Books reviews

„The Imagination Machine – How to Spark New Ideas and Create Your Company‘s Future“

As a long-standing science fiction fan, I can only testify – best ideas come from people‘s minds. „The Imagination Machine – How to Spark New Ideas and Create Your Company‘s Future“ take the ideas further – from the realm of the possibilities to the reality field. Boston Consulting‘s Group Martin Reeves and Jack Fuller are embarking on building a prototype – for finding and bringing great ideas to help.

Humans have many things that other species miss – but there is nothing like imagination. It is the only capacity known to transition from one realm to ours – and back. *The Imagination Machine“ apply a wealth of consulting techniques and cases to build the above mentioned prototype. From the ancient caves to the realm of science fiction, humans are able to use various combinations of artifacts and abilities to create new products. Or new ways of seeing the same things – in a new light. Imagination has given us the greatest inventions, those who make our lives richer than those of a Roman Emperor. Yet, many companies fail to invent anything substantial for decades, even fail to innovate. Others do and manage to change the world in the process. Read More »„The Imagination Machine – How to Spark New Ideas and Create Your Company‘s Future“ (by Martin Reeves and Jack Fuller) – a HBR Book Essentials

Better, Simpler Strategy – Book Essentials by Doitinvest.com

Stuck with quite a few strategic dilemmas? Not sure what your business should do next? Maybe it’s time to go back to the drawing board – or even back to school. “Better, Simpler Strategy – A Value-Based Guide to Exceptional Performance” by Felix Oberholzer-Gee goes beyond the theory books, into the realms of the organizational practice.

One could theoretically argue that not one, but 10 books can be written on the strategy implementation topic. Strategy deployments seems to be ever-elusive – and the more experience a Board of Director’s has, the more the doubts on the potential pitfalls. Kaplan and Norton (2005) estimate that fewer than 15% of the organizations around the world are successful in their strategy implementation. Think about it, one in 6 companies is happy with the strategic outcome of their own-decided actions!

Felix Oberholzer-Gee takes this topic at the next level. First of all, he is no-nonsense scholar. He starts with 2 strong statements:

“Strategy is simple” and

“I am not sure if this is the right sentence to begin this book”.Read More »“Better, Simpler Strategy – A Value-Based Guide to Exceptional Performance” by Felix Oberholzer-Gee – a HBR Book Essentials Review

A HBR Press Title Book Essentials

Strategy is notoriously difficult to explain.the most famous business thinkers are still struggling to convey to the Boardrooms what they think the strategy should be. Yet, as the countless courses, consultants and breakdowns demonstrate, the strategy is often properly understood.

This is why this HBR illustrated book is actually a keeper. “What is Strategy? An Illustrated Guide to Michael Porter”, written by Joan Magretta, does a great job of bringing strategy down to Earth. “What is Strategy?” decomposes all of the elements envisioned by Michael Porter since 1980s and re-assembles them in visual style. Think of it as one of the best business graphical novels ever put on paper. Or as the most worked-on strategy power point presentation brought to you. Add to it a light-hearted, interactive visual style – and voila, you have a reference, easy to use guide to strategy.

This does not mean that the illustrated guide to Michael Porter’s idea is for children. It is not even beginners’ exclusive. The guide looks detailed enough to be used by any experienced person as a quick reference guide or, why not, as a strategy concepts refresher. For example, it starts with a depiction of the the executive team that goes into the boardroom. This description serves two purposes:

– to introduce the characters that play different roles in the business world and

– to describe the most common roles in the C-suite – what does each do and what are their responsibilities.Read More »“What is Strategy? An Illustrated Guide to Michael Porter” by Joan Magretta, A Harvard Business Review Press Title – Book Essentials

 The win-win American capitalism might be skewed towards extremes, leaving the middle exposed. Roger L. Martin, a famous strategy professor, decided to take a new look at this “democratic capitalism” model. More importantly, he takes on a journey on how we can fix it. How well is Martin faring?

“When More Is Not Better – Overcoming America’s Obsession with Economic Efficiency” crosses the border of the WIFM business books. It might even become one of those titles that made famous the Chicago tribune economists – and propelled them in the driving seat of America’s economic policies. For a few decades, the US economy was transformed (at least conceptually) in a money making machine. Well, we all know the problems with the machines, do we?:

– their behavior is deemed predictable;

– they function constantly, based on well-known principles;

– the machines cannot learn and certainly cannot adapt to new ever-changing reality factors.

Read More »“When More Is Not Better: Overcoming America’s Obsession With Economic Efficiency” by Roger L. Martin, a HBR Press Review – Book Essentials

Strategic Analytics – the Insights You Need”

Analyzing the future available options strains every individual. “Strategic Analytics – the Insights You Need” takes the strategy at the next level. Curated and assembled by editors and authors from Harvard Business Review, “Strategic Analytics” puts together a pretty rounded picture on the hot topic of summarizing your organizational possibilities.

Analyzing the strategic options and their implementation results for a company is exponentially more difficult. Most organisations decide themselves on embarking on a data journey, yet the resources (hardware, software and people) are not there. And even if you arranged all your resources properly, many companies fail to deliver results at the right pace. 

What are the usual ingredients for a successful strategic analytics implementation?:

** Data and technology

Whilst usually data is there, organizations need to put in place processes to make sense of it. Every transaction with a customer is an opportunity to learn how to better serve the needs 

** The right talent and skill-set

Analysing and transforming the terrabites of customer and market data takes talent and experience. They are hard to find and need usually serious nurturing.Read More »“Strategic Analytics – the Insights You Need” Handbook from HBR Press – Book Essentials Review

How should a leader be? What is your favorite CEO style?:

** A CEO that is polite, accepting most of the team’s excuses and under pressure from the Board?

OR

** One that is polite, tough and relatively fair, difficult to work with and well perceived by the Board?

“Unleashed: The Unapologetic Leader’s Guide to Empowering Everyone Around You” came in June 2020 to change a bit our views on the efficient leadership styles. There has been much written on the topic of efficient leadership, especially at the CEO level.

The general research literature agrees overall on several traits of an effective leader:

– she gets results…

– … Without damaging the team…

– … Empowers others without giving up control…

– … And overall creates an organisation admires by customers and competitors.

Frances Frei and Anne Morriss offer in their new book a different perspective. Your success as a leader is directly proportional with your ability to unleash the maximum potential in those around you. This leadership potential depends on how far and smart are you empowering the others around you. Of course, this is just an ingredient of an organizations’ success – ultimately no company can survive only on good leadership skills.Read More »“Unleashed: The Unapologetic Leader’s Guide to Empowering Everyone Around You” by Frances X. Frei and Anne Morriss – Book Essentials