Welcome to Bob's Website

Bob Stone is an internationally known author and speaker on ethical leadership and on leading change.

His new book, just out, is Ostentatious Time-Wasting: Tales from The White House, Pentagon, and City Hall. This comprises thirty-four short (or very short) stories about what Bob learned while attempting (with some success) to dismantle centralized management at the Pentagon and throughout the Federal government. Some of the lessons are things “everybody always knew,” but didn’t often follow; some are profoundly imprinted on Bob’s heart. All are useful to living and leading.

Tom Peters called the stories wise, practical, and inspiring. His overall assessment is that “Ostentatious Time-Wasting is as fine a leadership book as I have read in many many a year.” Philip Howard wrote that it “shows how a sense of purpose and a healthy disrespect for rules can get good people to a good place.”

Bob’s popular seminar, The Ethics Challenge: Essential Skills for Leading and Living, has been called life-changing by participants. It’s unique among ethics seminars or training: no talk about bribery, fraud, or conflict of interest. He covers what it means to behave ethically, and how that differs from merely behaving legally or in compliance with the rules. Bob starts with the basics: keep your word and follow the Golden Rule. He finishes with three essential skills for living and leading. These skills are easy to describe, not so easy to live, but living them will sharpen your ethical sensitivity and make it easier to keep strong and to follow your good intentions.

Bob’s two earlier books are:

• Confessions of a Civil Servant: Lessons in Changing America's Government and Military. This describes Bob’s journey from management tyro to bureaucracy-busting transformational leader. Tom Peters called this, "maybe the best text ever on large scale organizational change. Anywhere." It has been used as a textbook at Harvard’s Kennedy School, USC, Texas's LBJ School, SUNY-Albany, Washington State, and the University of Montana.

• The Ethics Challenge: Strengthening Your Integrity in a Greedy World (co-author with Mick Ukleja). This breezy, story-filled guide to becoming a more ethical person explains why ethical behavior is a winning strategy, then lays out six things everyone can do to keep strong and to follow their good intentions. Robert Eckert, then-Mattel CEO, called it “Powerful, personal, and most important, relevant for today’s students of business and society.”

Bob has taught graduate students, undergrads, and government executives all over the U.S., Europe, and the Middle East. The audiences love his seminars and workshops because he gives an entertaining picture of how large organizations really work, and how they can be made to work better and more ethically. His message is as applicable to business as it is to government.