Leading the Revolution - Softcover

Hamel, Gary

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1578511895 ISBN 13: 9781578511891

Publisher: Harvard Business School Press, 2000

Synopsis

Gary Hamel, world-renowned business thinker and co-author of Competing for the Future, the book that set the management agenda for the 1990s, now brings us Leading the Revolution. An action plan-indeed, an incendiary device-for any company or individual intent on becoming and staying an industry revolutionary, this book will ignite the passions of entry-level assistants, neophyte managers, seasoned VPs, CEOs, and anyone else who worries that their company may be caught flat-footed by the future. Hamel argues that in an increasingly nonlinear world, only nonlinear ideas will create new wealth. To thrive in the age of revolution, companies must adopt a radical new innovation agenda. The fundamental challenge companies face is reinventing themselves and their industries not just in times of crisis-but continually.

Based on an extensive study of "gray-haired revolutionaries," including Enron, Charles Schwab, Cisco, Virgin, and GE Capital, Leading the Revolution
Explains the underlying principles of radical innovation
Explores where revolutionary new business concepts come from
Identifies the key design criteria for building companies that are activist-friendly and revolution-ready
Details the steps your company must take to make innovation an enduring capability
Packed with insight and practical advice, Leading the Revolution shows you how to
Get off the treadmill of incrementalism
Save your company from becoming a "one-vision wonder"
Harness the imagination and passion of every employee
Develop new financial measures that focus energy on the challenge of creating new wealth
Create vibrant internal markets for ideas, capital, and talent
Drawing on the examples of activists who profoundly changed their companies with their bare hearts, Hamel outlines the practical steps anyone can take to lead a successful revolution in their own firm.

Leading the Revolution is not a book for cozy corner-office types. It is for everyone who has the guts to act on the knowledge that our heritage is no longer our destiny. With an arresting four-color design and a compelling message that will set the new innovation agenda for the next century, this groundbreaking book from the premier business thinker of our time is a call to arms for the dreamers and doers who will lead us into the age of revolution.

About this title

About the Author

Gary Hamel is a Founder and Chairman of Strategos, and Visiting Professor of Strategic and International Management at the London Business School. He lives in Woodside, California. Contact Gary Hamel at hamel@leadingtherevolution.

From the Back Cover

"Gary Hamel captures the moment with a no-holds-barred assessment of the issues facing companies all around the world as they struggle to catch up with the new economy." --Sir Richard Branson, Chairman, Virgin Group

"Gary Hamel's 'revolutionary entrepreneurship' model represents a substantial advance in our understanding of what companies must do to become outstanding innovators. It should influence not only top management but also all employees who are, indeed, the CEOs of their business lives."
--Ken Lay, Chairman and CEO, Enron Corporation

"Revolutionaries in the new economy are those leaders and companies willing to change the strategies that once made them great. Gary Hamel's clear and powerful blueprint for radical innovation is eye-opening for any business."
--Michael Dell, Chairman and CEO, Dell

"Gary Hamel captures the new competitive business environment, one in which dreams and reality merge. Leading the Revolution will inspire innovation at all levels and provide insight into opportunities for rewarding revolutionary thinking in new and bigger ways."
--Arthur M. Blank, President & CEO, The Home Depot, Inc.

"As venture capitalists, we like to finance swarms of startups that kick the stuffing out of established companies. So please put this book down. Now slowly back away from the counter.... Because if you and your company put Hamel's revolutionary principles to work, it's going to be a lot harder for our start-ups to take your company by surprise."
--Steve T. Jurvetson, Managing Director, Draper Fisher Jurvetson

Reviews

A fixture in the Harvard Business Review, and the man who introduced the phrase "core competencies" into the business lexicon, Hamel urges everyone, including managers of old-line companies, to lead a business revolution by fully implementing e-commerce, participating in cooperative techniques such as joint ventures, engaging in "co-oppetition" (selective cooperation between competitors) and taking advantage of the general upheaval in the marketplace. Hamel, a consultant on the faculty of both the London School of Economics and the Harvard Business School, makes his case forcefully and clearly: the "gale of creative destruction [theorized by economist Joseph Schumpeter] has become a hurricane. New winds are battering down the fortifications that once protected the status quo." The solution, he argues, is simple: imagine the kind of future you want for your company, then go out and create it. Businesspeople have to rethink everything they've ever learned, he argues, because firms will either become revolutionaries or will become irrelevant. In addition to cheerleading for change, Hamel fills his book with examples of companies large (Enron) and small (Sephora) that have seized huge competitive advantages by changing either their mission or the way business is done in their industry. Some of Hamel's fansAand they are legionAmay be disappointed by this volume, however, because it co clearly echoes Hamel's earlier writings. Even so, his powerful presentation may well spur to action those not already familiar with his work. 150,000 first printing; $250,000 ad/promo. (Sept.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

For the past five years, Hamel has been the biggest name in management gurudom. He and his consulting firm Strategos are regularly profiled in the business press, and his articles frequently appear in the Wall Street Journal, Fortune, and Harvard Business Review. Competing for the Future, which Hamel cowrote with C. K. Prahalad in 1994, won numerous accolades and is still an influential, often-cited work. Strategy is Hamel's mantra. He argues that companies must continuously reevaluate, update, and redefine their core strategies. IKEA, Home Depot, Charles Schwab, and Cisco are some of the "insurgents" leading Hamel's revolution, tipping over such stolid icons as Kodak, K-mart, Compaq, and Westinghouse. Hamel even maintains Nike is on shaky ground. It is not enough, he warns, to start new businesses or develop new products. Victors in the revolution must invent new ways of doing business. Attempting to validate his own "revolutionary" credentials, Hamel has re-created--or at least repackaged--the business book, this one coming with jazzy illustrations and four-color graphics; and it will be heavily promoted. David Rouse
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: Harvard Business School Press
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1578511895
• ISBN 13: 9781578511891
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 333