Influence without Authority »

ALLAN R. COHEN is Edward A. Madden Distinguished Professor of Global Leadership and Director of Corporate Entrepreneurship at Babson College, where he specializes in leadership and transforming organizations. He holds MBA and DBA degrees from Harvard Business School and has consulted for such organizations as GE, Polaroid, IBM, and Toshiba.

DAVID L. BRADFORD is Senior Lecturer on Organizational Behavior at Stanford Graduate School of Business and Director of Stanford's Executive Program in Leadership. He has consulted for such organizations as Frito-Lay, Levi Strauss & Co., and the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Cohen and Bradford are also the authors of Managing for Excellence and Power Up, both from Wiley.

In organizations today, getting work done requires political and collaborative skills. That’s why the first edition of this book has been widely adopted as a guide for consultants, project leaders, staff experts, and anyone else who does not have direct authority but who is nevertheless accountable for results. In this revised edition, leadership gurus Allan Cohen and David Bradford explain how to get cooperation from those over whom you have no official authority by offering them help in the form of the “currencies” they value. This classic work, now revised and updated, gives you powerful techniques for cutting through interpersonal and interdepartmental barriers, and motivating people to lend you their support, time, and resources.

Publishers Weekly

This guide by management consultant Cohen and Stanford University Graduate School of Business professor Bradford skillfully demonstrates, with numerous examples, how managers and other employees can achieve their career objectives--as well as those of their companies--by forming mutually advantageous alliances. Urging patient planning of strategies, the authors offer advice on coping with turf rivalries, handling delicate inter-level relations and tips on how to bypass rules and foster managerial flexibility and innovation. Macmillan's Executive Program dual main selection; Fortune Book club alternate. (Dec.)