The Art of Making Honey

The clock started before she arrived. When Bea is chosen to lead the colony, the beetles have been in the comb for forty-four days and the Keepers have given the hive one hundred. She has fifty-six. No plan. A board that speaks in four words. A competitor with a sweet name and a killer's habits. And a workforce that has made honey the old way for as long as anyone can remember.

The Art of Making Honey is a fable about turning a business around — about the gap between the day the clock starts and the day you have a plan, which is where most leaders live longer than they know. Day by day, the countdown runs: Bea and her team have to find the number, agree the plan, say the hard things briefly and well, and move a colony before the old comb comes down.

Part Two takes the story apart and hands you the method behind it — the same operating system Bill Canady uses to turn companies around, from the first hundred days to the thousandth. Five questions at the back are for reading it with your team.