Just (12/21/2011) re-read the book and love the concepts. But I knocked a star off of my rating since during this re-read I felt like the author puffed up the findings and, indirectly, himself. Sure, good-to-great principles seem to be true, insightful, and necessary for a transformation. I even found that re-reading this book helped me to realize I was being quite undisciplined in my use of time (trying to create momentum by doing, doing, doing instead of "unplugging extraneous junk.") But I don't think Collins has found the gospel and he plays it up to that level.


I started reading it and then gave it to my boss. I'm currently listening to the audio book but I would like to own a hardcover copy. (2007)

The concept that has struck me as most applicable (so far), particularly with respect to businesses, is the need to get the right people on the team first and in the right positions, then decide what to do. Managers should not waste time and energy motivating people to excellence. Instead, they should give self-motivating people a vision they can support and work hard to bring to realization. Fewer great people on the team are better than lots of mediocre people. The mediocre people just make extra work for the great people and the net result is "good". It's easier to be great than good.

Another interesting concept I've been told about, but haven't read about yet, is the flywheel. Progress is made by implementing small changes at opportune times. Momentum is gained slowly and steadily by these small, periodic decisions. The image used by Collins is that of a flywheel with lots of inertia. Each little push eases the flywheel ahead. The wheel starts rotating slowly but as little pushes continue to be made, the wheel picks up momentum and is hard to stop. This concept is seen in the growth that companies like Google have experienced. Google started out as just a slightly better search engine. Small changes at opportune times have turned it into the booming multi-service company that it is today

Rather than try and brave the icy closed freeways this morning, I decided to snuggle in with this book and mark it off the reading list. It's probably a good thing that I picked it for today, because in any other weather situation short of a hurricane, I would run far away from it.

It's not often that I don't like a book, but oh man. This one. While I certainly agree with many of Collin's conclusions, it's a terrible presentation. The writing is just a chore to get though, like sitting in the most boring lecture ever where the professor goes on and on repeating himself. In the same sentence. Without ever taking a breath. Maybe look at adding a ghostwriter to that crack research team.

Also, I realize the book was written in 2001, but the examples of Circuit City and Fannie Mae as "great" companies is hard to swallow these days.

This was good but not great; why do all these self-betterment books argue from an a posteriori position; look at all these successful (on the basis of x metric) people and companies; these are their attributes so go and do likewise! (Disclaimer; no guarantees this works just as well a priori); i.e. thanks for not so much.

I've always been fascinated with the analytics of reaching greatness in business, and this is why I've read this book the second time years later. Here's a couple of ideas that I liked from the book:

There's a strong emphasis to people. The book says: "The most important asset of the companies is not the people, but the RIGHT people". It sounds so true, isn't it :)

The so-called "hedgehog concept" is cool. The book says that greatness comes if and only if we operate where these three areas intersect: What we are deeply passionate about, what we can be the best in the world at, and finally, what drives our economic engine.

One last thing: I liked the idea of "stop-doing" lists! The book says that such lists are generally more important than to-do lists.

Good is the enemy of the great. That is the first sentence and thesis of this book. In other words, if you're performing adequately, your motivation to improve yourself can easily be stifled. After all, you're getting by. Why put in all that discipline to go from good to great? But if you want to go from good to great, this book promises you the secrets of doing it.

I guess I'm destined to be merely good because I'm returning this book to the library unfinished. I thought the advice was worth applying for the first half, but then I got to the point that said, "Figure out what you can be best in the world at. If you can't be the best in the world, then stop doing it."

Excuse me? Only the best is good enough? C'mon. Only one can be the best. The world is full of many, many second-bests, and we get along just fine.

Perhaps it's incorrect for me to try to apply these principles, which are meant for businesses, to my life as an individual. But I believe what I say for businesses, too. Not everybody can be the best. You can strive to be better, but if "best" is your goal, you're more likely to be disappointed than to succeed. And if not being the best is enough reason to give up, then I give up on this book.

Too bad. I really did want to become great.

This book was collecting dust on my shelf for at least a year before I finally got around to it. I thought it would be a hopelessly overwhelming book to read. I could not have been more wrong. This is a very clear, concise and easily understood book. The author and his team spent years understanding why some companies beat the market and others did not. This was done after first having carefully made a selection and the conducted indepth interviews. Then they drew the conclusions into lucid and enlightening chapters. Definitely recommended!

کتابی که نمی توان آن را به عنوان سرلوحه پیشرفت قرار داد اما می توان از نکات خوب و آموزنده آن به شرط بومی سازی بهره فراوان برد

I normally don't like books that read like a course book! But Good to Great offered a lot of insights for me to put aside my internal biases.

In summary the book is a report on a 5-year research on what make good companies to turn into great companies with sustainable results. The answer is level 5 leadership (strong will + humility) coupled with a process that defines who (get the right people on the bus and the wrong people off it) and what (the hedgehog concept: the intersection between the 3 circles of what are you passionate about? Can you be the best in the world at it? How will you manage its finance).

The book elaborates that technology itself is not a reason for rise and fall of great companies but companies who leverage technology for realizing their hedgehog concept are the true winners. It does not matter if you are the first to acquire any given technology, what matters is that the technology is used in bringing your hedgehog concept to life.

The book is worthwhile read. I listened to an unabridged audio book from Recorded Books read by Rick Rohan and I was satisfied with it.

Good to Great, which is sort of a prequel to Collins's bestselling Built to Last, is a study of 11 established companies that suddenly broke out and outperformed the market in an unbelievable fashion. 11 comparison companies that remained stable in the same industry and environment are used in the study.

Each good-to-great company displayed a certain style of leadership that Collins calls "Level 5 Leadership." Each focused on getting the right employees onboard before figuring out what to do with them. And there are 5 other concepts that were common between them which each get a chapter in the book. These concepts have to do with psychology, core philosophies, management strategies, organizational behavior concepts, and more.

Each of the 7 concepts in this book could be applied to starting and running your own small business, to finding good businesses to invest in, to managing in any business or organization, to teaching and coaching, to your own personal creative endeavors, and so much more. Using these businesses and their leaders as an example, Collins and his team provide a research-based model for becoming the best in the world at something.

Just being good is not enough! Pursue greatness!!

Jim Collins, an expert in the field of leadership, introduced a story from Aesop’s Fables called “The Fox and the Hedgehog” in his own book “Good to Great.”

A fox is a cunning and beautiful creature. It is also fast, lean, and a proficient hunter. In contrast, a hedgehog is small, slow, and plump. Therefore, a hedgehog only concerns itself with finding food and caretaking its home. Every day, a fox thinks of strategies to hunt the hedgehog and bides its most opportune chance. However, when the fox attacks the hedgehog, the hedgehog will curl itself into a ball to protect itself. The fox ultimately fails and returns home to think of a new plan. Yet, the same result repeats itself every time. The fox ends up with nothing, and the hedgehog stands victorious.
The fox has much knowledge, but the hedgehog knows one critical piece of information. Great organizations are like the hedgehog. Like the hedgehog, great organizations think of easy, effective,
impactful action plans in the simplest methods. According to Collins, the hedgehog’s strategy concept of focusing on a single plan is born from understanding one’s own identity with accuracy and depth.

Джеймс Коллінс і команда зробили дуже цікаве дослідження (і написали/озвучили доступну книжку!) про розвиток, успіх, злети і падіння компаній. Як і інші адекватні книжки про організації та менеджмент ( High Output Management,  The One Minute Manager), Джеймс пише про очевидні речі, але розказує про приклади того, як, насправді, складно дотримуватись таких базових практик.

Спочатку хотів просто написати кілька речень про книжку і все, та подумав, що буде краще написати головні ідеї так, як вони запам'ятались мені. Ключові принципи, про які пишуть в Good to Great:

- level 5 leadership: умілий менеджмент, який приймає, в першу чергу, рішення в інтересах компанії, а не в своїх особистих. Часто цих людей описували як скромних, спокійних, тихих, таких, що керуються фактами, а не емоціями.

- first who, then what: get right people on the bus, wrong people off the bus and then decide where to go. Тут нічого додати, окрім посилання на  Work Rules!: Insights from Inside Google That Will Transform How You Live and Lead.

- brutal facts first: говорити чітко і про головне, just facts & no bshit, і не втрачати надію, якими б ці факти не були.

- hedgehog concept: фокусуватись на тому (1) що любиш, (2) можеш бути найкращим у світі, (3) де можеш заробляти.

- culture of discipline: тут мені найбільше спадає в голову аналогія з deliberate practice.

- technology accelerators: технологія є лише частиною успіху, його акселератором, але майже ніколи не є вихначальним критерієм. Тобто, багато компаній може мати одну й ту ж технологію, але не кожна зможе її успішно використати для свого росту.

- flywheel: "проривний успіх" -- це часто момент, коли публіка про нього чує. Ніхто не хоче чути про роки поступових дій та покращень, які за ним стоять. Зсередини компанії "проривний успіх" часто виглядає як просто ще одна сходинка на сходах.

Висновок: 5+. Автори переварили велику кількість статей, інтерв'ю та фінансових даних. Результатом є цікава книжка, частини якої можна перечитувати по кілька разів і використовувати на практиці при прийнятті рішень.

was this a riveting read? no not even a little bit. will I ever read this again? absolutely not. was this the worst book I had to read for this class? also no. for that reason alone im giving this 3 stars (generous... if I could do 2.5 I would). obsessed with the phrase level 5 leader. that is my one and only takeaway from this book.