Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap...and Others Don't (Jim Collins, 2001)

Review: They have gone through many different companies and stringent criteria to know what is great. The elements are exactly what you need to build a great company, not so much for startup and right down to established corporates, still it is good practice for startup to shape the culture though. Rated: 9.5 / 10

Good is the enemy of great

• Ten of eleven good-to-great CEOs came from inside the company

Level 5 leadership

• Lv 1: highly capable individual > lv 2: contributing team member > lv 3: competent manager > lv 4: effective leader > lv 5: executive
• Modest + willful + humble + fearless
• They want to see the company even more successful in the next generation, comfortable with the idea that most people won’t even know that the roots of that success trace back to their effort
• Creates superb results, unwavering resolve to do whatever must be done, settle for nothing less, looks in the mirror and not outside, compelling modesty, determination and not charisma, channel ambition into the company, apportion credit to the company

First who… then what

• Get the right people first then set the vision
• Being rigorous: when in doubt don’t hire and keep looking, act when you need to make a person change, put the best people on your biggest opportunity and not the biggest problem
• People are not your most important asset, the right people are

Confront the brutal fact (yet never lose faith)

• Unwavering faith
• Lead with questions and not answers, engage in dialogue and debate and not coercion, conduct autopsies without blame, build “red flag” mechanism
• The Stockdale Paradox: retain the faith you will prevail in the end (believe you can do it) and at the same time confront the most brutal facts of your current reality (prepare for the worst)

The hedgehog concept (simplicity within the three circles)

• The curse of competence
• Hedgehog concept circles: what you can be the best in the world + what drives your economic engine + what are you deeply passionate about
• Shift your profit per your-usual-line (e.g. customers, store, mortgage) to profit per something-else (e.g. per customer, per geographic region)

A culture of discipline

• You don’t need hierarchy or bureaucracy when you have discipline
• Build a culture around the idea of freedom and responsibility, within a framework > fill that culture with self-disciplined people who are willing to go to extreme lengths to fulfill their responsibility. They will “rinse their cottage cheese” > don’t confuse a culture of discipline with a tyrannical disciplinarian > adhere with great consistency to the Hedgehog concept, exercising an almost religious focus on the intersection of the three circles. Equally important, create a “stop doing list” and systemically unplug anything extraneous 

Technology accelerators

• Technology is never the root cause
• Always be the pioneer in technology adoption

The flywheel and the doom loop

• Build momentum
• Like a flywheel all the results and from building from before
• Follow a pattern of buildup leading to breakthrough > confront the brutal facts > attain consistency with a clear hedgehog concept > follow the pattern of disciplined people > hardness appropriate technology > make major acquisitions after breakthrough > let the momentum of flywheel be infectious > let the results do the talking > let the flywheel continues to do its work

From good to great to built to last

• Turn the company into an iconic stature
• Preserve core values, core purpose
• Change cultural and operation practices, specific goals and strategies