News Stories · Leadership - Negotiation

IMD Professor George Kohlrieser's best-selling "Hostage at the Table" released on audio book

Kohlrieser's seminal book reveals how to face conflict to address business challenges
June 2016

June 2016 – Talking Book has just released the audio version of IMD Professor George Kohlrieser’s award-winning book “Hostage at the Table: How Leaders Can Overcome Conflict, Influence Others, and Raise Performance”. The title is available digitally and on CD via Talking Book’s website, as well as over 16 other retail and library outlets. Talking Book recorded the audiobook, read by the author himself, at Echo Mountain Recording Studio in Asheville, NC.

George Kohlrieser is a clinical psychologist and a hostage negotiator of some 45 years who has himself been held hostage four times. He is an expert on leadership and introduced the hostage metaphor to leadership development. An award-winning bestselling author, radio host, media commentator and motivational speaker, he started his life as a farm boy in rural Ohio and entered a Catholic Seminary at the age of 12.His life is an extraordinary journey and provides a powerful backdrop for his work with the world’s most senior leaders as Professor of Leadership and Organizational Behavior at IMD. He has been involved in conflict management and mediation interventions with the police, the military and humanitarian organizations in Israel, Palestinian territories, Croatia, as well as with police departments around the world.

In this seminal book, George Kohlrieser explains that it is only by openly facing conflict that we can truly address the most difficult business challenges. It reveals how the proven techniques and psychological insights used in hostage negotiation can be applied successfully to any personal or business relationship. Step by step, he outlines seven key factors that anyone can use to remove the blocks that stand in the way of resolving tough problems, and he shows how business leaders in particular can develop and access the skills they need to create trust and a positive mindset in their companies.

Find out more about the Hostage at the Table audio book read by George Kohlrieser himself.