Open-Book Management

"In open-book companies, people learn to follow the numbers and help make decisions. They learn to think and act like owners, like business people, and not like hired hands."

"In the new economy, the marketplace is more competitive?sometimes by orders of magnitude?than it used to be. "

"For a long time now, more and more of our jobs have involved processing data and exchanging information and tending to the needs or wishes of our fellow human beings. But the shift in the nature of work doesn't stop there."

"A company needs a mission, a strategy. But more than anything else it needs eager, willing employees, people who have a reason to care about their employer's prosperity and who know how to help it succeed."

"Without information and understanding, the pioneering companies believe, empowerment is just an empty word."

"Open-book management is a way of running a company that gets everyone focused on helping the business make money. Nothing more, nothing less."

"You put the numbers out there and teach people to understand them. You give people the chance to move whatever numbers they're able to affect."

"The beauty of open-book management is that it cuts a whole new channel, all at once. It works because it steps outside of the mindset we inherited from the last industrial revolution."

"Any company, large or small, should understand the connection between open-book management and its business objectives. That's the only good yard stick for measuring your success in implementing the philosophy."

"Get the information out there! Tell employees not only what they need to know to do their jobs effectively but how the division or the company as a whole is doing. That's the first step to open-book management."

"Companies in America have never expected their employees to understand the fundamental financial data of business."

"Open-book empowerment . . . is empowerment with brains, and with accountability. It means taking ownership of the numbers?forecasting them, tracking them, making them behave. It's like owning your own business. "

"Let everyone share in success. Give people an incentive to work hard, go the extra mile, use their brains as well as their hands."

"A good bonus or profit-sharing system rewards employees generously when their company does well. It also focuses their attention on balancing all the goals?so that the company can continue to do well. "