In today's competitive business arena, let's start with this fundamental supposition: The longer you have worked as a manager, the more likely you can do your job cheaper, faster and smarter.  Your experience should have broadened your perspective, helping you to cultivate new ideas, new directions, and new efficiencies.

That's productivity.  And that's proving your value as a strong manager and a good value for your company.

but it's one thing to say experienced managers should be able to do the job more efficiently, and it's another to learn the proper process to find that efficiency.  Face it, most people find a comfort zone and stay there.  They will duplicate their victories because that is easy and safe.  They travel "the road most taken." 

Moving beyond the comfort zone, changing something even though it doesn't appear to be broken--that's ground-breaking scary stuff.  Winners will make the change, however, because it's that edge that gives them the business advantage.  They will continually reinvent themselves to reflect and counter business's ongoing changes.

Before you can move forward to better efficiencies, it is important to question the status quo.  Said differently, you must understand where you've been, and what you currently do, before you can carve out a new, better way to perform.  The first step in Positioning Success is to understand how your organization operates.

This book will help you identify the fundamental ways your organization now operates.  It is designed to help you look at key operating areas, and lead you into developing an understanding of its opportunities.  You need to know what you don't know!  The second and third books in this series will focus on strategies to change and strengthen your organization.

(Excerpt from Positioning Success, section 1 on Understanding Your Organization)