BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Harvard Business Review Press (HBR Press) announced today the publication of Results: Getting Beyond Politics to Get Important Work Done by Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker and long-time colleague Steve Kadish. Available in stores and at retailers around the world, Results is a much-needed implementation guide for anyone in public service, as well as for leaders and managers in large organizations hamstrung by bureaucracy and politics.
In Results, Governor Baker, one of the most popular governors in the US, and Kadish, Baker’s first chief of staff, and a former CFO and COO who has held other senior leadership roles in both the public and the private sectors, have put together the practices they have developed over their nearly three decades of working together. With a broad range of examples from health care, transportation, child welfare, Covid, and more, they show how to move from identifying problems to achieving results in a way that bridges divides instead of exacerbating them through a four-part framework: People are Policy, Follow the Facts, Focus on How, and Push for Results.
Written for current leaders and managers as well as aspiring executives especially in the public sector, Baker and Kadish aim to show that government can in fact do good work—and to provide public servants a customized set of ideas that pay attention to the unique dynamics of their work. “Our focus has been on the public sector—on pragmatic ways to get things done in government and in nonprofit organizations,” they write. “We had experienced how government operates and believed that it could, and should, function better—not just for those who have special access, but for everyone.”
“Results is about what sets leaders, good leaders, apart—and that’s great execution,” said Melinda Merino, Editorial Director of HBR Press. “You won’t help anyone with your brilliant plans and ideas if you can’t get them implemented. This book shows you how to do that.”
Baker and Kadish also aspire to renew people’s faith in public service. As they write, “A core mission of government is to provide strong public services, and results are inherently rewarding: they fulfill the purpose of government itself, they make lives better, and they help restore our faith in democracy.” In the many stories throughout the book, Baker and Kadish demonstrate how government can be an engine of positive change and an example of effective operation, not just a hopeless bureaucracy.
“The authors’ execution framework provides leaders with a common vocabulary for leading diverse teams with competing goals and agendas. But at its core, Results is about restoring people’s faith in government,” said Merino. “The rare combination of idealism and pragmatism in the book makes it unique and, we hope, inspires leaders in all contexts to raise their game, be their best, and get their important work done.”
Charlie Baker is Governor of Massachusetts. He has served as CEO of Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, a top-performing health-care insurance provider, and twice as Commonwealth of Massachusetts Cabinet Secretary leading the Executive Office of Health and Human Services and the Executive Office of Administration and Finance.
Steve Kadish has been CFO and COO, and held other senior leadership roles in health care and higher education in both the public and the private sectors. He served as Governor Baker’s first chief of staff. Steve is a senior research fellow at Harvard Kennedy School’s Taubman Center for State and Local Government.