Although I enjoyed reading this book, I found that the author spent quite a lot of time reminiscing about his life. This said, I found the content really useful, informative and more importantly, I have been able to put the information to good use.

'Change Management Excellence - revised Edition: Putting NLP to Work' by Martin Roberts I bought the first edition in around 2003 and Martin's application of NLP in Change Management really turned my Company around. I was so please to see the revised edition published, with the additional chapter on Modelling, as it is an area of NLP so rarely covered clearly. Again Martin's approach was eye opening and I'm already putting into practice, plus recommending this great book to many colleagues and clients. I cannot recommend this book highly enough; Martin explains in clear ways and from a 'real world' perspective rather than just theory.

Most consultants have something to learn from this book, even if they won't admit it! If you plan a change process, make sure someone in your change team reads this!

With change happening all the time, this is an essential read.

Dr Roberts uses his considerable experience as a management consultant to give insights and techniques on how to handle and deal with change in the workplace. He draws upon the theories of NLP, TA and other psychological models and applies them in the field of change management in a clear and succinct manner.

This is an excellent book for everybody who is involved with business change.

Managing change is a huge topic, and it becomes quite immense if you include related aspects such as the history, principles and application of neuro-linguistic programming (NLP), a discussion of the function and perception of time and how it relates to strategic planning, and a critical evaluation of well-known 'packaged' management tools Like Total Quality Management and Business Process Re-engineering. So it could be argued that the author has tried to cover too much in this book. But it's welt-written and it's all interesting stuff. Solutions to many different problems are offered in these pages. Managers who find it difficult to communicate with colleagues should benefit from the section on NLP, those affected by tensions within their organisation, whether caused by change or other factors, can learn strategies to resolve conflicts; and anyone who is about to embark on planning and delivering change within an organisation, either as a manager or as an outside consultant, would do well to read the case studies and find out why projects that were supposed to open the door to an era of unprecedented success have sometimes actually weakened or even destroyed the company. Or if you simply want to widen your knowledge of the various theories that are floating around in the upper echelons of the world of business, there should be plenty here to engage your interest.

Martin Roberts recently retired as a management consultant to many UK top 100 companies; he has also had experience of dealing with US corporations. He has had extensive experience of change management in practice, which certainly becomes clear from the many anecdotes and case studies.

Anybody involved in a change management programme would find this book beneficial and the ideal time to read it would defi-
nitely be before embarking on any revolutionary changes.

Roberts makes it very clear that evolutionary change is much easier to handle than revolutionary change and that both should
be made as simple as possible: "Overall the future is likely to generate far more opportunities for CM failures than previously. A straightforward and common-sense approach is always more likely to resolve the problems than a complex one."

Roberts explains that he has aimed the book at change managers who may find NLP a useful tool and at "NLPers' who wish to apply their knowledge to bring about change; he has tried to avoid jargon from both fields " and where it has been necessary to use jargon he has given adequate explanations.

I particularly liked the case studies throughout the book, with their excellent examples of bringing about change successfully and also a number of cases where the outcomes have been less successful and the appropriate lessons are drawn out.

Somehow, I found this to be a very generous book " Roberts shares his case studies, an extensive bibliography, lots of references and best of all many exercises and activities that can be used within the change management process. My only criticism is that it would have been more helpful if these were more conspicuous in the text. After an initial complete reading I would want to hunt out and use some of these techniques or exercises and it would valuable if they were more clearly defined and indexed.

This revised paperback edition (first published 1999) contains an additional chapter detailing some of the pitfalls of NLP modeling, but also how it can be applied pragmatically and successfully.

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Achieve excellent Change Management using various techniques from the field of organisational psychology, including NLP, Behavioural Modification and Transactional Analysis. For everyone involved in change in a business setting.

Explores why there are excessively high failure rates in Change Management programmes by an expert in the field of Organisational Psychology. Anyone concerned with change programmes " and why traditional approaches run into problems, and how to avoid them " would benefit from the insights in this well presented volume.

Overview

This is not just another superficial book about the process of change management. It is a refreshing, honest " and sometimes humbling " look at leading change, and avoiding the communication and perception problems that so often lead to failure.

Evaluation

This is the best read on change management I have had for years. So many books on the subject look at the change management process, suggesting that what you do (rather than how you do it) leads to success. Martin Roberts starts and ends with the reader's context and experience. His focus is on how to use NLP to help an organisation uncover and accept where it really is, what needs changing and what is practicable.

He integrates theory and practice with interesting stories, examples and case studies that are bound to ring a bell with anyone who ever tried to make changes to an organisation" and that's most of us, at some level. You find yourself nodding in agreement and recognition as you read, as the book talks to you rather than at you. There is so much practical advice and information that there can be very few people who would not find something powerful and helpful, to take away and use.

There is one frustration. It needs at least three readings " and that's only the start. Unlike most of the books on change management, there is so much to think about and take from Change Management Excellence that you can't say you have read it when you reach the end for the first time. For instance, Martin Roberts could take the 6 page section on Human Factors and produce a complete book on the subject. He expresses so many frequently overlooked truths" truths that anyone leading a change ignores at their peril. For instance, do we not all know someone who could at least treble their success in leading change, if they would only sit and consider just this single sentence?

No matter how clever the technology is, if you cannot get the people to buy in to the project goals, then the project will almost certainly fail.

When he "blames' management fads like TQM for so many failures, Martin Roberts is not "knocking the opposition'. As he says "the downside of TQM stems not from the concepts of quality, but from the misapplication of TQM techniques. His message is not that NLP is a better fad, or a magic formula. His message is that NLP offers a commonsense set of personal skills, that anyone leading change should think about and adopt. That message comes through loud and clear.