Reviews (93)

Beyond expectations for firms searching for answers
I admit I was skeptical of the promises this book made.The book went beyond my expectations.It gives a structured framework for culling newness out of tired competition.
Profound Insights into Marketing and into Life!
The authors show us examples of companies who were not satisfied with the socially accepted business paradigms of their industry and were eventive enough to create a whole new market for themselves with their intuition, grit and determination. Exciting! May even change your life!

If you do not own your own business, his could be fun reading
I have never made the time to review a book, but this book came highly reccommended by other reviewers.Since I cant know their business backgrounds, I'd like to help someone else in making the decision of reading this book.
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Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business/Economics    4. Investments & Securities - General    5. Market segmentation    6. Marketing - General    7. Marketing Management    8. New products    9. Product Management    10. Strategic Planning    11. Business strategy   

Reviews (44)

"the book" for all executives and managers
It is not a book focus on "managing career transmission" as suggested by the title of the book. Actually it is the guide book on all management related topics on management effeciveness, leadership, negotiation and organizational behavior. Very clearly articulated, easy to read and down to earth. Another excellent example of Harvard's high intellegence assets.

Great Topic - kudos Mr Watkins!
My husband took the book out from the library for me and after reading the first few chapters I decided that this was a book to own. As you will keep going back to re-read the roadmap to help you on your new venture(s).
Most helpful!
Sound, practical advice for anyone climbing the corporate ladder. Great exercises and guidelines for conversations with new bosses as well as new underlings. Great help for those first 90 days and beyond. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business/Economics    4. Decision Making & Problem Solving    5. Executive ability    6. Leadership    7. Management    8. Strategic planning    9. Structural Adjustment    10. Management & management techniques   

Reviews (58)

Highly readable, useful, and even inspiring
What happens when an organization needs to change (if it hopes to be successful in the future) but hasn't put much thought into what the process of change itself looks like?More than likely: failure.
Read it too late
This book is excellent for anyone going through or planning to make changes in any organization. The material is straight forward, concise, and right on target. I only wish I had read this book last year before attempting to make major changes in our organization

Very Helpful
I would recommend this book to any manager who is currently leading an organizational change effort. It's very practical. Kotter's Eight Steps are easy to follow. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business/Economics    4. Entrepreneurship    5. Industrial organization    6. Leadership    7. Leadership In Business    8. Organization Development    9. Organizational change    10. Strategic planning    11. Structural Adjustment    12. Business strategy    13. Organizational theory & behaviour   

Editorial Review

Spawned by a 10-year study of 2,000 firms conducted at Bain & Company, a global consultancy specializing in business strategy, Read more

Reviews (28)

Define your core business clearly
The authors of this book see 3 essential elements separating a good growth strategy, one that is successful from a poor growth strategy, one that fails:
Skip this one and read the sequel instead
This is not a terrible book- it has some interesting case studies which the authors use to prove their points. However, there is not a great deal in here that is new if you've read the sequel to this book first ("Beyond the Core", Zook), and have read other
Very Realistic and very useful
This book is very good, it explains very clearly the different growth concepts with clear definitions, and a very interesting growth matrix. in addition, unlike other books, this book uses a lot of real world examples to illustarte the different concepts and growth startegies. It explains how companies, that succeded, evolved from their core business and developed new products without getting lost in the process. Also, explains why and how some companies failed. The book is realistic, and gives you some tools and matrix that you can apply when analyzing and developing a growth strategy. You should also check out the web site, it has some examples of how to apply the gowth matrix. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business/Economics    4. Corporate & Business History - General    5. Corporate Finance    6. Corporate profits    7. Corporations    8. Entrepreneurship    9. Growth    10. Industrial management    11. Management - General    12. Strategic Planning    13. Business strategy   

Reviews (47)

Are you adding or destroying value ? - Find it out with The Balanced Score Card
The financial performance of an organization is essential for its success. Even non-profit organizations must deal in a sensible way with funds they receive.
Aligning four key business areas to your vision and strategy
This book has become a classic in the field of business management.The 'balanced scorecard' has surely been referenced enough to include it in the dictionary.Robert Kaplan is the Arthur Lowes Dickson Professor of Accounting at Harvard Business School.His co-author David Norton is the president of Renaissance Solutions, Inc.
Effective for top down planning
The balanced scorecard approach is a very effective tool for top-down planning initiatives. The method will ensure that any business unit initiative is cross-checked with the broader corporate goals.The book provides an easy-to-understand yet detailed how-to guide to strategy planning.
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Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business/Economics    4. Corporate Planning    5. Entrepreneurship    6. Evaluation    7. Industrial Management    8. Industrial productivity    9. Management - General    10. Measurement    11. Organizational effectiveness    12. Strategic Planning    13. Budgeting & financial management    14. Business strategy   

Editorial Review

In their previous book, Read more

Reviews (21)

Overview, technique and implementation
An outstandingly well written book that decribes the balanced scorecard and provides excellent examples. An effective, practical guide for C-level executives and mid-level managers for implementing strategic scorcarding. I recommned this book for the breadth and depth of the explanation of the subject matter and concise implmentation examples.

If you can measure it, you can manage it
The Balanced Scorecard was initially designed as a financial and non-financial corporate performance measurement tool.Organizations focused on strategy have taken the Balanced Scorecard and transformed it into a strategic tool for measurement.These 5 key principles transform the Balanced Scorecard:
Highly Recommended!
The fact that executives keep trying new strategic initiatives despite their abysmal rate of failure is, like second marriages, a triumph of hope over experience. Or, it may indicate just how much pressure top managers face to improve their profits. By one estimate, nine out of ten companies fail to execute their strategic visions. Yet, CEOs - who witness a world in constant flux - continue to introduce change initiatives. Are they trapped in the operational definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result? Or, are they just ready for this book? Authors Robert S. Kaplan and David P. Norton offer wise counsel to help executives break the cycle of strategic flops. They advise executives to transform their companies into "Strategy-Focused Organizations" using the "Balanced Scorecard" and "strategic mapping" tools. With these initiatives, CEOs can ensure that every employee pays attention to strategy implementation. Kaplan and Norton, the all-star co-author team who wrote "The Balanced Scorecard" and "Strategy Maps", have done it again, in this well-organized but somewhat dry volume. We strongly recommend this book to any manager who is responsible for designing or implementing a strategic change initiative. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business/Economics    4. Corporate Planning    5. Entrepreneurship    6. Executive Management    7. Forecasting    8. Leadership    9. Management - General    10. Strategic Planning    11. Business strategy    12. Organizational theory & behaviour    13. Performance Measurement   

Reviews (4)

Using IT to support the business, not the other way around...
All too often, an "enterprise architecture" is designed for a company by IT, and then it gathers dust as everything continues along the same path it always has.The book Enterprise Architecture As Strategy: Creating A Foundation For Business Execution by Jeanne W. Ross, Peter Weill, and David C. Robertson approaches the whole subject from a different perspective, and it's one that actually integrates IT and business...
Pointing the way to how successful companies operate
The typical path taken by the CEO of the company is typically up the channel ofproduct, sales, or financial -- in today's world, a lot of financial types are reaching the big corner office. Unfortunately none of these paths to the top tend to educate the executive into the relatively arcane world if the information technology specialist.
How to achieve and then sustain superior execution

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Subjects:  1. Automation    2. Business & Economics    3. Business / Economics / Finance    4. Business/Economics    5. Industrial management    6. Information Management    7. Information technology    8. Management    9. Strategic planning    10. Business strategy   

Reviews (5)

Book review
I ordered this for my boss. He said it gave him some direction for a project he is working on.

Their most important book thus far....

A repeat of the other two books - little help for those who need alignment
If you are a CIO, Head of HR, or other so called "support" function looking for help on how to align with the business, this is not the book for you.
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Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business/Economics    4. Corporate Planning    5. Industrial Economics (General)    6. Industrial management    7. Industrial organization    8. Industries - General    9. Management - General    10. Management Science    11. Strategic Planning    12. Business strategy   

Reviews (5)

Definitely worth exploring but first be aware of your perceptual sensitivity to the world!
Peripheral Vision: Detecting the Weak Signals That Will Make or Break Your Company
Blindsided
Sometimes the numbers don't tell the story, the noise on the peripheral does.Often that noise is small - a blog post, an irate customer, a competitor changing thier business.These small signs can indicate bigger changes to come.It involves not only knowing where to look but how to deal with it (the book is a bit weaker on some of the how to deal with it stuff)
Seeing and Doing Directions for the Adaptive Enterprise
For a number of years, business books have been extolling the virtues of responding sooner and more appropriately to what stakeholders (employees, customers, users, distributors, partners, suppliers, investors, lenders and the community) require or would benefit from.Such books are filled with great anecdotes about organizations that don't pay attention . . . and far fewer anecdotes about organizations that succeed.
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Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business/Economics    4. Management    5. Marketing    6. Marketing Management    7. New Product Development    8. New products    9. Strategic Planning    10. Business strategy   

Reviews (29)

A "must-understand" for leaders concerned with long-term prosperity
Many thanks to Vijay Govindarajan (VG) and Chris Trimble for this grand exposition of ideas first shared in the Spring 2005 California Management Review and the May 2005 Harvard Business Review.VG and Trimble's "Forget, Borrow, Learn" framework is the most powerful recipe for corporate reinvention that I have encountered.
Raising Tigers
In Nature it is rare for one species to successfully rear the young of another species. The difficulties, for example, of a tiger cub being raised by a herd of elephants are easy to imagine. If the tiger isn't accidentally trampled underfoot while it is still too immature to look after itself, it is only a matter of time before some astute members of the elephant herd recognize they are raising a natural enemy, and trample it underfoot on purpose.
How to start a new business structure inside an established success
Even the most successful business eventually hits a growth ceiling which can lead to stagnation and new industry emergence: but most businesses can use their profitable platform to make changes with a little extra innovation, which is explored in Vijay Govindarajan & Chris Trimble's TEN RULES FOR STRATEGIC INNOVATORS: FROM IDEA TO EXECUTION. Start a new business structure inside a large, established company structure with the rules here: they are accompanied by industry profiles of companies which have successful made such changes, and provides ideas managers can't afford not to consider. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business Enterprise    4. Business/Economics    5. Creative ability in business    6. Entrepreneurship    7. Management    8. New Business Enterprises    9. Strategic Planning    10. Structural Adjustment    11. Business strategy   

Reviews (13)

Future of marketing...
Caveat - I see most things from a marketer's prospective, hence, I read this book in that context. I think the ideas of Prahalad and Ramaswamy are the future of marketing.If you take a look at a few of today's successful companies, including Amazon.com and eBay for instance, you will see that one of the reasons they have been so successful is because they worked with their customers.I think the book should be required reading for anyone going into the marketing field.

Nothing insightful that is worth the onerous read
The authors have created a massive text that does not add much to the earlier paper they had published. The book has mainly two messages - maximizing customer experience is the basis of value creation and firms have to be experience-driven rather than product-centric. (BTW, these are the author's buzz words not mine Breakthrough Thinking for higher IQ managers
The concepts presented in the book are deceptively easy to gloss over. I do not blame the reviewers at this site who did not 'get it'.
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Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business/Economics    4. Competition    5. Customer Service    6. Customer relations    7. Customer services    8. Economic value added    9. Forecasting    10. Leadership    11. Marketing - Research    12. Strategic planning    13. Business strategy    14. Sales & marketing   

Reviews (23)

A way to earn consistently higher profits
The Loyalty Effect is an analysis of the effects of loyalty.The author, Frederick F. Reichheld, takes a rigorous looks at a variety of successful companies and finds that those "that earned superior levels of customer loyalty and retention also earned consistently higher profits" and sustainable levels of growth.
Learn how to foster loyalty in customers and within your organization
These days it would be easy to believe that loyalty didn't matter anymore.Customers are going to shop around, employees are going to hunt for new jobs before they get downsized, and investors will be fickle about holding onto stock if its price moves even an inch.Loyalty, says a whole cadre of business gurus, is out of date and irrelevant.Not so, says author Frederick Reichheld, a director of Bain & Company.Companies like Leo Burnet and A.G. Edwards consistently pay the highest salaries, offer high value to customers at competitive prices, have the highest employee retention rates, and have the highest profitability rates.Loyal customers, employees and investors fuel a sustained cycle of growth at these companies.If you want to foster loyalty in your customers, employees and investors, Reichheld has the following advice:
Excellent book.
Is a very good approach of how a company shall work in order to achieve loyalty from its customers and all the positive effects that derive from it. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Business & Economics    2. Business / Economics / Finance    3. Business/Economics    4. Consumer satisfaction    5. Corporate & Business History - Strategies    6. Customer relations    7. Entrepreneurship    8. General    9. Job satisfaction    10. Labor productivity    11. Loyalty    12. Strategic Planning    13. Business strategy    14. Personnel & human resources management