Driving Down Costs

This is the first accessible and practical book to address cost management in a general and holistic way for managers at every level and in every function. Driving Down Cost sets out a structured, practical approach to intelligent cost management, offering a toolkit of key ideas and cost management strategies, frameworks for analyzing cost, and practical techniques for implementing cost-reduction programs. Cost management is not an issue only for the CEO, or for senior management, or for technical specialists. Junior managers who are proactively tight on cost are learning good habits for the future, ones that will bring them recognition and advance their climb up the organizational chart. And cost management is relevant to private-sector businesses and public-sector organizations, and to managers in every function. You only need to engage in high-profile cost cutting if you haven t been effective at long-haul cost management.While this book does cover one-off cost reduction programs, its main theme is what interests most managers a sustained cost management program. In this timely book Andrew Wileman gives you the inside scoop on what has worked for him over years of consulting on costs. He looks at the smart ways cost can be created and the even more innovative ways they can be cut like getting your customers to do your work for you, or turning cost into revenue. Sometimes cost management is in fashion, sometimes it is out of vogue. As it happens, the US, the UK and other big Western economies are currently appearing shaky. A cost-cutting wave looks imminent and this book's theme seems prescient. But actually, timing does not and should not matter. In three or five years time growth will be back, but cost will still be critical. Cost management is not just for downturns, but for always.