Professor profile
Isaac Getz is a professor of Idea, Involvement, and Innovation Management at ESCP Europe. ESCP Europe Business School has campuses in Paris, London, Berlin, Madrid, and Torino.
1. What are you currently working on (area and medium (case, article, book, new course…)?I continue to explore the freedom-based organizational forms and how they contribute to corporate performance (eg. innovation) and human happiness. I have a book and several articles in progress, as well as new courses for MBA and executive audiences.
2. A case study that you think is important. Why?"Sun Hydraulics Corp." (A, B, C, and D) by Louis B. Barnes, Colleen Kaftan (Harvard Business School, 1985, Number: 485169-PDF-ENG). To my knowledge the only case study on a freedom and responsibility based organizational form. For years, HBS would invite executives from Sun Hydraulics to come in person because MBAs couldn’t believe the case is about a real and not fictional company.
3. A management book you think highly of. Why?Robert Townsend's
Up the Organization (1967, republished in 2007). Townsend was the first leader who built a freedom-based successful organization in Avis and wrote down his playbook in an extremely accessible and provocative style. It was a huge bestseller and still viewed by Wharton as the No.1 book to be read by managers.
4. A recent management title you read and/or one you would like to read. Describe.Ricardo Semler’s
Seven Day Weekend: Changing the Way Work Works (Portfolio). This a second book by Semler after
Maverick where he describes how he built one of the most successful freedom-based companies, Semco, in Brazil.
5. What is one of your well-liked teaching moments (case, discussion topic,…)?I enjoy cases from my own field work, seeing how astonished people are that such companies exist.
6. What was your most interesting consulting assignment? Why?Unfortunately consulting demands time commitment that I don’t have. Also, in the areas I’m interested in (transformational/liberating leadership) it’s for the CEO to do the job. The moment he believes a consultant will do it for him it’s over.
