Why Some Firms Go From Good to Great and Stay Great — And Why Others Don’t — Part #1

Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don’t

Credit to Author

Here Collins pursues one basic question: “Can a good company become great and if so, how?

Elusive Greatness

When this now-classic manual first appeared in 2001, it rapidly became one of the most popular business publications of all time. Prolific business author and consultant Jim Collins, a foremost analyst of how to build and sustain a business, also wrote How the Mighty Fail and Managing the Small to Mid-Sized Company, and co-wrote Great by Choice and Built to Last, another bestseller.

Here he pursues one basic question: “Can a good company become a great company and, if so, how?” The principles of his “good-to-great” formula still hold up, but interestingly, many of the companies he and his research team identified as great didn’t last. Why is that? Clearly, Collins’ good-to-great tenets identify sound management practices: Hire the right people, specify your purpose, focus on results and make the tough decisions — the basic precepts now taught in any business management course. Yet unpredictable or unquantifiable forces, such as cumbersome bureaucracy, CEO ego, unanticipated markets…