Management gurus continue to exert tremendous influence over management thinking and strategy, not only through their published works, but more significantly via the international management lecture circuit. Research suggests that public performances are critical to their popularity and success, and that the "best" gurus are all highly skilled in persuasive communication techniques.
This book examines techniques, both verbal and non-verbal, used by gurus to communicate their messages and identifies several additional techniques which enhance the gurus' reputations as highly effective orators. It focuses on video recordings of public lectures given by Tom Peters, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Kenneth Blanchard, Daniel Goleman, Gary Hamil, Charles Handy and Peter Senge who are all renowned for their public performances and the impact they have had on organizational life.
Challenging and original, this text provides a unique insight into the management guru industry and the persuasive skills of some its leading proponents.

Based on primary research into the public lectures of management gurus, this fascinating new volume analyzes how such gurus disseminate their ideas, values and visions on the international management lecture circuit. Adopting a novel conceptual/theoretical perspective, it brings together insights from the fields of management, sociology, media studies, communications and social psychology.

Written by leading figures in the field, this topical book covers such broad ranging areas as the live presentation of management ideas, using rhetoric, legitimating ideas, values and visions, the grammar of persuasion and charisma and oratory and is a valuable resource for students academics and researchers in the fields of management, sociology, and communications.

The widespread promotion of management ideas, their regular inclusion in textbooks and business school curricula and their use in organizational change programs has engendered debates about the impact of these ideas on management and organizational practice. Based on analyses of managerial audience members' activities and related meaning-making prior to, during and after guru events with leading management thinkers, this book sheds new light on how management practitioners come to use management ideas in the different relevant contexts of their working lives. The authors argue that a broader, more differentiated and more dynamic view of managerial audiences is essential in understanding the impact of management ideas as well as the nature of contemporary managerial work. For scholars and students in organisation studies, knowledge management and management consultancy, as well as reflective management practitioners.