The Advantage

Author: Patrick Lencioni

This book is the result of an unexpected journey that began when I was just a child, perhaps eight or nine years old. My father was a very skilled salesman, but I remember him often coming home from work frustrated, complaining about how his company was run. I didn't know what management was, but I was sure my father shouldn't feel frustrated after dedicating ten hours of his time to work. Years later, I started working as a waiter in high school and a bank teller in college, and I got my first real glimpse into management. Still, I didn't understand everything it entailed. It was clear to me that some things that happened in the organization I worked for made sense, and others didn't, and that all those things had a real impact on my colleagues and the customers we served. After graduating from college, I joined a management consulting firm and thought I would finally figure out what management meant. Instead, I found myself doing data aggregation, data entry, data analysis, and a host of other data-related things. To be fair, the company taught me a lot about strategy, finance, and marketing, but not much about organizations and how they should be managed as a whole. But somehow, I became convinced that the biggest problem facing our clients, and their greatest opportunity for competitive advantage, wasn't really about strategy, finance, or marketing; it was something a little less tangible; something that seemed to be about how they ran their organizations. When I suggested looking into this, my bosses gently informed me that this was something our company didn't do for a living, which was ironic because we were a management consulting firm. But I was hooked and decided I had to change the focus of my career. I spent the next few years working in corporate America in the world of organizational behavior, development, or psychology; whatever you call it. I found it certainly interesting, but it was ultimately loose, disjointed, and overly academic. This bothered me because I knew there was something that needed to be understood and appreciated more widely. But something was missing. Context. Integration. Practicality. And so, a group of colleagues and I started our own company, and I began consulting and speaking about a practical approach to improving organizations. I have to admit that we were a little surprised by how quickly and enthusiastically our clients responded to our approach. There was definitely a need for it. Over time, it became clear that dozens of people working in all kinds of organizations, at all levels, were experiencing the same pain my father had, and they were thirsty for a better way. So I started writing books that took a practical approach to addressing various organizational dysfunction issues—teamwork, meetings, consistency, employee engagement—while my company's consulting service focused on integrating all those topics.