Strategy That Works

Strategy That Works
Author: Paul Leinwand
Publisher: Harvard Business Review Press
Total Pages: 277
Release: 2016-01-12
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1625275218

How to close the gap between strategy and execution Two-thirds of executives say their organizations don’t have the capabilities to support their strategy. In Strategy That Works, Paul Leinwand and Cesare Mainardi explain why. They identify conventional business practices that unintentionally create a gap between strategy and execution. And they show how some of the best companies in the world consistently leap ahead of their competitors. Based on new research, the authors reveal five practices for connecting strategy and execution used by highly successful enterprises such as IKEA, Natura, Danaher, Haier, and Lego. These companies: • Commit to what they do best instead of chasing multiple opportunities • Build their own unique winning capabilities instead of copying others • Put their culture to work instead of struggling to change it • Invest where it matters instead of going lean across the board • Shape the future instead of reacting to it Packed with tools you can use for building these five practices into your organization and supported by in-depth profiles of companies that are known for making their strategy work, this is your guide for reconnecting strategy to execution.

Business Strategy

Business Strategy
Author: The Economist
Publisher: The Economist
Total Pages: 321
Release: 2015-05-26
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1610394771

The effectiveness of a good strategy well implemented determines a business' future success or failure. Yet history is full of strategic decisions, big and small, that were ill-conceived, poorly organized and consequently disastrous. This updated guide looks at the whole process of strategic decision-making, from vision, forecasting, and resource allocation, through to implementation and innovation. Strategy is about understanding where you are now, where you are heading and how you will get there. There is no room for timidity or confusion. Although the CEO and the board decide a company's overall direction, it is the managers at all levels of the organization who will determine how the vision can be transformed into action. In short, everyone is involved in strategy. But getting it right involves difficult choices: which customers to target, what products to offer, and the best way to keep costs low and service high. And constantly changing business conditions inevitably bring risks. Even after business strategy has been developed, a company must remain nimble and alert to change, and view strategy as an ongoing and evolving process. The message of this guide is simple: strategy matters, and getting it right is fundamental to business success.

Good Strategy Bad Strategy

Good Strategy Bad Strategy
Author: Richard Rumelt
Publisher: Currency
Total Pages: 338
Release: 2011-07-19
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0307886239

Good Strategy/Bad Strategy clarifies the muddled thinking underlying too many strategies and provides a clear way to create and implement a powerful action-oriented strategy for the real world. Developing and implementing a strategy is the central task of a leader. A good strategy is a specific and coherent response to—and approach for—overcoming the obstacles to progress. A good strategy works by harnessing and applying power where it will have the greatest effect. Yet, Rumelt shows that there has been a growing and unfortunate tendency to equate Mom-and-apple-pie values, fluffy packages of buzzwords, motivational slogans, and financial goals with “strategy.” In Good Strategy/Bad Strategy, he debunks these elements of “bad strategy” and awakens an understanding of the power of a “good strategy.” He introduces nine sources of power—ranging from using leverage to effectively focusing on growth—that are eye-opening yet pragmatic tools that can easily be put to work on Monday morning, and uses fascinating examples from business, nonprofit, and military affairs to bring its original and pragmatic ideas to life. The detailed examples range from Apple to General Motors, from the two Iraq wars to Afghanistan, from a small local market to Wal-Mart, from Nvidia to Silicon Graphics, from the Getty Trust to the Los Angeles Unified School District, from Cisco Systems to Paccar, and from Global Crossing to the 2007–08 financial crisis. Reflecting an astonishing grasp and integration of economics, finance, technology, history, and the brilliance and foibles of the human character, Good Strategy/Bad Strategy stems from Rumelt’s decades of digging beyond the superficial to address hard questions with honesty and integrity.

Business Strategy

Business Strategy
Author: Patrick J. Stroh
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 101
Release: 2014-03-11
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1118893220

Embrace strategies for improving your business and reaching your organization's goals "I wholeheartedly agree with Patrick Stroh: Good leaders understand strategy and good strategists need to be good leaders. Make this book a strategic tool for improving your business strategy." — Harvey Mackay, author of the #1 New York Times bestsellerSwim With The Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive In today's fast-moving and competitive business environment, strong leadership, insightful strategy, and effective innovation are critical links to staying ahead of your competition. Getting your business house in order can often be complicated, but does it really have to be? How do you take MBA 101 lessons, great models, and exceptional concepts and put them into play in the real world? Business Strategy: Plan, Execute, Win! strives to answers these questions in an educational and entertaining format. Working as a Fortune 20 practitioner with C-level executives, author Patrick Stroh has a keen understanding of the role played by current day strategists. With 5 chapters following the format of "All I Ever Needed to Learn About Business Strategy I Learned..." At the Movies, On the Farm, On Shark Tank, On Hell's Kitchen, and From the Bible, readers will gain valuable strategic insight regardless of industry, business maturity, or current business turbulence and how to apply these insights based on the factors impacting their own business. Each chapter ends with a One Chapter Conclusion, Two Gold Nuggets the reader is to write down and Three Additional Resources/Tools for more information, offering a practical roadmap to simplifying your success.

Smart Growth

Smart Growth
Author: Whitney Johnson
Publisher: Harvard Business Press
Total Pages: 132
Release: 2022-01-11
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1647821169

A Wall Street Journal bestseller Named one of 10 Best New Management Books for 2022 by Thinkers50 Creating a culture of learning and growth. Growth is the goal. Helping people develop their potential—enabling them to articulate and become the self they want to be, are capable of being, and that best serves them and others in the short and long term—is what we as individuals and leaders strive toward. But how do we grow? It turns out it happens in a predictable way, which means we can understand where we are in our growth and chart a way forward. In this compact, complete guide, Whitney Johnson dives more deeply than ever into the S Curve of Learning so that you can envision how growth happens and direct yourself and others in your organization to create a culture that fosters it. The growth and learning journey comes in three phases: the Launch Point, the Sweet Spot, and Mastery. Compelling examples of successful people will show you when and why growth is slow, how to keep going, what to do when growth and learning are almost too fast to keep up with, and how to leap from one growth journey to another. As individuals grow, so do organizations and societies. Growth is learning put into action—action that betters the world as we better ourselves and our small niches, both personal and professional, within it. Growth occurs when learning is internalized—when we try something new and invest the effort to move it from being something we do to something we are.

Love as a Business Strategy

Love as a Business Strategy
Author: Mohammad F Anwar
Publisher: Lioncrest Publishing
Total Pages: 332
Release: 2021-04-09
Genre:
ISBN: 9781544520278

To increase revenue, improve customer experience, and develop higher-performing teams, it's time for leaders to stop looking for quick fixes to complex business problems and start building a culture of love. Yes, love. Anchored by Softway's own transformational journey, Love as a Business Strategy offers a new, people-first framework for achieving any business outcome-written by folks that aren't fans of run-of-the-mill business books. As a matter of fact, Love as a Business Strategy is so chock-full of real-world examples of mistakes, heartbreak, and redemption that it reads more like a juicy exposé than a business book. Love as a Business Strategy steers clear from piety and theoretical concepts and instead shares grounded stories of resilient people running a real business. A business, as you'll come to find out, that was on the brink of disaster before 'love' took hold. Love As A Business Strategy doesn't preach or mislead, rather it lays out the blueprints for better business outcomes-like better employee engagement, enhanced patient experiences, and increased efficiency-then walks you through it step-by-step. A better way of doing business is possible. The workplace revolution has arrived. Love as a Business Strategy will help you ditch the status quo, embrace humanity, and achieve lasting success.

Picture Your Business Strategy: Transform Decisions with the Power of Visuals

Picture Your Business Strategy: Transform Decisions with the Power of Visuals
Author: Christine Chopyak
Publisher: McGraw Hill Professional
Total Pages: 241
Release: 2013-05-31
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0071815031

PICTURE THIS: A BOLD NEW BUSINESS STRATEGY DRAWN FROM TODAY'S HOTTEST VISUAL TRENDS Scientific studies have shown that looking at pictures, drawings, and other graphics engage both sides of the brain--opening the "mind's eye" and business systems to new possibilities we might not otherwise see. Frustrated by lackluster approaches to strategy, companies are combining illustrations and color with business strategy with phenomenal success. If you want to go beyond drawing on the back of a napkin, this book shows you how. Picture Your Business Strategy will help you master the principles of "strategic illustration," a proven system for visualizing ideas. Pictures and strategy come to life in the board, conference, or meeting room quickly, easily, and brilliantly. With just a few markers and paper, you can: Use pictures to restructure, reorganize, and rethink your business plan Draw lines between people, processes, and productivity Create new business possibilities through pictures and idea sharing Chart your progress with benchmarks and goal lines Create a project activity map that allows you and your team to see the big picture--and make it succeed Packed with clever drawing tips and simple templates to help you unlock your creativity, this inspiring book gives you everything you need to start bringing your big ideas to life. Developed by Christine Chopyak at Alchemy: The Art of Transforming Business, the book provides a fresh new business model for developing specific "seeable" actions that can be measured, tracked, and cascaded into other priority areas. There are so many practical, purposeful ways to use drawings in your everyday work environment, you'll wonder why you never did it before. Most important, you and your team will learn how to turn strategic illustrations into real-world results. Whether you're a boardroom doodler, corporate cartoonist, or Picasso for fun and profit, Picture Your Business Strategy will help you draw your way to success. "With this approach, organizations can create a cohesive and authentic understanding among teams that ultimately leads to increased motivation and bottom-line results. Chris shows us that drawing isn't just for kids, it's for leaders looking for a competitive advantage." --Tamara Kleinberg, serial entrepreneur and founder of TheShuuk.com "A brilliant piece of work that brings together the finite world of words with the infinite possibilities of pictures, taking strategic thinking and collective wisdom to a whole new level and presenting a more colorful way of imagining/imaging the future." -- Sabina Spencer, business strategist and author of The Heart of Leadership

Lords of Strategy

Lords of Strategy
Author: Walter Kiechel
Publisher: Harvard Business Press
Total Pages: 363
Release: 2010-03-03
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1422157318

Imagine, if you can, the world of business - without corporate strategy. Remarkably, fifty years ago that's the way it was. Businesses made plans, certainly, but without understanding the underlying dynamics of competition, costs, and customers. It was like trying to design a large-scale engineering project without knowing the laws of physics. But in the 1960s, four mavericks and their posses instigated a profound shift in thinking that turbocharged business as never before, with implications far beyond what even they imagined. In The Lords of Strategy, renowned business journalist and editor Walter Kiechel tells, for the first time, the story of the four men who invented corporate strategy as we know it and set in motion the modern, multibillion-dollar consulting industry: Bruce Henderson, founder of Boston Consulting Group Bill Bain, creator of Bain & Company Fred Gluck, longtime Managing Director of McKinsey & Company Michael Porter, Harvard Business School professor Providing a window into how to think about strategy today, Kiechel tells their story with novelistic flair. At times inspiring, at times nearly terrifying, this book is a revealing account of how these iconoclasts and the organizations they led revolutionized the way we think about business, changed the very soul of the corporation, and transformed the way we work.