The Well Timed Strategy: Managing the Business Cycle for Competitive Advantage - Hardcover

Navarro, Peter

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0131494201 ISBN 13: 9780131494206

Publisher: Wharton School Pub, 2006

Synopsis

Most companies ignore one of their best opportunities for honing competitive advantage: the opportunity to proactively manage business cycles and macroeconomic turbulence. Despite the profound impact that the business cycle has on the fortunes and fate of so many businesses large and small--and the employees and investors that depend on them--not fa single book offers a comprehensive guide to strategically and tactically managing the business cycle. The Well-Timed Strategy shows how to manage not just the business cycle and industry cycles but also today's unprecedented level of macroeconomic turbulence. Peter Navarro shows how to align every facet of business strategy, tactics, and operations to reflect changing business conditions. Drawing on hundreds of examples, Navarro distills clear, simple management principles for managing economic upswings and downswings. Navarro addresses everything from inventory, production, and supply chain management to marketing, pricing, and long-term capital investment. Navarro presents examples from around the globe, ranging from Broadcom and Cemex to Paccar and Xilinx Chinese real estate developers to U.S. small caps. Clear, concise, and exceptionally readable, The Well-Timed Strategy makes complex macroeconomic forecasting easy to understand -- and even easier to act upon.

Introduction xvii

Chapter 1: Strategies and Tactics of the Master Cyclist Executive 1

Chapter 2: Countercycling Your Capital Expenditures 15

Chapter 3: The Acquisitive Master Cyclist Buys Low and Sells High 39

Chapter 4: The Art of “Cherry Picking” and Other Well-Timed Tactics of the Human Resources Manager 55

Chapter 5: “Macromanaging” Your Production, Inventory, and Supply Chain 75

Chapter 6: Master Cyclist Marketing Through the Business Cycle Seasons 95

Chapter 7: Pricing the Cycle and Managing Credit and Account Receivables 111

Chapter 8: Proactive Profiting From Oil Price Spikes, Interest Rate Hikes, and Exchange Rate Risks 129

Chapter 9: When You Can’t Beat the Business Cycle, Hedge Its Risks! 149

Chapter 10: Surviving–and Prospering from–the Economic Shocks of War, Terrorism, Drought, and Disease 169

Chapter 11: The Master Cyclist’s Favorite Forecasting Tools 185

Concluding Thoughts 211

Appendix A: The Master Cyclist Project’s Treasure Trove of Data and All-Star Team 213

Appendix B: A Business Cycle Primer 223

Notes 233

Index 239

About this title

About the Author

Peter Navarro is a business professor at the University of California, Irvine.

 

He is author of the best-selling investment book If It’s Raining in Brazil, Buy Starbucks and the best-selling audio lecture course “Big Picture Investing: How, When, and Why the Stock Market Moves.” His weekly newsletter on the economy and stock market is distributed widely and is available to the public at www.peternavarro.com.

 

A widely sought-after and gifted public speaker, Navarro has appeared  on Bloomberg TV, CNN, CNBC, NPR, and all three major network news shows. Navarro’s articles have appeared in a wide range of leading publications, including Barron’s, Business Week, Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Sloan Management Review.

 

Professor Navarro holds a B.A. from Tufts University and a Ph.D. in economics from Harvard.

From the Back Cover

"In The Well-Timed Strategy, Navarro provides a useful primer on business cycle risks and opportunities. Recognizing that business success depends most of all on human capital, he makes the crucial observation that the trough of a recession is the best time to find good people and the most important time to focus on retaining them. This and other insights about investment, production, and marketing give today s executives a useful checklist for building and maintaining competitive advantage."

Michael Milken, Chairman, The Milken Institute

"Navarro s conclusions should be an integral part of any management strategy playbook. Timing is indeed everything, and this book shows you how to master it for a successful business."

Bruce Karatz, Chairman and CEO, KB Home

"The business cycle bedevils all companies, yet few take it into account when plotting strategy. Peter Navarro provides a powerful set of tools, insights, and examples that will help every executive master the all-important art of timing."

Nicholas G. Carr, Author of Does IT Matter?

"What surprised me the most about this wonderful Big Ideas book was not how incisive, useful, and far-ranging its strategic prescriptions are but rather how much fun I actually had reading it."

Mark Zandi, Chief Economist and Co-Founder of Economy.com

"The overriding approach to real estate success used to be location, location, location, but it is an absolute fact that timing, timing, timing is the ultimate driver behind maximizing return on investment. Peter Navarro illustrates that point with compelling examples of some of the best companies that have proactively navigated the business cycle as well as those that have faltered. The Well-Timed Strategy is an insightful look into the critical concept of knowing not just how to make a move, but more importantly, when."

Richard S. Ziman, Chairman and CEO, Arden Realty, Inc.

"Don t miss this guide to surviving and thriving during topsy-turvy industry fluctuations."

Kirkus Reports

"This book is a virtual tour de force of strategies and tactics being used by some of best Master Cyclist business executives in the world. Using a wealth of real-world examples, Navarro clearly explains the dos and don ts of timing important executive decisions to the business cycle so much so that after reading this book, you ll view the business cycle more as a strategic partner rather than an economic adversary."

Lakshman Achuthan, Managing Director, Economic Cycle Research Institute

"A path-breaking book full of useful war stories from the front lines. As Lance Armstrong would advise, you don't win a race in the flats but in the mountains, by managing the ascents and descents better than your competition. Navarro shows us how the same is true for how businesses navigate the ups and downs of the business cycle."

Stephan G. Richter, Publisher and Editor-in-Chief, theGlobalist.com

"Peter Navarro is that rare academic whose expertise spans both strategic management and technical economics and writes like a dream. Here, he clearly explains how an understanding of the economics of business cycles gives managers a huge advantage in strategic planning while offering many compelling examples of how companies have succeeded or failed according to their reading of the impact of macroeconomics on their industries."

Peter Passell, Senior Fellow at the Milken Institute and Editor of the Milken Institute Review

"Peter Navarro has written a remarkable, path-breaking book about strategic management of the business cycle that is destined to be a classic in both corporate boardrooms and business schools. Using a rich array of real world examples, he shows why corporate leaders must always be proactive, often counter-cyclical, and ever nimble."

Bernard Baumohl, Executive Director of the Economic Outlook Group and Author of The Secrets of Economic Indicators

Most companies ignore one of their best opportunities for honing competitive advantage: proactively managing the business cycle and broader macroeconomic turbulence. In The Well-Timed Strategy, Peter Navarro reveals why the business cycle is an even more powerful P&L driver than you may realize, and demonstrates how it can be profitably managed.

Navarro distills a set of clear and compelling strategies and tactics for managing economic upswings and downswings, oil price spikes, currency crises, trade wars, and other severe macroeconomic shocks. Navarro s "Master Cyclist" management principles address everything from inventory, production, and supply chains to marketing, pricing, acquisitions, and long-term capital investment. Navarro presents examples and case studies from around the globe, ranging from high tech to heavy industry, from Broadcom, Micron, and Cemex to Paccar and Xilinx, from Chinese entrepreneurs to large multinationals.

Clear, concise, and exceptionally readable, The Well-Timed Strategy makes complex business cycle strategy and tactics easy to understand and even easier to act upon.

Edition details

• Publisher: Wharton School Pub
• Publication date: 2006
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0131494201
• ISBN 13: 9780131494206
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 244