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Maestro: A Surprising Story About Leading by Listening

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A conductor reveals powerful leadership lessons by explaining the inner workings of a symphony orchestra

Roger Nierenberg, a veteran conductor, is the creator of The Music Paradigm, a unique program that invites people to sit INSIDE a professional symphony orchestra as the musicians and conductor solve problems together.

He captures that experience in A Surprising Story about Leading by Listening , a parable about a rising executive tough challenges. The narrator befriends an orchestra conductor and is inspired to think about leadership and communication in an entirely new way.

For

• A maestro doesn't micromanage, but encourages others to develop their own solutions. There's a big difference between conducting and trying to play all the instruments.

• A maestro helps people feel ownership of the whole piece, not just their individual parts.

• A maestro leads by listening. When people sense genuine open-mindedness, they offer more of their talent. If not, they get defensive and hold back their best ideas.

• Truly great leaders, whether conductors striving for perfect harmony or CEOs reaching for excellence, act with a vision of their organization at its best.

For more information, www.MaestroBook.com

128 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2009

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246 people want to read

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Roger Nierenberg

5 books1 follower

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5 stars
65 (34%)
4 stars
62 (32%)
3 stars
40 (21%)
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15 (7%)
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6 (3%)
Displaying 1 - 30 of 42 reviews
Profile Image for Tim Chavel.
249 reviews80 followers
July 6, 2015
What a wonderful book on leadership. I have never heard of the author of the book, but saw it in a second hand store and the title looked interesting. The book it an easy read but has many good principles that apply to leadership and life. The book is written in story form. A business man learns many business principles from watching and talking with a conductor of an orchestra. I have shared serval below. I know those that enjoy music will especially enjoy this book.

A maestro doesn't micromanage. Instead of demanding mindless obedience, he communicates a larger vision, inviting people to draw upon the full range of their talents.

A maestro enables people to feel ownership of the whole piece, not just their individual parts.

A maestro leads by listening. When people sense an open and receptive ear, they offer more of their full potential. If not, they get defensive and hold back their best ideas.

It is a wonderful thing to project confidence and authority. But your main channel of influence with an orchestra is your listening. Every time you come to the podium, ask yourself," Am I really hearing what's going on in this room? Am I being affected by what I'm hearing?" If not. then you must take some of your attention away from what you yourself are doing, and focus it on the people you're here to lead.

As the conductor says, "Eventually I realized that a great performance would happen only when the motivation sprang as much from them as from me. I learned to see my job as simply creating an environment where that could happen. Once I learned to engage their artistry, everything felt so much easier."

If a leader wants his people to truly own the work, then he has to be willing to let go of some control.

You can force compliance with your directions, you can require obedience, but you can't mandate enthusiasm, creativity, fresh thinking, or inspiration. If you value that, then people need to feel ownership of the work, and the leader must cede some control to them.

Everything I do is aimed at creating a feeling of community and shared responsibility.

The conductor's job is to create success. It really falls upon him to stretch his reality until it encompasses that of the players, too.

The conductor needs to understand the reality from the chairs as well.

If a conductor wants them to play with unity then he must stretch his imagination to embrace their reality. That's what elicits the kind of cooperation and trust that invites them to get interested in the unique perspective the podium offers.

My (podium) position allowed me to see what each part contributed to the whole. The members of the team, however, were surprisingly unaware of the support they received from others, but hyperaware of any threat posed by the invisible activity in another building or wing.

Certain problems can be solved most easily from the chair, but others require the podium view.

One's first task is not to stamp one's own personality on everything, at whatever cost, but to listen.

It is a wonderful thing to project confidence and authority. But your main channel of influence with an orchestra is your listening.

Every time you come to the podium, ask yourself, "Am I really hearing what's going on in this room? Am I being affected by what I'm hearing? If not, then you must take some of your attention away from what you yourself are doing, and focus it on the people you're here to lead. [This quote I listed twice on purpose]

It's important to make a distinction between problems that are the musicians can best solve themselves, and problems that involve collaboration and teamwork. When your baton undertakes to solve every problem that might arise, you actually decrease the orchestra's listening ability.

I want to acquaint you with how to lead when the orchestra already knows the music and doesn't need to be taught. That is the most difficult type of leadership to learn. They still need direction if they're ever to perform to their potential, but the direction must be more visionary and strategic and less about helping them manage the details.

As leaders we should strive to exert the minimum necessary intervention.

A leader must commit to that which has not happened.

It is only in anticipating, and committing to what will happen next, that any leadership can take place.

When you have a group that's well disciplined in teamwork, it liberates you to do your best.

It doesn't matter how good you sound if you don't match the others who are playing with you.

Leadership doesn't make a small difference, it makes all the difference in the world.

If you're a leader you can elevate your team to heights beyond their wildest imagination.

Here is a website for more information about this type of leadership music paradigm

Profile Image for David Hutchens.
Author 22 books20 followers
March 16, 2022
I was surprised how much I loved this book. I read a lot of business books written in the “fable” format and in most cases the fable doesn’t really add to the insights. In Maestro, the fable approach is essential to understanding — and also “feeling" — the the impact of the conductor’s lessons. Lots of rich insights into a “conductor’s” role in leading collaboration. Bravo.
93 reviews
November 17, 2019
Maestro is an excellent leadership book on the level of Who Moved My Cheese. It speaks about leadership from the perspective of being a conductor in a symphony. It does a nice job in the
last chapters of the book to show how this process can be used in everyday businesses and organizations too. The book follows the interactions of a business leader and a conductor. I think one of the strongest points is the importance of creating and having a vision for your business and
organization and being sure that everyone in your business and organization know and understand that vision. The book gave me some excellent insights to how my church choral director artistically leads us now and it can be used in all organizations. In your first reading, you may not understand the points the book is trying to read, but with some review and re-reading it will become more apparent. For others, the points the will be clear the first time. It is another leadership book, but I really feel it has some excellent ideas for all of us to use.
Profile Image for Rosie.
529 reviews1 follower
December 27, 2019
This was part of an extra credit for my Global Healthcare Systems class this past semester. The title caught my attention because I was in band in junior high and high school, so I decided to give it a go.

This fictional story follows a business leader trying to get his company to cooperate and function as a team to the best of their ability. He sits in on several orchestra rehearsals and has the opportunity to talk with the orchestra's maestro. This book hones on in the importance of listening to the players involved in each part of the orchestra (or team) in order to get the desired outcome you want. It's an interesting take on leadership but something that can still be useful in our fast-paced on-the-go culture.
Profile Image for Psyckers.
246 reviews3 followers
April 18, 2023
Is it strange to have a veteran conductor of Orchestras write a business book on leadership? Yes it is.
Does it work out? Absolutely.
This book showcases many of the issues that face leaders in business today and by applying good listening skills you can confront these issues and form harmony in your organisation.
I was surprised at how engrossing this book is as it follows the story of a business leader with issues throughout the organisation and how befriending the 'Maestro' and listening in to orchestra sessions, made him see sense in the issues of the organisation and 'his way'.
It is a captivating read that we all can find commonalities in the issues discussed and how to overcome them through applying some good listening skills.
6 reviews
April 18, 2020
Surprising

I chose this book because it was recommended on a social media site for band directors. While I don’t think it gave me a lot for teaching middle school band it really made me think about leadership, and the role of a conductor but also about leadership outside of the music world. I come from a family with quite a few business owners and I’m not sure they ever thought or even think of business in this way. Principals, business leaders, musicians and conductors can all find value in this book. At least some thought provocation anyway.
Profile Image for Thebruce1314.
955 reviews5 followers
July 29, 2020
Nierenberg's idea of applying the wisdom of conducting to business scenarios is not a new one, but he does a very good job of describing the connections between the two fields in this parable. While I'm not sure that transformational leadership can be learned from a book, this might be a good starting point, keeping in mind that Nierenberg's ulterior motive in writing this is to hawk his "Music Paradigm" program for organizational training.
Five stars because it directly relates to my research, and it is short and accessible. :)
490 reviews3 followers
May 1, 2021
This is an interesting leadership book. Most of it is the build up to the last two chapters which is the meat of what the author is trying to say. I have this book such a low star rating because it is quite contrived. The story is a fiction although the events happened. One doesn’t hear about it until one reads the acknowledgements. However. You cannot understand the last two paragraphs until you have gone through the whole story.
Profile Image for Scott Vandrick.
270 reviews1 follower
March 7, 2022
The story of an experience that turned into a conference session that turned into a business. If you’ve participated in any collaborative artform – music, theater, dance – this quick tale is a comforting reminder of why your time (earning your college degree!) was so well spent as collaborative art translates across all aspects of business. There’s nothing earth-shattering here, and it feels a bit like a sales pitch, but it's assuring to read about the value of art across many disciplines.
Profile Image for Chakla.
21 reviews
June 19, 2022
Such a great quick read. I had many takeaways. Interesting comparison of music and leading an orchestra to business and leading an organization. It is about the focus and energy that leaders must ground themselves in. Just looking at the transactions and individual perspectives with no passion and vision will lead to a lot of isolated points of frustration. It takes a maestro/leader to provide the aligned purpose that can be the catalyst to a lifelong masterpiece.
Profile Image for Richard Gombert.
Author 1 book20 followers
May 11, 2017
Another worthless business book.
Fiction stories serve no purpose in illustrating business practices. If you have a good management idea, find a real world example.
These stories of the beleaguered exec finding enlightenment from an unlikely mystic source are just BS.
You can get just as much management wisdom for "Wuthering Heights" and "Moby Dick"/
Profile Image for Michael Levitt.
Author 2 books2 followers
May 3, 2020
Maestro Roger Nierenberg's book is a MUST HAVE for every leader. The lessons of conducting an orchestra and leading organizations are more common than you would think. The book provides so many insights and lessons, that your leadership will dramatically improve, by implementing the tips shared in the book.

Bravo!
Profile Image for Patricia J.
32 reviews
September 8, 2023
An easy read and thought provoking. Having played in the string section of my high school orchestra decades ago, I could easily imagine the feelings the author was trying to invoke. The entire book itself was an analogy of leading by listening, and I found it insightful and applicable to many social and managerial situations.
Profile Image for Sniffer.
39 reviews2 followers
February 25, 2021
Wow. This little book is so fascinating. It's one of the best example of giving a metaphorical of de facto experiences. This is the first time I get goose bumps while reading a book. It feels like I have unlocked the question that have been in my mind for so long.
Profile Image for Kevin Pinder.
44 reviews1 follower
October 16, 2021
I am not one who enjoys "self help" or business books. This was interesting and had some interesting points both on the business and music sides. The storyline was good but not to realistic.

I did listen to it on Audible at 1.7x speed. Quick read.

Profile Image for Victoria Poehlein.
65 reviews2 followers
February 9, 2024
Had to read this book for school. I wouldn’t have picked it up otherwise but it was a great book on leadership. Would definitely recommend to others looking to go into management or leadership careers.
36 reviews7 followers
December 6, 2017
nice perspective on leadership and shows leadership is about enabling collaboration and communities
67 reviews1 follower
March 4, 2021
You can see another point of view when it comes to leadership as a view of a maestro. Quite interesting to read.
1,358 reviews11 followers
April 6, 2021
A little heavy handed and little light at the same time somehow, but short and sweet, too. If you like allegory or Who Moved My Cheese, you'll like this.
Profile Image for Loy Machedo.
233 reviews215 followers
March 3, 2012
Introduction
With praise showered on this book from the likes of Marshall Goldsmith (NYT bestselling author of Succession and What Got You Here Won't Get You There) who exclaimed "Creative genius meets executive challenge in this unique and fascinating tale. Maestro is a must-read!" and Scott H. Heekin-Canedy, President & General Manager, The New York Times who said "I have twice experienced Roger Nierenberg's The Music Paradigm, an unparalleled leadership learning experience that has profoundly influenced me. Now Mr. Nierenberg has turned the experience into a wonderful parable that conveys in print his gift of insight for leading people and organizations", I was under the impression this was a book that would bring something new to the table or at least bring a refreshing feel to what I already know in a creative, interesting and thought-provoking manner.

Sadly, this was not the case.

Not only was it a boring read, the analogies were as predictable as watching a C-grade movie attempting to impress you with their stellar cast of amateur actors.

New Management Wisdom?
After reading the book, I asked myself what did I learn?
The Gap Theory?
The true listening abilities of a leader?
The drawbacks of micro-managing?
Delegation of authority & responsibility?
Accountability?
Or may be that I need to take my entire organization to an Orchestra and watch a conductor perform?

The whole book that drags you to the depth of despair is nothing but these 4 principles.
1. Have a clear and vibrant vision for your people's success
2. Listen carefully to your people
3. Translate your agenda into directions that can easily be understood and executed by the players.
4. It's not about you. It's about how the orchestra sounds under your direction.

So why go make the readers go through all the pages and pages of words just to get to this?

Roger Neirenberg may be a very accomplished conductor who has performed in the Americas and parts of Europe. However as an author, its plain and simple – he sucks. The only hope this book has is that may be this book could be offered to college students who know nothing of the corporate world to take it as study material. But given the boredom and predictable analogies one would have to painfully undergo, I presuppose most of them will end up going to sleep every time the musical notes of this book start flowing in the air.

Overall Opinion
An honest attempt at being creative and original in the business management world however a bad product in the end. And to those who put up false and misleading reviews – You should be ashamed of yourself. Remember - People are not idiots. The next time they are not going to value your opinion.

Overall Rating
Even for all the pain and boredom this book caused me, I will appreciate the creativity and honest effort of the author and give him a 1 out of 10.
179 reviews5 followers
June 29, 2012
What if their leaders produced a unifying vision for the future that they and everyone around them could embrace? A vision so deeply grounded in the company's mission that it redefined for everybody what the work was about. Pursuit of an overarching vision would uplift people's awareness beyond their day - to - day concerns to a discovery of new possibilities that become suddenly and brilliantly visible. What might we be like if I could inspire my people to invest in a future like that?

Maestro - was defined as master, teacher, tutor, or instructor. Italian friends definition " The maestro is the one who lays the foundation for learning, who teaches the principles and the values: the curiosity about the world, the confidence that education eventually leads to freedom, the courage to strive for something higher than just satisfying your appetite, the ideals that last throughout your life. That is the maestro."
Profile Image for Rob.
192 reviews
December 7, 2011
I'm putting this under philosophy because this is a philosophy of leadership. I love the principles this book brings to live through the use of music and orchestra. As a former band geek, I really appreciate how the author teaches about what it means to be a leader through the experiences of the orchestra. It is extremely important to be in tune with others, to truly listen and understand from their point of view, and to understand the true beauty and power that flows from the baton. The baton is no tool for manipulation. It is a tool to bring vision to life, to communicate that vision with a purpose, and to help everyone else remember what is happening in every other seat. This was a great book and very challenging as I think through what it means to be a leader in every aspect of my life.
Profile Image for Sharon.
Author 38 books397 followers
January 21, 2013
This was a very different take on leadership, and one that I wish more companies would consider.

The first-person narrator goes to visit an orchestra and, during the visit, starts to see things that the maestro/conductor does that might be helpful to him as a C-level officer. He gets some things wrong, of course, which allows for more opportunities to get it right.

The main "take away message" is the importance of getting everyone in on the maestro's vision instead of taking the sort of top-down "as from 10 AM today, this is your new behavior" approach with which most of us are far too familiar.

Nierenberg uses the orchestra as a metaphor for business in a way that resonates with me not only as a professional but as a musician. There are ways to apply the material in this book at all levels. Highly recommended.
Profile Image for Renée.
Author 5 books21 followers
January 2, 2011
While I found many of the concepts in this book interesting and intriguing, I was disappointed with it's presentation. On the sentence-level, the prose was flat and uninspired. And I would have liked to know that the main "character" in this was a composite of real world people. The maestro and the executive were presented in a way that they had the same voice on the page, making it difficult to sense any difference in the characterizations.

Despite my criticism of the prose and style, I thought the idea of business people learning from the orchestra quite interesting. I would recommend the book to those looking to implement real change in an organization as a way to consider how the arts can serve as a model for excellence.
Profile Image for Jennifer Johnston.
207 reviews
July 29, 2014
Received this book from my company after sitting in on one of the orchestra teaching sessions. While the live session was positive, I did not enjoy the book so much. It provided some leadership concepts not enough specifics on how to address them. And the writing was flat at times, tempting me to skip parts.. but I did not. I will give it 2 stars, primarily because the leadership concepts are correct, and I read the first part at a time that did remind me to step back from the "weeds" of a situation and remind my team of the larger vision. After that, I had high hopes for remainder of book, but was disappointed.
Profile Image for Phillip.
1 review
November 14, 2015
I recently attended the Elliott Masie's Learning 2015 conference and had the opportunity to experience Maestro Roger Nierenberg's The Music Paradigm. I read the book on my flight back from the conference, as it is an easy read. The concepts themselves may not be new; however, I found the way in which they could be demonstrated as quite interesting. Maybe it it was because I just saw the real life application of The Music Paradigm or maybe it was because I have a love for the arts, but I just enjoyed the book. It just spoke of a fresh perspective to me. Lastly, maybe I just enjoyed as it was one of the first books I have read in years.
191 reviews21 followers
June 8, 2010
Quick little read over Memorial Day while sitting in the north woods of Wisconsin. Parable format. Big take-away: Good leading, like good conducting, means getting the members of the team to listen well to one another so that the end product is a greater than the sum of the parts.

This is not a sophisticated read, but the metaphor is tremendously helpful. Really has me thinking this week.
Profile Image for Marc Byerley.
14 reviews
November 20, 2011
What a fantastic book about Leadership. It should definitely be on a must read book list for all Leaders. Enjoyed that it was a short simple read. I enjoy reading books on Leadership but get bogged down sometimes by the lengthy books that are written. I believe more books should be written in the range of 100-130 pages.
Profile Image for Helen.
21 reviews2 followers
July 1, 2012


A very interesting and insightful view into the business/ music worlds combined through their need for effective leadership. "some may view these two worlds as incongruous, but central to both business and music is the human capacity for communicating, working together, and self-actualization."~ Roger Niernberg creator of The Music Pardigm
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