Robert H. Waterman Quotes

Robert H. Waterman Jr. is a non-fiction author and expert on business management practices.

He is best known as the co-author, with Tom Peters, of In Search of Excellence. Waterman currently directs his own company, The Waterman Group, Inc., after 21 years at the management consulting firm McKinsey & Company.

In Search of Excellence was published in 1982 and became a bestseller, gaining national exposure when a series of television specials based on the book and hosted by Waterman and Peters appeared on PBS. The primary idea espoused was that of solving business problems with as little business process overhead as possible, and empowering decision-makers at multiple levels of a company.

He is also the author of:

The Renewal Factor

Adhocracy: the Power to Change

What America Does Right . Wikipedia

✵ 1950

Robert H. Waterman: 6 quotes 0 likes

Famous Robert H. Waterman Quotes

“In today's business environment, more than in any preceding era, the only constant is change. Somehow there are organizations that effectively manage change, continuously adapting their bureaucracies, strategies, systems, products, and cultures to survive the shocks and prosper from the forces that decimate their competition. They move from strength to strength, adjusting to crises that bedevil others in their industry. They are masters of Renewal. No organization can maintain excellence without renewing. No organization can strive for excellence, or even attempt to improve, without the ability to renew.”

Robert H. Waterman

Source: The Renewal Factor, 1987, p. xv

“Any form of organization that cuts across normal bureaucratic lines to capture opportunities, solve problems, and get results. In an era of accelerating change, organizations, and national economies, most likely to succeed are those with the ability to adjust and adapt. Robert H. Waterman Jr., … shows how and what this sort of innovation must become a way of life for business organizations across the board. What is needed is an environment that fosters the use of an ad-hoc problem-solving technique, in effect an -adhocracy- that functions outside the often initiative-stifling bureaucracy”

Robert H. Waterman

Robert H. Waterman (1993), Adhocracy: The Power to Change. W.W. Norton ; Book summary

“True or false? "America is falling behind in world competition". The surprise answer is "false". Recent research on industrialized nations shows that American workers outproduce workers in Germany and France by 20 percent, workers in Britain by over 30 percent, and Japanese workers by over 60 percent. The reason has nothing to do with technology, worker attitude, or worker skill… [Looking] at some of the best American firms… [we can concluded] that the key to strategic advantage is organization: they are organized to focus on the things that motivate their own people, and organized to anticipate customer needs.”

Robert H. Waterman

Robert H. Waterman (1994). What America Does Right: Learning from Companies that Put People First. W.W. Norton; Book summary .

“Man is a maker of meanings in a world that sometimes seems without meaning. Few things help us find meaning more than a cause to believe in, better yet, about which to get excited. Renewing organizations seem to run on causes.”

Robert H. Waterman

Source: The Renewal Factor, 1987, p. 12

“Visible management attention, rather than management exhortation, gets things done. Action may start with the words, but it has to be backed by symbolic behavior that makes those words come alive.”

Robert H. Waterman

Source: The Renewal Factor, 1987, p. 11

“The renewing companies treat everyone as a source of creative input. What's most interesting is that they cannot be described as either democratically or autocratically managed. Their managers define the boundaries, and their people figure out the best way to do the job within those boundaries. They give up a measure of control in order to gain control over what counts - results”

Robert H. Waterman

Source: The Renewal Factor, 1987, p. 7

Similar authors

Frank Herbert photo

Frank Herbert 158

American writer

William Saroyan photo

William Saroyan 190

American writer

Ray Bradbury photo

Ray Bradbury 401

American writer

William Faulkner photo

William Faulkner 214

American writer

Julio Cortázar photo

Julio Cortázar 29

Argentinian writer

David Foster Wallace photo

David Foster Wallace 185

American fiction writer and essayist

Pearl S. Buck photo

Pearl S. Buck 95

American writer

Charles Bukowski photo

Charles Bukowski 555

American writer

Joseph Campbell photo

Joseph Campbell 140

American mythologist, writer and lecturer

Dale Carnegie photo

Dale Carnegie 98

American writer and lecturer