How Did They Manage?: Leadership Secrets of History

If you could go back in time and ask any historical figure for advice on how best to manage your business and personnel, who would it be? Benjamin Franklin? Confucius? Moses? Hammurabi? Solomon? William Shakespeare? Queen Elizabeth I? Niccolo Machiavelli? Most of us think of business management as a phenomenon of the modern age. Nothing could be further from the truth. For as long as people have lived, worked, fought, played and prayed together, there has been a need for strong leadership and people management skills. Throughout history leaders have achieved success through time-tested managerial techniques. Daniel Diehl and Mark Donnelly have combed historical record to bring you some of the most time-honoured and tested managerial advice from nearly twenty historical figures spanning more than three millennia. This book contains the managerial acumen of religious leaders, philosophers, kings and despots, pirates and prophets, statesmen and industrialists. Their advice—presented in their own words through diaries, letter and legal codes—is sometimes drastic, occasionally humorous, always profound. With contemporary analysis and commentary from Diehl and Donnelly, How Did They Manage? provides timeless insights into human foibles and motivations, insights you can put to use in the modern workplace. Never before has the wisdom of the past been combined into such a useful, enjoyable and accessible form.