Microsoft Secrets: How the World's Most Powerful Software Company Creates Techn

Today, Microsoft commands the high ground of the information superhighway by owning the operating systems and basic applications programs that run on the world's 170 million computers. Beyond the unquestioned genius and vision of Bill Gates, what accounts for Microsofts astounding success?

Drawing on almost two years of on-site observation at Microsoft headquarters, eminent scientists Michael A. Cusumano and Richard W. Selby reveal many of Microsoft's innermost secrets. This inside report, based on forty in-depth interviews by authors who had access to confidential documents and project data, outlines the seven complementary strategies that characterize exactly how Microsoft competes and operates, including the "Brain Trust" of talented employees and exceptional management; "bang for the buck" competitive strategies and clear organizational goals that produce self-critiquing, learning, and improving; a flexible, incremental approach to product development; and a relentless pursuit of future markets.

Cusumano and Selby's masterful analysis successfully uncovers the distinctive way in which Microsoft has combined all of the elements necessary to get to the top of an enormously important industry — and stay there.

Based on highly confidential interviews with personnel, internal memos, and top-secret company documents, this compelling portrait reveals the philosophy, style, and competitive strategies that have taken Microsoft to the heights of the high-tech industry.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 477-491) and index.

Michael A. Cusumano teaches strategy and technology managment at MIT's Sloan School of Management. He lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Contents

Preface to the Paperback Edition

Preface

Introduction

1. Organizing and Managing the Company

   Find "Smart" People Who Know the Technology and the Business

2. Managing Creative People and Technical Skills

   Organize Small Teams of Overlapping Functional Specialists

3. Competing with Products and Standards

   Pioneer and Orchestrate Evolving Mass Markets

4. Defining Products and Development Processes

   Focus Creativity by Evolving Features and "Fixing" Resources

5. Developing and Shipping Products

   Do Everything in Parallel, with Frequent Synchronizations

6. Building a Learning Organization

   Improve Through Continuous Self-Critiquing, Feedback, and Sharing

7. Attack the Future!

Appendixes

1. Microsoft Chronology
2. Main Microsoft Desktop and Business Applications
3. Microsoft Operating Systems
4. Applications Division Employee Survey
5. Selected Chronology of Microsoft Agreements for the Information Highway

Interviews

Notes

Acknowledgments

Index