Results, Not Reports: Building Exceptional Organizations by Integrating Process, Performance, and People

Despite investing significant amounts of money in improvement methodologies over the years, roughly 70% of large-scale performance improvement efforts fail. But what distinguishes the 30% that are successful?

Peter Follows, the co-founder and CEO of Carpedia International, has chronicled his company's experience helping clients achieve lasting improvements in performance and profitability. Carpedia has a remarkable success rate in large-scale improvement programs, helping clients achieve their improvement goals over 90% of the time. The company's past clients include highly successful organizations such as The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company, H.J. Heinz, Constellation Brands, DHL, Fedex, Delta Airlines, and Yale New Haven Hospital.

In his book, Results not Reports, Peter explains how to achieve sustainable improvement through the dynamic management of process, performance, and people. The book emphasizes that all three components have an interdependent relationship with each other, and the key is to address them concurrently. To achieve higher performance levels, managers must adopt a different mindset and approach to their work at every level, and leaders must create an environment that fosters this new way of thinking to support their managers' efforts.

Results not Reports is structured in a sequence that reflects an improvement cycle and is divided into three parts: Where to Look, What to Improve, and How to get Results. Each section is designed to reinforce and build on the previous one, but they can be read independently.

The book, written with practical clarity, is for senior leaders who need to execute their strategies and implement changes that stick. It uses self-deprecating stories of lessons learned to explain how to integrate the management of process, performance, and people.