Published by Soundview Executive Book Summaries, 10 LaCrue Avenue, Concordville, Pennsylvania 19331 USA
©2002 Soundview Executive Book Summaries • All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or part is prohibited.
Why Some Companies Make the Leap …
And Others Don’t
GOOD TO GREAT
THE SUMMARY IN BRIEF
In his previous bestseller, Built to Last, Jim Collins explored what made
great companies great and how they sustained that greatness over time.
One point kept nagging him, though — great companies have, for the most
part, always been great, while a vast majority of good companies remain
just that: good, but not great. What could merely good companies do to
become great, to turn long-term weakness into long-term supremacy?
Collins and his team of researchers used strict benchmarks to identify a
group of eleven elite companies that made the leap from good to great and
sustained that greatness for at least fifteen years. The companies that made
the list might surprise you as much as those left off (the likes of Intel, GE
and Coca Cola are nowhere to be found).
The real surprise of Good to Great isn’t so much what good companies
do to propel themselves to greatness — it’s why more companies haven’t
done the same things more often.
Concentrated Knowledge™ for the Busy Executive
Vol. 24, No. 5 (3 parts) Part 1, May 2002 • Order # 24-11
CONTENTS
How Did They Do It?
Page 2
The Eleven Good-to-Great
Companies
Page 2
Level 5 Leadership
Pages 2, 3
First Who ... Then What
Pages 3, 4
Confront the Brutal Facts
Pages 4, 5
The Hedgehog Concept
Pages 5, 6
A Culture of Discipline
Pages 6, 7
Technology Acceleration
Page 7
The Flywheel and
The Doom Loop
Page 8
By Jim Collins
FILE:STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT
®
What You’ll Learn In This Summary
✓ Celebrity executives almost never lead good companies to greatness.
Good-to-great leaders embody a paradoxical mix of personal humility and
professional will.
✓ You can’t achieve great things without great people. Many companies
create strategy, then try to rally people around it; good-to-great companies