Predictive Leadership: Avoiding the 12 Critical Mistakes That Derail Growth-Hungry Companies

by Kirk Dando

Nothing masks issues and robs an organization of its full potential like success

That’s right! Most successful, growth-hungry companies begin to miss their projections or worse, not because demand is low or conditions are difficult, but simply because they don’t know how to predict, nurture, or even maintain their own growth and success. At each stage of growth, natural problems are glossed over in the scramble to expand, making the organization vulnerable to chaos, no matter how strong or expert its leaders. Most leaders feel isolated, pressured to build on earlier success and maintain total control – the perfect recipe for the 12 most common and critical mistakes to show up and slow or kill growth.

Kirk Dando, leadership and growth expert, CEO of Dando Advisors, calls these roadblocks the “12 Warning Signs of Success,” and has helped leaders across industries predict, prepare, and avoid them at every stage of growth. Predictive Leadership is rich with real-world stories, prescriptive advice on how to scale your business and limit the drama so you can unlock the growth and success you desire.

Maybe you had the right idea but hired the wrong person. Maybe you’re running into a leadership bottleneck, having trouble getting your team aligned, unknowingly incentivizing failure, or losing sight of your core values. Dando, known in leadership circles as the “Company Whisperer,” has encountered every one of these obstacles himself, as a C-level executive in a high-growth billion-dollar business. He knows firsthand that these moments of truth determine whether you can lead your company to become a strong, mature, and financially sustainable organization, or drift toward an uncertain future.

240 pages, Hardcover

First published May 27, 2014

Reviews

[Dave · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've seen much of Dando describes in action at several companies.

[Dana · Rating 4 out of 5]

I recently read a book on creative industry management where one of the major points was that instead of focusing on problem prevention, management should focus on enabling employees to become problem solvers. I wanted to read Kirk Dando’s “Predictive Leadership” to see the argument behind the opposite approach—management should focus on problem predicting/preventing instead of problem solving. It definitely makes a ton of sense in a non-creative context.

This book is wonderfully thorough with detailed explanations and many real-life examples. It also covers a wide range. There’s chapters dedicated to each of the different levels of growing companies (start-up, hyper-growth and market leader) and the problems typically encountered at these levels. There’s also chapters on the twelve warning signs that a company’s current success is going to lead to problems sooner or later. The methods for predicting/preventing future problems (and solving current problems) seem like they’d be achievable and effective.

I’ve read several business books, and this one contains a lot of perspectives and advice that I haven’t seen before. For example, Dando points out that management often goes unknowingly soft with their expectations on employees after a while, when their expectations should remain high permanently. If you have an employee that you’re not thrilled with, but who doesn’t seem bad enough to warrant firing, Dando suggests asking yourself, “If this employee interviewed for this position today, would I hire them again?” When Dando asks his clients this, the answer is often “no,” which is very telling. If someone couldn’t get past the interview stage again, why keep them now?

Overall, this book is well written and I’d recommend it to any business owner or anyone in management.

Note: I received an advanced reading copy in exchange for an honest review.

[Stephanie · Rating 1 out of 5]

I got this book from goodreads first reads. I actually read this book two times through in hopes that I was not at the right point in my careers to appreciate the information in the book. Unfortunately it didn't get any better on the second go around. There were a few useful thing (part 3 wasn't awful but it wasn't good enough to pull the rating up). The tone of voice was oozing bad infomercial vibes, there were too many needless italics, the graphics/charts were hard to read, and a gender studies class would shred this book. The whole beginning was really grating because it pretty much said that if you don't take anything away from this book you aren't trying hard enough with enough swaggering bravado it made you feel crummy and not empowered to learn. This book claims that it speaks to all businesses and upper management levels but that simply is just not the case. I don't know why I bothered giving it a second read to try and trick myself into thinking it was better than it actually was.

[Catherine · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a small business owner, I really enjoyed some of the points made in this book by Kirk Dando.

He helped me understand where my company is in it's growth business cycle

His message of 'Face the Truth and Take Action' is a good one and he makes the strong point of setting just a few goals - not many - at one time.

He helped me to see the obvious and simple and to stop being reactive as a problem solver and to be more predictive as a leader.

Very useful book for entrepreneurs and business leaders.

[Blanca Madrigal · Rating 3 out of 5]

I felt there was a slow start to the book, in which the writer mentioned a lot what we were about to learn and why it was important...waiting a while for it to get to the 'point'. But it got better. And although the recommendations are simple, leaders forget about the basics in managing a business; thus, this book was a refresher to basic principles leaders should be applying toward successfully managing and growing their business.

[Eric · Rating 5 out of 5]

I received this book as part of the goodreads giveaways program.

I reAlly enjoyed this book, and have already started implementing suggested actions within my department. I think that anyone in a leadership or management position should read this. The only critique I really have is that I wish version that focused on non-profits and higher Ed existed, as I really had to stretch to find some examples relevant to my work.

[Andrew Booth · Rating 5 out of 5]

First Reads Free Copy Winner: I'm excited to get this book! I can't wait to read it. I'll update this review once I've read it!

[Mujahid Aziz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great for young entrepreneurial minds or person looking to sharpen up on there Leadership skills...