Ego Check: Why Executive Hubris is Wrecking Companies and Careers and How to Avoid the Trap

by Mathew Hayward

A former investment banker and venture capitalist, Hayward (Leeds School of Business, U. of Colorado, Boulder) explores the sources of false confidence among executives and specific approaches for their management. Following an examination of the roots of hubris, the text features case studies of failures and successes, including Apple Computer's Steve Jobs and John Sculley, Carly Fiorina at Hewlett-Packard, Warren Buffett at Berkshire Hathaway, eBay CEO Meg Whitman, a comparison of Scaled Composites and NASA, Vivendi CEO Jean Marie Messier, and Michael Dell of Dell Inc. Hayward identifies links between solid executive decision making and successful business outcomes, and offers frameworks and concepts allowing executives the benefits of a healthy ego without the dangerous excesses of executive hubris. Annotation ©2007 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Genres: Business

272 pages, Hardcover

First published January 2, 2007

Reviews

[Maxwell Hayward · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent review of well-known business leaders and an important message of humility in all walks of life.

[Kristin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very well researched and well thought-through study of what can happen to business leaders as a result of excessive pride. The author uses real world examples we are familiar with, such as Steve Jobs and Michael Dell, which keeps the reading intersting. He is very respectful in his analysis of their failures (there is no bashing here) and he goes on to point out what they learned from these experiences and how they have grown as a result. He maps these individual stories to frameworks he has developed to assist leaders at all levels in gauging their susceptibility to failure based on excessive pride. I got a lot out of this book and would recommend it to anyone in, or aspiring to, a leadership role in the workplace or elsewhere.

[Levent Bayindir · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the first book i have read from my "ego vs leadership" series. I don't want to comment much before reading remaining books.

As far as i see, the hypothesis proposed is supported with many examples of leaders from best silicon-valley companies. I believe every leader/human being should be aware of the effects of ego on his/her and others life. I can also clearly see similar ego mistakes in my life (Who does not have an ego :)).

Despite having many examples, the approach is not systematic enough in my opinion. But the book is obviously worth to read and can be used as a reference book for later use.