With its tools to build scalable infrastructure from the outset and make businesses more agile, efficient, and resilient, this book navigates the complex and often competing approaches from business, management, and social science research to provide a straightforward model with practical guidance for companies to streamline administrative systems, reduce inefficiencies, and prevent organizational burnout.
Providing a clear and concise alternative to expensive consultants or trendy apps, it guides leaders to solve three key problems undermining organizations today: (1) employee burnout and turnover; (2) constant updates and changes to technology resources; and (3) the inability of organizations’ infrastructure to keep up in a perpetually shifting and fast-paced environment. Written by consultant-researchers specializing in behavior, evidence-based practice, and ethics, this book equips CEOs, COOs, entrepreneurs, and organizational leaders with proven strategies to address burnout, streamline workflows, and unite multi-generational teams. It goes on to show how to embed values into daily operations, eliminate bottlenecks, and harness the best ideas across the organization. Readers will learn to evaluate technology for true impact, build agility, and create a high-performing infrastructure that hums in the background while the business thrives.
The actionable, evidence-based strategies in this book are ideal for senior managers and leaders, as well as business and leadership students, particularly in organizations facing change due to AI and the tech startup and nonprofit sectors.
Table of Contents:
Setting the Stage. Chapter 1. How Change Actually Starts. Chapter 2. The Administructure Approach. Chapter 3. The Foundation for Change: Setting the Stage. Administructure Approach. Chapter 4. Identifying Values and Goals. Chapter 5. Transforming Leaders. Chapter 6. Developing Employee Expertise. Chapter 7. Integrating Leaders and Employees. Chapter 8. Aligning Structure & Processes. Chapter 9. Integrating Values & Mission. Chapter 10. Achieving Goals. Chapter 11. Adapting to Change in Real-Time. Wrapping Up. Chapter 12. Becoming an Administructural Organization
About the Author :
Jennifer P. Wisdom is a distinguished clinical and organizational psychologist, consultant, executive coach, author, professor, TEDx speaker, and past president of the Society of Psychologists in Leadership.
Cynthia Drake Morrow is a health services researcher, an educator in public health and research methods at Michigan State University, and a consultant in life sciences.
Review :
''As a psychologist, consultant, business owner, and faculty, the most consistent challenge I've seen leaders face is unnecessary people problems that stem from insufficient operational infrastructure. Administrative Intelligence is the most comprehensive, practical book I've seen for successfully implementing strong operations in any organization.''
Dr. Mira Brancu, Towerscope & Duke University
''Administrative Intelligence gives early-career leaders what they wish they could have learned sooner: how organizations actually work. Connecting values, leadership, and systems, it shows how real decisions get made—and how emerging leaders can create impact well before they hold formal power.''
Thomas D’Aunno, Ph.D., New York University
''Administrative Intelligence emerges from lived experience across all levels of organizations. It speaks directly to the organizational design puzzles I grapple with daily and provides a strong foundation for leadership teams to build shared understanding around internal challenges and opportunities for refinement.''
Delaney Keating, strategist and business developer
