Doing What Matters

James Kilts recounts some of the issues he faced in leading Gillette, Nabisco, and Kraft as CEO during times of business challenge. He offers insights into his management style of focusing on fundamentals and the tasks at hand while maintaining a broad-based view of the future and acting decisively based on the best information available. He describes many of those challenges, illustrating the basics of his approach. Marc Cashman is a steady narrator who keeps the pace moving. He presents Kilts as a down-to-earth but intense leader with conviction in his philosophy and in his skills. Cashman's conversational style is easy to listen to and highlights the major themes. J.E.M. (c) AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine

July 23, 2007
In a business book that reads like a case study, turnaround artist and brand-builder Kilts walks managers and CEOs through the lessons he learned while resuscitating shaving-company Gillette. Having revived Nabisco, Kilts was planning to retire until famed investor Warren Buffett persuaded him to upgrade Gillette. With an analytical tone, Kilts describes how he moved the company off the ledge and paved the way for a bidding war. The book is likely to resonate with CEOs accustomed to dense discussions of corporate successes, businessy acronyms (like ZOG, or “zero overhead growth”) and sorting through heaps of advice. On rare occasions, Kilts gets folksy, as when describing the loss of perspective that comes with immersion in an organization's culture: “If you put a frog into boiling water, it jumps out,” Kilts writes. “If you put a frog into cool water and slowly raise the temperature, the frog gets cooked before it knows what's happening.” The slow boil is bad for business, he reasons. But overall, it works as an approach for this book.

L.J. Ganser's urgency and precise enunciation somehow improve the credibility of this management book by the former CEO of Gillette, Nabisco, and Kraft. Kilts offers a broad lesson about judgment, vision, and strategy and recommends creating conceptual frameworks that guide and energize organizations. With the author's experience mostly in large consumer product companies, the emphasis is on product development, branding, and marketing issues. His problem-solving examples are often in the realms of production or technology, but he also provides a steady stream of insights on character, integrity, and leadership. The audio is full of ideas and tools for managing people in large teams. The tight writing and perfect fit of Ganser's narration make listening an energizing experience. T.W. (c) AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine