Why is profitable growth so hard to achieve and sustain? Most executives manage their companies as if the solution to that problem lies in the external environment--find an attractive market, formulate the right strategy, win new customers. But when Bain & Companys Chris Zook and James Allen, authors of the bestsellingProfit from the Core, researched this question, they found that 90 percent of the challenges to growth are internal: increasing distance from the front lines, loss of accountability, and proliferating processes and bureaucracy, to name only a few. More crucial is their finding that companies experience a set of predictable internal crises, at predictable stages, as they grow; and that for even the healthiest companies, these crises, if not managed properly, can stifle the companys ability to grow further--and actively lead it into decline. The key insight from Zook and Allens research is that managing these choke points requires a "founders mentality--an insurgents clear mission and purpose, an unambiguous owner mindset, and a relentless obsession with the front line (behaviors typically embodied by a bold, ambitious founder)--to restore the speed, focus, and connection to customers, all of which are lost as companies grow. Based on the authors decade-long study of companies in more than forty countries, any leader--not only a founder--can use a founders mentality to overcome these predictable challenges and set their companies back on a path of sustainable growth. This book shows how, empowering leaders everywhere to control the destiny of their companies.
- | Author: Chris Zook
- | Publisher: Harvard Business Review Press
- | Publication Date: June 07, 2016
- | Number of Pages: 224 pages
- | Language: English
- | Binding: Hardcover
- | ISBN-10: 1633691160
- | ISBN-13: 9781633691162