Thinking for a Living: How to Get Better Performances And Results from Knowledge Workers

by Thomas H. Davenport

Knowledge workers create the innovations and strategies that keep their firms competitive and the economy healthy. Yet, companies continue to manage this new breed of employee with techniques designed for the Industrial Age. As this critical sector of the workforce continues to increase in size and importance, that's a mistake that could cost companies their future. Thomas Davenport argues that knowledge workers are vastly different from other types of workers in their motivations, attitudes, and need for autonomy--and, so, they require different management techniques to improve their performance and productivity.

Based on extensive research involving over 100 companies and more than 600 knowledge workers, Thinking for a Living provides rich insights into how knowledge workers think, how they accomplish tasks, and what motivates them to excel. Davenport identifies four major categories of knowledge workers and presents a unique framework for matching specific types of workers with the management strategies that yield the greatest performance.

Written by the field's premier thought leader, Thinking for a Living reveals how to maximize the brain power that fuels organizational success. Thomas Davenport holds the President's Chair in Information Technology and Management at Babson College. He is director of research for Babson Executive Education; an Accenture Fellow; and author, co-author, or editor of nine books, including Working How Organizations Manage What They Know (HBS Press, 1997).

Genres: Business, Leadership, Management, Nonfiction, Audiobook, Professional Development, Education

240 pages, Hardcover

First published September 1, 2005

About the author

Tom Davenport holds the President's Chair in Information Technology and Management at Babson College. His books and articles on business process reengineering, knowledge management, attention management, knowledge worker productivity, and analytical competition helped to establish each of those business ideas. Over many years he's authored or co-authored nine books for Harvard Business Press, most recently Competing on Analytics: The New Science of Winning (2007) and Analytics at Work: Smarter Decisions, Better Results (2010). His byline has also appeared for publications such as Sloan Management Review, California Management Review, Financial Times, Information Week, CIO, and many others.

Davenport has an extensive background in research and has led research centers at Ernst & Young, McKinsey & Company, CSC Index, and the Accenture Institute of Strategic Change. Davenport holds a B.A. in sociology from Trinity University and M.A. and Ph.D. in sociology from Harvard University. For more from Tom Davenport, visit his website and follow his regular HBR blog.

Reviews

[Alexandra · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some interesting nuggets on how the best knowledge workers are those with the network that complements their skillset, who bounce ideas in the early stages. Also interesting that it used to be that managers were the supposed smartest workers in the era before knowledge work became as widespread as it is. Now the managers are almost necessarily not the most intellectual but the best at orchestrating and juggling moving parts/ people.

[Chris · Rating 3 out of 5]

I listened to the audio book and it is okay.

I recommend this book.

[max momot · Rating 5 out of 5]

Интересная и полезная книга про организацию работы интеллектуальных работников. Читается легко, есть много примеров из жизни и много интересных исследований. Книга больше заставляет задуматься, чем дает готовые ответы. Радует множественное упоминание Друкера, понимание важности качества результатов работы, разбор процессов и рассмотрение ИТ-решений. Понравился трезвый взгляд автора на желание многих руководителей жестко управлять интеллектуальными работниками.

[Jon Daiello · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a manager and leader of design, I am always on the lookout to understand the disciple better, so I can lead and facilitate designers better. This book was mentioned explores the importance of finding appropriate ways of managing knowledge work. Most of our management goals and principles are based on the pre-industrial revolution ideas about improving manual labor. Knowledge work is different. This book doesn’t give a whole lot of practical answers, but the psychological study does highlight the differences and some possible approaches to improve knowledge work. I intend to explore these in my leadership of design work.

[Libra1bk · Rating 3 out of 5]

I tried reading this book several times and although the references to other sources were solid the information was too broad throughout - including case studies with current statistics on this subject would have been interesting to read about.

[Cumberland BlueDevil · Rating 4 out of 5]

I got to this book a couple of decades late. While the emphasis on knowledge management is visionary Anna before its time, this book badly needs an update. There have been numerous models and research since this book that prove its ideas are on the right track.

[Steven Kolber · Rating 3 out of 5]

Was okay

[Marcelo Bahia · Rating 1 out of 5]

Terrible book. This was one of my worst reads of the past few months. This is one of those that bring you to the point of irritation while you’re reading it, especially because I had much higher expectations given the positive reviews on Amazon and the curriculum and background of the author.

What the book intends to do is to present the results of an extensive analysis on “knowledge workers”. This is a term created by Peter Drucker decades ago that referred to people who mainly dealt with information in the workplace. The problem is that the results and recommendations made by the author are simply too obvious, useless and naïve.

Not to say all of the content is bad. Occasionally the author presents a few bits of interesting data, or one example here and there of how some companies dealt with the problem in question. Aside from these rare points of the book, the value of the remaining 95% of the content is surely questionable.

The research presented was overly superficial, and all the chapters lacked any usable insight on the matter. I would expect that at least a few differentiated insights would come out of this book (I didn’t expect one to appear in every chapter), but I finished it with none. NONE. Instead, there are only obvious observations and conclusions, most of them so obvious that I’m sure that any trainee with less than one year of experience should be more than able to find out by himself. I really mean it!

In addition, at some points the author overvalues his advice, “upgrading” it to a category that is scientifically stronger than it really is. For example, when analyzing how to evaluate something done by a knowledge worker, he says that one useful “technique” is to put peers to evaluate it. TECHNIQUE! Come on, if you have spent at least one month in ANY workplace where human capital prevails, you’ll agree that this is the first thing that any reasonable person of any seniority would suggest under any such problem. For me this was the “I’m going to bang my head on the wall and tear these pages” moment of the book, but I’m sure that each of you could find others and would have the favorite ones of your own.

Maybe this book was written to target students with no professional experience and I’m being too harsh on it. But the book is so empty of content that even for newcomers there are other better readings on the subject out there.

[Andrea James · Rating 1 out of 5]

I think I must have bought this book because it was (positively!) referenced in another book and probably also because it was available cheaply on Amazon (and reviewed well there too). Of course, these days I value my time so this book fell into the category of "to be skimmed rather than savoured".

It's possible, though unlikely, that I may have given the book a two-star rating had I read it when it was published in 2005 but the book has not aged well so any hope it had of receiving that additional star evaporated with its "of-the-moment" observations and suggestions.

Coming across statements like "web-logging, or "blogging" as it's becoming known" adds to how antiquated things feel. This is not to say that I don't like or read older books. I'm currently reading Decision Power - written in 1992 - and most of its observations are useful and can still be applied today. I suppose I expected a book with a title like "thinking for a living" to have fundamental principles that will still hold 10 years on.

Oh well, on to the next book!

[Liam · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Fortunately, there is an answer to measuring the quality of knowledge work, although it's subjective. It involves determining a relevant peer group for the particular workers involved, and asking them what they think of the work. This technique has often been used, for example, in evaluating professors for promotion and tenure." (49)

"Every effort to change how work is done needs a dose of both process -- the design for how work is to be done -- and practice, an understanding of how individual workers respond to real work and accomplish their assigned tasks." (74)

"Many GE researchers and engineers have Six Sigma green or black belts and are experts in the application of statistical analysis to research and engineering processes, making the company perhaps the most advanced of all organizations in applying process management techniques to research." (78)

"Knowledge workers prefer closed offices, but seem to communicate better in open ones." (167)

"fast, flexible, focused, friendly, and fun" (preferred work places of knowledge workers, 199)

[Katherine · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm not a big fan of business-oriented books and would not have picked it up if I hadn't been asked to read it. But I did and I'm actually very happy that I did read it. I never thought of myself belonging to a specific type of worker and had never heard of the concept of "knowledge worker" but after reading this book, many things make more sense to me in terms of how I work and work dynamics in any place nowadays. Davenport does cover most characteristics of a knowledge worker, but if you're not in the corporate field, a lot of things are just not relevant or practical yet insightful. The best chapter for me was the last chapter, which talks about management. An extra chapter of bringing everything together might have been my suggestion to end the book, but maybe this is how business-oriented books end.

[Jay French · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nice as a summary but beginning to get dated. I had worked on similar topics in the mid 90s and this was not so different from what I found researching back then. I did find the description of embedding knowledge into systems to be interesting. Self-learning tools, like IBM's Watson, have come to the front since the writing and should change the descriptions here, but the book covers the difficulties in gathering knowledge for systems and keeping it fresh. And any book that talks about the spectacular personal benefits for people using Palm Pilots feels very dated now. Surprisingly, no mention of Lotus Agenda.

[Alex Jonas · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book did a good job of highlighting a very important issue in business today - the transition of manual labor to knowledge workers. However, it did a much better job of asking good questions than providing good answers, which I believe it purported to do. Some of the recommendations seem pretty useful, but there was also some less valuable content to wade through. If you're interested in the topic of how to improve and manage workers who think, rather than do, for a living, it's worth a read. Don't expect to be presented with any revelations, but you may have some of your own.

[Diane · Rating 1 out of 5]

What did I learn from this book? That managers are grossly overpaid, conspire to increase the length of meetings and reports far beyond any reasonable length, and could be replaced by any six year old with common sense.

This book contains perhaps ten pages of actual information. The rest is justification to the publisher.

[Marcus · Rating 2 out of 5]

Far from being a quintessential reading, it just adds up some input to the theme, but seemed to be too long for not taking you anywhere. I started with some expectations that were not accomplished at the end.

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book helped me understand how and why I work the way I do. It also helped me get the appreciation and support for a group of knowledge workers in the company I worked for so they could continue to contribute the "hard to evaluate" gifts they produce each and every day.

[Ryan Krishnan · Rating 1 out of 5]

Quite the snooze fest here... I listened to it on CD, and I literally did some research to make sure it wasn't read by a computer voice program. A lot of talk, not a lot of action; no real concrete ideas; not worth the time.

[Anne · Rating 2 out of 5]

There wasn't much beyond common sense in this book (but maybe that's typical for management books?) :)

[Corza · Rating 4 out of 5]

Love the first half of the book. It then tends to fade in the second half talking about some case studies that don't necessarily align with my situation.

[Maxey]

Just started this after it was recommended to me. So far, it's kind of snoozy, but it's non-fiction, so that's to be expected for me. I'll hang in there for a few chapters and then reassess.

[Jim · Rating 3 out of 5]

As this book tends to fall into the world of useless buzz words, it was a horrible mess of a book. With that said, the information contained within was good once you deciphered it.

[Georgina · Rating 1 out of 5]

Couldn't finish - probably should have read this back in 2006 when I first bought it....

[Valentina · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good topic, mediocre book.

[Major Doug · Rating 2 out of 5]

Listened to this book: material was dated [(c)2005]; not worth the time.

[Bridget · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting read for work. Gotta read up on Knowledge Management you know.

[Maciej · Rating 2 out of 5]

Boringly points out the obvious, and speculates inaccurately about upcoming technologies such as blogging. Very little of value.

[Glenn · Rating 3 out of 5]

An academic and thorough investigation of knowledge work, if a bit dry.

[Alberto Lopez · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really, really good! It may just be a bit too academic for most.

[Richard Gombert · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting Quote: "Programmers with bigger offices perform better."

[penny shima glanz]

Definitely showing its age.