Customer Reviews

Changing Focus: Kodak and the Battle to Save a Great American Company

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Changing Focus could have been a compelling and dramatic story about the challenges still facing the Eastman Kodak Company. Sadly, it lacked focus, and more importantly, it was weak on drama.

Fiction or non-fiction, the story needs to be a 'page turner.' For example, the author glossed over the aborted attempt to move marketing headquarters from Rochester to D.C. The dramatic moment was a
semi, drapped with a protest message by local merchants, parked in front of Kodak Headquarters during a board of directors meeting. The board freaked and the move was over in a Kodak moment. The author destroys CEO Kay Whitmore's financial judgement, but omitted an infamous memo by Jack Thomas, Whitmore's president, to all employees to reduce everything from postage stamps to toilet paper to achieve fourth quarter earnings. Wall Street howled and the stock went down with the stamps.

Without the real drama, Ms. Swasy dabbles in a variety of mundane opinions by employeees, insiders and the community.
The Class of '93, a group of layoff victims, revisited often in the book, was not generally a sympathetic group. This is especially true of the Coutures, a yuppie couple impacted by layoffs, who sang, 'The world owes me a living,' throughout the book.

Swasy's biggest challenge is that the Kodak story is far from being complete. The battle with Fuji, the shift to digital, and the change in culture may one day yield a dramatic business case and drama. 'Changing Focus' is a blurred attempt, which falls short.