company to look like in the future?
Why do we want to look like that?
How do we get there?
(What + Why + How) = Strategy

This strategic planning approach derives from the author’s own alchemist-like professional search to find the magic formula for transforming the value of companies.

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Several years ago, cardiologist Bob Carey, M.D., decided he wanted his grandchildren to understand how much he had learned over his 56-year career not from his colleagues or from medical school but from his patients and their caregivers. “I wanted to share their kindness and courage,” he explains. “I wanted to write stories about my patients so my 12 grandchildren could learn from them as I had.” His daughter shared what he had written to an author who encouraged Bob to realize a book. Now Dr. Carey’s dream has finally come true! “Patients Teach a Doctor About Life and Death: Tales from Fifty-Six Years of Practicing” is a compendium of detailed and inspiring personal vignettes culled from Bob’s experiences over half a century. Beginning with his early years at Boston University Medical School’s main teaching hospital (now called Boston Medical Center) in the early 1950s, Bob’s book recounts the story of his treating his very first patient, Gladys: “a tall lady with enlarged lymph nodes in her neck” originally diagnosed with Hodgkin’s disease. Though ultimately dying from heart disease and kidney failure, Gladys remained Bob’s patient for nearly two decades, teaching Bob that “one can never be absolutely certain of a person’s ultimate prognosis.” This lesson stayed with him throughout his many years of practice. After the initial introduction, “Patients Teach a Doctor About Life and Death” is divided into sections that describe his years in medical school, his military service in Okinawa, his years of medical residency as well as private practice, family experiences, time in China and extensive pro-bono work in South America. Each section conveys heartwarming stories from Dr. Carey’s unique point of view. A fellow doctor and friend R.A. Macdonald testifies that Bob’s book is the story of a doctor “who is a product of a largely bygone era… A time when doctors actually listened to their patients.” An absorbing read, “Patients Teach a Doctor About Life and Death” has much to say about how relationships work between doctors and patients from a medical standpoint as well as teaching us how curiosity and compassion play into successful outcomes. Proceeds of the book are being donated to a foundation established by Bob to provide scholarships for medical students to work with doctors in poor countries. Born in Arlington, Massachusetts in 1929, Bob Carey is a graduate of Harvard College and Boston University School of Medicine. In 1954 he married his high school sweetheart, Mary O’Neill, and the two went on to raise five children. In 1960 he joined a practice in Arlington, and later helped found Internist Inc., a group practice, in 1970. This practice joined Lahey Clinic in 1993 until Bob officially retired from medical practice in 1998. Since then, he has been teaching at BU and Harvard Medical School, and volunteering annually for pro bono medical service in Bolivia and Ecuador.

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