Synopses & Reviews
Only a third of excellent companies remain excellent over the long term. Even fewer organizational change programs succeed. In this book, Scott Keller and Colin Price draw on the most exhaustive research effort of its kind, as well as the experiences of an impressive array of senior leaders, to explore why excellence is so hard to achieve and sustain. What's more,they provide you with groundbreaking insights and practical advice on how you andyour organization can beat the odds—giving you the ultimate competitive advantage.
"Empirical, provocative, and refreshing, this book is a remarkable barometer of corporate progress. If you're running a company and you want enlightenment or inspiration about the next big step, you should read it. It's a book that has deep insights into behavior—and behavior matters, because it lies at the heart of successful culture."
—John Varley, former group CEO, Barclays Bank
"A sprinter who wins gold in the 100-meter dash and then collapses and dies isn o model for building a sustainable high-performance organization. Beyond Performance presents a powerful training plan for the institution that seeks to win today and tomorrow."
—Tom Glocer, CEO, Thomson Reuters
"Beyond Performance delivers a big, profound idea with remarkable simplicity.It draws on the accumulated experience of hundreds of companies over more than a decade to arrive at fundamental truths about how organizations large and small can stay healthy,adaptable, and responsive both now and into an uncertain future. We need more books like this one, and more authors like Keller and Price to provoke, challenge, and inform us."
—Sir David Nicholson, National Health Service Chief Executive, England
"This book makes a strong case for why a focus on organizational health, not quarter----by-quarter profits, will deliver consistent long-term results. A must-read for CEOs, senior managers, or even students who want to understand what drives long-term value creation."
—N. R. Narayana Murthy, Chairman and Chief Mentor, Infosys Technologies
"Sustainability of success is on the mind of every responsible leader. Keller and Price combine analytical rigor with a profound understanding of human behavior in describing organizational health as a way to perform beyond the short term."
—Daniel Vasella, Chairman, Novartis
"If you've ever wondered why some good organizations go bad, read this book.Keller and Price succinctly explain the reasons and show how to stop it from happening to you."
—Shikha Sharma, Managing Director and CEO, Axis Bank
Review
"
Beyond Performance is a gem – it is evidence-based, emotionally compelling, and relentlessly useful. If you want to create a team or organization that enjoys sustained financial performance—and where people love to work—this delightful book is for you."
—Robert Sutton, Stanford Professor and author of Good Boss, Bad Boss
Synopsis
What makes your company great today, however, won't necessarily make it great tomorrow. Evolving is critical to long-term corporate performance and health. Humankind's greatest invention isn't the wheel, it is organization: people working together towards a goal that is beyond what can be achieved by the sum of individuals acting alone. As each generation finds better and better ways of working together, we perform at levels that previous generations could never have imagined. On top of long term trends like cost-free availability of information and deriving differentiation by creating an experience, the world appears to be emerging from the most profound and far-reaching economic crisis since the great depression of the 1930's. And five other factors will continue to drive global change: the historic shift in economic growth from the developed to the developing world; an unprecedented imperative for mature economics to raise productivity to preserve living standards; the rise of new networks of communication and trade; a profound challenge in balancing economic growth and environmental sustainability; and an expanded role for the state in regulating markets. For organizations to not only be excellent but stay excellent, companies need to respond to these challenges with tact and understanding that with the right techniques, change can be driven to a company's advantage. If you are a leader of people who wants to change things for the better, this book is for you. If you want to leave a profound and lasting legacy in your organization and the stakeholder it serves, this book will help you do so.
Synopsis
The secret of achieving and sustaining organizational excellence revealedIn an ever-changing world where only a third of excellent organizations stay that way over the long term, and where even fewer are able to implement successful change programs, leaders are in need of big ideas and new tools to thrive. In Beyond Performance, McKinsey & Company's Scott Keller and Colin Price give you everything you need to build an organization that can execute in the short run and has the vitality to prosper over the long term.
Drawing on the most exhaustive research effort of its kind on organizational effectiveness and change management, Keller and Price put hard science behind their big idea: that the health of an organization is equally as important as its performance. In the book's foreword, management guru Gary Hamel refers to this notion as "a new manifesto for thinking about organizations."
- The authors illustrate why copying management best practices from other companies is more dangerous than helpful
- Clearly explains how to determine the mutually reinforcing combination of management practices that best fits your organization's context
- Provides practical tools to achieve superior levels of performance and health through a staged change process: aspire, assess, architect, act, and advance. Among these are new techniques for dealing with those aspects of human behavior that are seemingly irrational (and therefore confound even the smartest leaders), yet entirely predictable
Ultimately, building a healthy organization is an intangible asset that competitors copy at their peril and that enables you to skillfully adapt to and shape your environment faster than others—giving you the ultimate competitive advantage.
Synopsis
The greatest invention of all time isn't the wheel, it's organization. By working together effectively, people can achieve feats far beyond anything they could accomplish individually. At a time of unprecedented economic, political, and social change, organizations need more than ever to operate at peak levels of performance. In order to do so, they need leaders who understand both how to achieve organizational excellence and how to sustain it.
Evidence shows that only a third of organizations that achieve excellence are able to maintain it over decades. Even fewer manage to implement successful transformation programs. These statistics have devastating implications. In business, most of today's companies will falter within twenty years. In government, the majority of reform programs will fail. So will most efforts to create broader social change.
This book is written for those who intend to beat these odds. Based on one of the most extensive research efforts ever undertaken in the field of management, Beyond Performance shows how leaders can deliver performance today while also ensuring that their organizations stay fitfor the future.
About the Author
Scott Keller is a director in the Southern California office of McKinsey & Company, and leads its transformational change practice inthe Americas. He has published several articles on change management and organizational behavior, as well as a book for colleagues and clients. He holds an MBA and a BS in mechanical engineering from the University of Notre Dame and has worked as a manufacturing manager with Procter & Gamble and a photovoltaic engineer for the U.S. Department of Energy. Outside McKinsey, Scott is a cofounder of Digital Divide Data, an award-winning social enterprise that utilizes a sustainable IT service model to benefit some of the world's most disadvantaged people.
Colin Price is a director in McKinsey's London office, and leads its organization practice worldwide. He has advised many of the world's largest corporations, several national governments, and a number of charitable institutions. His booksinclude Mergers (with his colleague David Fubini and Maurizio Zollo of INSEAD), and Vertical Take-Off (with Sir Richard Evans, former chairman of British Aerospace). He holds degrees in economics, industrial relations and psychology, and organizational behavior. He is an associate fellow at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford, and a visiting professor at Bath University.
Table of Contents
Foreword ix
INTRODUCTION Excellence Found? Xiii
Only a third of organizations both achieve and sustain excellence. Why so few? People have been working together for millennia—you’d think we’d be better at it by now. And what’s the cost to business and society that we’re not?
PART I WHY PERFORMANCE IS NOT ENOUGH
CHAPTER 1 The Big Idea: Performance and Health 3
Performance is about delivering financial results in the here and now. Health is about the ability to do it year in, year out. The two are not the same. Some companies have neither; others have just one. The ultimate competitive advantage lies in having both. But how?
CHAPTER 2 The Science: Hard Facts behind the Soft Stuff 25
Health is every bit as measurable as performance. The path to health is just as clear as that to performance. The most exhaustive research ever undertaken in the field tells us so. Is a change in management accounting called for?
PART II THE FIVE FRAMES
CHAPTER 3 Aspire: Where Do We Want to Go? 47
Should we put more emphasis on short-term goals or long-term vision? Actually, it’s the medium term that matters most. Is there a recipe for success? In fact, there are four. Discover what a lottery ticket has to do with deciding which one is right for your organization.
CHAPTER 4 Assess: How Ready Are We to Go There? 77
You know where you want to go, but does your organization have the will and the skills to get there?
Finding out isn’t easy, but it is possible. Understand how through lessons learned from running a four-minute mile and observing disenfranchised monkeys.
CHAPTER 5 Architect: What Do We Need to Do to Get There? 109 Now it’s time to plan the journey to achieve your goals.
Working out what to do to improve performance isn’t enough—you need to decide what not to do as well.
And designing the how just as thoughtfully as the what will be the key to unlocking better health.
CHAPTER 6 Act: How Do We Manage the Journey? 155
Staying the course requires flexibility—adjusting as you go. Understand a tale of two pilots, put in place the right structure, and measure the right things. You’ll need extraordinary amounts of energy, so use both military and marketing tactics to drive ownership.
CHAPTER 7 Advance: How Do We Keep Moving Forward? 177
Now what? Keep changing! Once you’ve built the infrastructure for continuous improvement and the leadership competencies to drive your organization forward, change will come naturally. Ultimate competitive advantage is yours.
PART III PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER
CHAPTER 8 The Senior Leader’s Role: Does Change Have to Start at the Top? 203
The senior leader casts a long shadow. The road to success is immeasurably easier if they embrace the role that only they can play. That means making it personal, getting the right team in place, and applying the right levels of challenge and support.
CHAPTER 9 The Five Frames in Action: How Do You Make a Great Organization Even Better? 219
It’s one thing to face the challenge of turning around a struggling organization. But how do you set about transforming when life is good? Follow one company as it makes its journey through the five frames.
CHAPTER 10 Making It Happen: Do You Have What It Takes? 231
Now you’ve got the knowledge, what are you going to do with it? Start by getting a firm grip on your organization’s performance and health. Then work through the five frames. If the odds of becoming and staying excellent are to improve, it starts with you.
Notes 243
Recommended Reading 261
Acknowledgments 263
About the Authors 269
Index 271