John Paul Kotter is the
Konosuke Matsushita Professor of Leadership, Emeritus, at the
Harvard Business School
Harvard Business School (HBS) is the graduate business school of Harvard University, a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. It is consistently ranked among the top business schools in the world and offers a large full-time MBA p ...
,
an author,
and the founder of Kotter International, a
management consulting
Management consulting is the practice of providing consulting services to organizations to improve their performance or in any way to assist in achieving organizational objectives. Organizations may draw upon the services of management consultant ...
firm based in Seattle and Boston.
He is a
thought leader
A thought leader has been described as an individual or firm recognized as an authority in a specific field and also as business jargon.
Meanings Go-to expert
From the perspective of a thought leader as the 'go-to expert', being a thought leader ...
in business, leadership, and change.
Career
In 2008, he co-founded Kotter International with two others, where he currently serves as Chairman.
The business consultancy firm applies Kotter's research on leadership, strategy execution,
transformation
Transformation may refer to:
Science and mathematics
In biology and medicine
* Metamorphosis, the biological process of changing physical form after birth or hatching
* Malignant transformation, the process of cells becoming cancerous
* Trans ...
, and any form of large-scale change.
Since early in his career, Kotter has received numerous awards for his thought leadership in his field from ''
Harvard Business Review
''Harvard Business Review'' (''HBR'') is a general management magazine published by Harvard Business Publishing, a wholly owned subsidiary of Harvard University. ''HBR'' is published six times a year and is headquartered in Brighton, Massach ...
'', ''
Bloomberg BusinessWeek
''Bloomberg Businessweek'', previously known as ''BusinessWeek'', is an American weekly business magazine published fifty times a year. Since 2009, the magazine is owned by New York City-based Bloomberg L.P. The magazine debuted in New York City ...
'', Thinkers50,
Global Gurus
and others.
Personal life
Kotter lives in
Boston, Massachusetts with his wife, Nancy Dearman. They have two children.
Written work
Kotter is the author of 21 books, as listed below. 12 of these have been business bestsellers and two of which are overall New York Times bestsellers.
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Successful change
In ''Leading Change'' (1996), and subsequently in ''The Heart of Change'' (2002), Kotter describes an eight stage model of successful change in which he seeks to support managers to ''lead'' change and to understand how people accept, engage with and maintain successful organisational change. The eight stages or steps include the creation of "a sense of urgency" and the use of "short-term wins".
Short-term wins, within a 6–18 month window, are considered necessary because "
norganization has to realize some benefits from
change effort to maintain stakeholder commitment".
[Tanner, R.]
Leading Change (Step 6) – Generate Short-Term Wins
Business Consulting Solutions LLC., updated 11 July 2021, accessed 8 August 2021 Kotter asserts that to be useful or influential, short-term wins need to be "visible and unambiguous" as well as "closely related to the change effort".
Arguing against a belief that there is a "trade-off" between wins in the short-term and wins in the long-term, Kotter argues from experience that both are achievable.
References
External links
Harvard Business School Faculty Bio2006 IMNO InterviewKotter International home page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kotter, John
1947 births
American business theorists
Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni
MIT Sloan School of Management alumni
Living people
Harvard Business School alumni
Harvard Business School faculty
People from San Diego
People from Ashland, New Hampshire
People from Cambridge, Massachusetts