Replying to LO28073
>>There is a good book though that was recently published on transformations
>>that I found interesting. I am biased because the book talks about
>>transformations in a way that I relate, and have found to be true over the
>>years. The book is titled "Good to Great" by Jim Collins amazon ref.
>>http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0066620996/
>
>I haven't read Collins' book, but from your description, I think that the
>findings are much similar to de Geus' "The Living Company"
I followed the link to Amazon and discovered that "Good to Great" is
co-authored by Jim Collins and James Collins.
James Collins is also co-author (with Jerry Porras) of "Build to Last". I
assume that the conclusions of the 2 books don't run in completely
opposite directions...
In de Geus' "The Living Company" there are 6 references to "Build to
Last". The first one reads (page 15/16):
"...Our conclusions (of the Shell study) have recently received
corroboration from a source with a great deal of academic respectability.
Between 1988 and 1994, Stanford University professors James Collins and
Jerry Porras asked 700 chief executives of US companies - large and small,
private and public, industrial and services - to name the firms they most
admired. From the responses they culled a list of 18 'visionary'
companies... They didn't set out to find long-lived companies but, as it
happened, most of the firms that the CEOs chose had existed for 60 years
or more (the only exceptions were Sony and Wal-Mart). Collins and Porras
paired these companies up with key competitors...and began to look at the
differences. The visionary companies put a lower priority on maximizing
shareholder wealth or profits. Just as we have discovered, C&P also found
that their most admired companies combined sensitivity to their
environment with a strong sense of identity: «Visionary companies display
a powerful drive for progress that enables them to change and adapt
without compromising their cherished core ideals.» "
Regards
Artur
--"Artur F. Silva" <artsilva@mail.eunet.pt>
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <Richard@Karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>
"Learning-org" and the format of our message identifiers (LO1234, etc.) are trademarks of Richard Karash.