"You Can't Enlarge the Pie"

by Max H. Bazerman, Katherine Shonk, Jonathan Baron

Why do our government leaders continually make decisions and craft policies that everybody knows are foolish? Because they, like the rest of us, remain trapped in foolish and unproductive habits of thinking. "You Can't Enlarge the Pie" analyzes the unspoken assumptions that lead to bad policy, wasted resources, and lost lives, and shows exactly why they're wrong. With fascinating case studies and clear, compelling analysis, it dissects six psychological barriers to ineffective government:1. Do no harm. 2. Their gain is our loss.3. Competition is always good. 4. Support our group. 5. Live for the moment.6. No pain for us, no gain for them. By freeing ourselves from the narrow way we evaluate our government leaders, we can learn to judge their performance more as that of business leaders is judged: by the overall health of their organizations.

Genres: Nonfiction

288 pages, Paperback

First published August 15, 2001

About the author

Max H. Bazerman is the Jesse Isidor Straus Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School and the Co-Director of the Center for Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School. Max's research focuses on decision making, negotiation, and ethics. He is the author, co-author, or co-editor of twenty books and over 200 research articles and chapters. His latest book, The Power of Noticing: What the Best Leader See, is now available from Simon and Schuster.