Strategy Huddle
Management Lessons from Sports
- Deepak Dhayanithy - Associate Professor of Strategic Management at the Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode
Strategy Huddle dives into the intricacies of strategy-making by captains, agents and players in a variety of sport arenas, and Deepak Dhayanithy’s passionate interest in both sports and strategy has enabled him to translate these intricacies lucidly into both known and unknown strategy lessons for management—creating a must read for both budding managers and business leaders.
Strategy Huddle: Management Lessons from Sports is a unique book which brings to light lessons in strategic management through the sports industry and successful sportsmen. It explains concepts in strategic management through lessons learnt from different sporting disciplines. It is a highly enjoyable read and a must read for leaders in organizations and sports aficionados. It will also encourage business schools to offer courses on strategy from a fresh perspective as Professor Deepak has been practicing at IIM Kozhikode. His passion for sports and strategy is evident in this well-researched book.
Deepak Dhayanithy has done a Rolf Dobelli, creating a brilliant compendium of management lessons from the world of sports. Most managers quote Moneyball. It was a great lesson, but the Oakland Athletics never won anything. The real leaders learn from Coach Pop whose leadership principles built the greatest sports franchise in San Antonio. This book has that and 26 other equally amazing lessons.
Everyone ‘knows’ sports, but hardly anyone has studied them with the passion and insight that Professor Dhayanithy has. More importantly for us, he has brilliantly extracted insights from those sports and translated them to the world of business and management, using easy language that will appeal to every manager out there. Essential reading!
Sports, whether individual or the team variety, capture the popular imagination like no other. Distilling the management lessons from the lives and work of sportspeople while simultaneously making for compelling reading, however, is not an easy task. Strategy Huddle accomplishes that task with flair, drawing on a diverse set of examples ranging from chess to e-sports. It should be an enjoyable and illuminating read.
Strategy Huddle explores and exposes the ubiquitous interweaving of sports and strategy across a wide spectrum of sports categories. A surgical dissection of 27 well-known instances, with a refreshingly simple outlook on each of them. Deepak’s innate sense and deeply personal interest in both areas shines through. A thoroughly enjoyable read, for both academicians and non-academicians alike.
The west (notably the United States) has a culture of board rooms drawing inspiration from sports managers. In India, this trend remains under-developed. Deepak Dhayanithy breaks the mould—bringing his deep understanding and appreciation for sports to strategic management. He is one of the pioneers of educational courses marrying the fields of strategy and sports. Strategy Huddle is a step in the direction of taking this mainstream.
