Good to Great Book Review
To transform a good company to great company is all manages' dream, but only few of them make it. To find out the core factors which lead to a good company became a great company is very difficult, because in different era, different industry companies face different opportunities and threats. To begin the research for the Good-to-Great study, Jim Collins and his research team searched for companies that: performed at or below the general stock market for at least fifteen years; then at a transition point began to pull away from the competition, and sustained returns of at least 3 times the general market for the next fifteen years. He started with a list of 1,435 companies and found eleven that met his criteria.
When A&P executives recognized their customer liked the modern superstore from the result of The Golden Key, they just closed it because they didn't like the answer (Collins, 2001, p.68). Unlike A&P, Kroger faced this cruel result bravely, and decided to "eliminate, change, or replace every single store and depart every region that did not fit the new realities" (Collins, 2001, p.69). After more than 20 years effort, Kroger became the number one grocery chain in America (Collins, 2001, p.69).
Compared with two cases, we conclude that "it is impossible to make superior decisions without knowing the entire process with an honest confrontation of the brutal facts" (Collins, 2001, p.88), Focus on corporation's strategic management, a company which can confront the brutal fact will help it to make the right decision (strategy formulation), get the real result of its program and make the correction (evaluation and control). That's why good to great companies faced the similar difficulty as comparisons companies but they responded differently, achieve great result.
Hedgehog concepts to all good-to-great companies: they are very good at doing one big thing. They are able to simplify a complex business into a single organizing concept that guides everything. This does not mean that the businesses themselves are uncomplicated. However, the Good-to-Great leaders are able to see through the complexity and fundamental economic driver of the business. Jim Collins