Customer Reviews
The contemporary equivalent to 'In Search of Excellence' - By: Rory Ridley-Duff, 29 Jun 2008 
This strong text is the contemporary equivalent of 'In Search of Excellence' that every self-respecting manager had on their bookshelf during the 1980s. Time will tell if the conclusions of this book are any more reliable than Peters & Waterman's contribution.
The pretext of this book is 'how do you take a good company & make it great?' Finding case studies to answer this question is no easy task & the research team set about it by finding companies that performed at the industry average for 15 years, then outperformed the market for the next 15 years by a factor of 3:1.
The team then interview & investigate the companies themselves & come up with some interesting & thought provoking findings. Out of these investigations come some concepts that will have enduring impact on management discourse - the most notable of which is the concept of a Level 5 leader (a person combining personal humility with professional will).
So why not a 5 star rating? The one weakness is the relatively lightweight approach to case study. From an academic perspective, this book repeats the same mistake made by so many other studies - it interviews only senior managers & makes too much use of media reports (written by journalists who talk to senior managers). Whilst I appreciate the access issues, good quality case study work involves a wider range of people & the theoretical conclusions of this book may - like its 'excellent' predecessor - unravel due to a failure to investigate any views other than those of managers.
You could sum it up in one page..... - By: KJW, 06 Apr 2008 
This book came highly recommended, but actually is rather boring - the whole gist of it could have been summarisedin just one page rather than needing a whole book.
This book is Good but not Great - By: Eclectic Boy, 06 Apr 2008 
I was co-erced into reading this at work & as business books go its one of the better ones & I actually fully believein the principles it sets out as a recipe for success.
The research & analysis has obviously been done well but at times, like a lot of academic work, the interpretation of data is subjective, leading to a few jumpsin reasoning.
That said, you can't argue with much of it. Reading & understanding this book is easy, applying the theory to reality is much more difficult. Unless you are at the right levelin an organisation with a team of committed colleagues who also subscribe to the same theory you will not reap the rewards but may end up frustrated.
Our organisation (FTSE 100) paid lip service to the principle within half of one business unit - but centres of excellence within an otherwise unfocused organisation can be unbalancing & rarely lift the whole company to excellence.
Some good lessons here for everyone & a great book to read if you're studying for your MBA but to be honest if you at the right levelin an organisation to effect this scale of change this book will probably only serve to reinforce what you already know.
Good is the enemy of Great! - By: DP, 17 Oct 2007 
"Good is the enemy of Great". A rather harsh opening shot from Jim Collins gets his book underway with a sense of honest purpose. Written after the highly successful "Built to Last" (BTL), which focused on how to build an enduring company from the ground up, Good To Great (GTG) instead focuses on ordinary companies that made the transition from obscurity to amazing financial performances that put giants like GE, Coca-Cola, Disney & Intel to shame!
The impetus for this venture came whilst the author was having dinner with a group of thought leaders shortly after his earlier book was published. Bill Meehan, then managing director of McKinsey SF, cheekily remarked to Jim "we love BTL around here...Unfortunately its useless...The companies you wrote about were for the most part always great. They never had to turn themselves from good companies to great companies...what about the vast majority of companies that wake up part way through life & realise that they're good but not great?"
The comment stuck firm & fast with the author, making him question whether a good company could actually become great - by virtue of the same definition of those companies he wrote aboutin his earlier book. Being a man of purpose, he embarked on a 5 year long scientific research project to find out. The greatness he searched for would lead to him find 11 companies that exhibited stock returns 6.9 times the general marketin the 15 years after their transition point to greatness. As the author points out when putting thatin perspective, GE only managed a return of 2.8 times, over the same period of 1985 to 2000 - or another way, $1in the 11 companies GTGfund compared to $1in the overall market fund, would get you 471 times initial investment compared to 56in the market.
Monetary statistics aside, the findings laid outin the book are worth taking the time to peruse. Armed with a research team of 20 enthusiastic researchers, & after accumulating 15,000 hours of research, the group (as the author humbly points out, the researchers & he together are responsible for the findings) devised a theory based on the interviews & findings they collected, that helped describe how these 11 companies made the transition. They ran an acid test, running this by the key executives of those companies, & received a resounding vote of acknowledgement. Their sampling range for the initial company set was immense, every companyin the Fortune 500 from 1965 to 1995 was subject to their scrutiny, & from this range, their systematic searching & sifting eventually gave them their GTG 11. To bring these companies into a monitoring group, they found `comparison' companies for each of these 11, against which they could compare performance before & after the transition to greatness took place. They also had a control group of `unsustained comparisons' of companies that made a short term shift to greatness but failed to maintain the trajectory.
The 11 GTG & their comparisons were as follows: Abbot-Upjohn, Circuit City-Silo, Fannie Mae-Great Western, Gillette-WarnerLambert, KimberlyClark-Scott Paper, Kroger-A&P, Nucor-Bethlehem Steel, Philip Morris-RJReynolds, Pitney Bowes-Addressograph, Walgreens-Eckerd, Wells Fargo-Bank of America.
The companies themselves give a lessonin point about the greatness factor - they were not big industrial players to begin with, & have a very dissimilar profile to the cover page companies that usually get associated with greatness. It also delivers a great point about the first theory gained, CEO Leadership - how many CEOs can you name from the 11 GTG companies? More on that later.
As expected, the theories put forth by the author are the real gem of the research. As most simple but hard learnt lessons learnt through life, these theories appear obvious after the fact, but have striking implications for all those companies out there looking to become something more than a medium term has-been. The theory itself is split into 3 stages: Build Up, Breakthrough & Flywheel. The book tackles thesein that order, beginning with Build up.
There are three main aspectsin the authors theory that comprise the Build Up stage: Level 5 Leadership, First Who then what, & Confront the Brutal Facts.
An interesting view of the Level 5 Leadership traits that the author proposes, is that they flyin the face of standard Management bravado & theory. Level 5 refers to the top level of leadership, as defined by the author & his team. Level 5 leaders stand above those below, by virtue of their behaviour & action, & it is this, claims the author, that allows them to lead a company from good to great with ease. Lee Iacocca gets many a mentionin the book as a great leader who was coveted world wide as the CEO of Chrysler, together with his tenacious traits, boisterous personality & go get them attitude. However, the author points outin surprise, that as admirable as this may seem it doesn't bode well for a GTG transition CEO. Instead, it emerged that Level 5 leaders had personal traits that set them far & apart from such cover page leadership as demonstrated by Lee Iacocca. These LEvel 5 leaders reserve their ambition for the institution, largely giving up the drive for personal success. Also, the leaders of the GTGs were not seasoned veterans of transformation or industry leading characters that were broughtin to instigate & manage the transition either. In fact, 10 out of the 11 GTG CEOs emerged from within the company, putting the comparison companies trend of external recruitment of stellar CEOs to shame. The leaders of these 11 GTG companies were far from the stereotype charismatic CEOs we would expect. The author states, they were just humble plough-horses who had the sheer drive & will to turn the companies aroundin all faces of adversity. Humble, modest, self-effacing, understated, driven, resolved, & sharing - just a few of the startling revelationsin the book about these leaders.
The next point made, about First Who then What, was the most amazing of them all. The executives of the 11 GTGs all shared a similar personnel based organisational strategy leading up to the GTG transition point. They all agreed that they would concentrate first on getting `the right people on the bus, & the wrong people off the bus' before they figured out where to drive the bus! What would appear at first, to be a practise that could find itselfin a footnote of global management strategy on team building, isin fact a key component to the core operating procedures of these 11 GTG companies. In some cases, they immediately hired persons they considered to be the `right' people without even having a role for them to take on. Wells Fargo embarked on such a talent injection drive instigated by the then CEO Dick Cooley. He acknowledged that bringing outstanding talent on board would ensure that the company was readying itself for whatever the industry would throw at it during the deregulation era. It goes without saying, that if Warren Buffet describes the resulting Well Fargo team as `THE best management teamin the industry', the strategy has some merit! It became clear that this point of people as being the PRIMARY asset of a company, was the key driverin getting the company ready for the next phase of transition. Without the right people on board, says the author, companies are not prepared for what they must do next to become great.
Confronting the brutal facts, is something that most companies shy away fromin many forms. Whether its by concocting short term remedy fixes, or plain ignorance of the facts, without realising the harsh realities of the market forces & features of the industry around it, a company has a much diminished chance of transition to greatness. The author points out,in the comparison companies there were cases where strong charismatic CEOs were the main liabilities that prevented transition, as well as being the main causes of a short blip of amazing growth & prosperity! These CEOs refused to face the reality of the situation ahead of them, & installed a climate of hiding & secrecyin the teams below them, often hindering free flow of data. They drove the company by fear & dictate, often neglecting succession plans & never investing the same rigour into getting the right people on the bus, & the wrong off the bus, as the GTG companies. Reference instead, is made of Churchill, whose strong personality was matched by his Level5 traits. He set up a separate organisation during WW2, that fed him brutal facts that his government may find disturbing & hence ignore or hide from him, quoting him as saying "I...had no need for cheering dreams. Facts are better than dreams." The author adds more fortifying points to this aspect of facing brutal facts gleaned from the 11 GTG companies, even going further afield & mentioning how he conducts his lectures during his tenure at Stanford Business School. Red flags were issued to his students, allowing them the unhindered ability to question him once only each term, mid-flow or whenever they felt the need to raise the flag, without any fear of repercussion from him at all. The GTG companies had installed a similar climatein their organisations, allowing employees to freely improve on performance via open suggestions, thus allowing facts to influence decision making without hindrance.
The Second Stage of transition, the Breakthrough stage has 3 aspects that help drive a company through transition into greatness: a hedgehog concept, culture of discipline, & technology accelerators.
The Hedgehog concept can bring a few chuckles to most cynics of management fads. However, that's precisely what it exemplifies - the reluctance to grasp any old management fad & strategy that appears asin fashion at that momentin time. Instead, it shows that the 11 GTG companies found a core concept, a core focus that spanned "What they were passionate about", "What they can be the best atin the world" & "What drives their economic engine". The source of the name is best left explainedin the book, but the concept it relates to is as prickly & hard to grasp as a hedgehog itself. The GTGs essentially concentrated on one unifying concept that encapsulated the three points, & drove towards this focus with ruthless desire. The key conceptin play, points out the author, is that the hedgehog concept is not a goal, strategy or intention to be the best, it is a brutally realistic understanding of what the company canin fact ACTUALLY become the best at. At this point within the book, everything starts to come together - the pieces fall into place - the previous theories & the endless references to the interviews they conducted with executives of the GTGs & comparison companies, all start making sense. The teams within these GTG companies, made up of the right people, led by the right leader, armed with the right data, were able to pick the correct direction & focus for the company (the correct hedgehog concept). Without these ingredients, asin the case of the comparison companies, strategy & focus would wane & waver at the executive level, &in some cases endlessly shift direction, thus never gaining sufficient momentum to carry the company up the chain. Instead, the GTG companies were able to pick the correct concept, with full understanding of what they could be the best at, how they would make the money to do so, & be safein the knowledge that it would motivate the company personnel who had a passion for this principle. A good illustration of the concept is Walgreens idea to `become the best convenience drug store', carefully placing storesin specific locations to ensure customers would bring higher profit per-visit than before. They would even close down existing stores that were profitable, just so that they could open one a block down, that fit the concept better, being on the corner with two entrance points! Another great point raised by the author, is the GTGs who ensured they paid as much attention to the `Stop Doing Lists' as much as the `To Do Lists', even if it seemed harsh & painful to do. The tenacity & discipline helped ensure that together with a keen understanding of the economic drivers, this ensured a better chance of sustained transition. This allowed companies to shut down key operations that were part of their history, but had no placein the future. Thus they were able to focus entirely on the concept that would make them great.
The Culture of Discipline is something that the GTGs seemed to be able to exhibit whilst the comparison companies lagged behind. The GTG organisations required little bureaucracy, & little or no micromanagement of staff to delivery the targets they needed. To do this, they required Disciplined People, Disciplined Thought, & Disciplined Action. It becomes apparent that the 2nd point madein the build-up stage, about bringing the `right people on the bus & getting the wrong people off the bus', was the absolute foundation that allowed the companies to breakthrough into greatness & sustain the performance. To illustrate this discipline, the author makes reference to an unusual concept of "rinsing your cottage cheese". His wife is a champion Ironwoman Triathlete, & the phrase stems from the practised discipline of Dave Scott, Ironman Champion 6 times over. His training regime was rigourous to begin with, & despite burning over 5000 calories a day, & being on top form, he would rinse his cottage cheese to get the extra fat off. The key is that there was no evidence whatsoever that he needed to do this, that rinsing would indeed remove the fat, instead its the realisation that doing this was just one more small step that he took to ensure that he continued to excel. This sort of discipline was exhibited by the GTG teams (thoughin operational aspects of their industry & notin culinary skill at work of course!) who would even go so far as to chase off disruptive Union Reps from the shop floor since they were seen as not adding any value & just inciting bad performance! The discipline was exhibited excessively at the executive level too, with such fierceness that the GTGs would actively avoid any idea or option that didn't fit their hedgehog concept, even if it offered immediate & huge rewards.
The technology accelerators chapter has one lean point to make. Technology often brings a promise of market leadership, but what is core is the correct evaluation & adoption of this technology than the technology itself. The simplest example of this within the book is when drugstore.com emergedin the internet era. Walgreens, a direct competitor of drugstore.com, faced a huge write off from its stock value as drugstore.com went public & generated huge interest. The Walgreens approach to this threat & technology opportunity was simple,slow & steady. It looked at the concept of internet shopping, wondered how it could integrate it into its hedgehog concept of `convenience shopping' whilst adhering to its economic units of measure (profits per visit) & it slowly introduced a website that began with prescription ordering. This took off, & over a prolonged period of time, the web operation emerged into a viable revenue stream as more functions were added. In essence, technology is seen as a tool that helps GTG companies, but never drives them.
The final stage of the GTG transition, is the act of sustaining the performance. The Flywheel concept is used to describe how GTG companies move slowly from stage to stage, but when they breakthrough, they are able to maintain the performance by the same or slightly less effort & process. No immediate strategy, or burst of effort, or single person was responsible for the transition, & therefore is required for sustaining the growth of these companies past breakthrough. Instead, the author points out using the analogy of the flywheel, a single push to a large flywheel moves it a little, but if you exert that same effort, constantly, pushing it a little at a time, it will gain momentum, moving faster & faster, until it reaches breakthrough & is able to sustain its movement with fewer pushes than before - BUT it still requires that push otherwise it slows down. This is how the GTGs operated before, during & after the breakthrough. They never waned, they never gave up, they just drove at the taskin hand, disciplined & focused.
The book is written exceedingly well, & delivers the subject matterin a clear & enjoyable manner. What is apparent, is the sheer effort that it must have taken to bring this work to fruition, & this is made even more evident from the conclusions derived from this research. They are initially simplistic, making you think its easy to make the transition, but the more you read the more you realise that the approach needs to be holistic, & more importantly, the implementation requires great resolve & discipline. Something that these GTG companies strove hard to acquire & put to to work, to obvious great effect.
A highly recommended book for those companies that are looking to make a transition to the next level. But be warned, its not an easy ride if this book is anything to go by!
Godd is the enemy of the best. - By: Andrew Moules, 05 Oct 2007 Why do some companies make the leap from average to great? Collins' research team was shocked by the answer; you won't be - it begins with a "Level 5 Leader." Key concepts that the secular & Christian world have milked from this book include: Good is the Enemy of the Great, Level 5 Leadership, First Who...then What, Confront the Brutal Facts (Yet Never Lose Faith), The Hedgehog Concept (Simplicity within the Three Circles), A Culture of Discipline, The Flywheel & the Doom Loop
