From Products to Services: Insights and experience from companies which have embraced the service economy [Hardcover]

Laurie Young (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"...[uses] the best academic thinking, real case studies and the author's own experience...for anyone who needs to learn fast." (Market Leader, September 1, 2008)

"...for companies keen to make the leap, this book outlines useful tools for establishing effective strategies to make the transition." (CEO Middle East, September 2008)

From the Inside Flap

During the last thirty years, a wide range of product companies throughout the Western economies have considered moving into or setting up service businesses. Some have rejected the idea after careful consideration, some have wandered into competitive services without any real idea of what is involved and others have deliberately executed a carefully considered strategic manoeuvre. Included in this debate are some of the most famous business names in the western world: Unisys, Ericsson, Michelin, Nokia and HP. For IBM it was Lou Gerstener’s “big bet”; at GE it was one of former CEO Jack Welch’s “four major strategies” and, at General Motors, the financial services arm was its most profitable business for many years.

Yet very little has been published on this profound transition. As a result, myths and idiocies abound. Some routinely claim that the “evolution from products through services to solutions” is inevitable. Others think that manufacturing is being outsourced to China and India while American or European teenagers face a career in hamburger stalls. The truth is much more fascinating.

To succeed in a service business, most functions of a product company need to change. Operations, management, recruitment, finance, sales, new product development and marketing must all be adjusted. So the move into service therefore involves huge risk caused by disruptive and radical change.

What has pushed realistic business people in such widely different industrial sectors to take so large a risk? Does their experience contain lessons or warnings for others? Is the trend likely to continue and affect other parts of the world as their economies develop? Will India, China or other developing economies need to learn how to export service once their manufacturing industries mature?

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 364 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 1 edition (June 3, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470026685
• ISBN-13: 978-0470026687
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #955,229 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Laurie Young is a businessman who likes to write (see www.lauriedyoung.com). His expertise is primarily in the marketing and selling of services; a field in which he has some recognition around the world. He is trained to masters level and is one of the few independent advisers to the professions who has himself been a partner in a leading firm.

Laurie's career has included senior positions with BT, Unisys and PricewaterhouseCoopers. He has also founded, built and sold a company. He now divides his time between consultancy work, teaching, public speaking and writing. He has Chaired Fujitsu's "Customer experience management" panel and is on the Innovation Board of Allen & Overy.

Laurie has advised senior executives in a wide range of different companies (on subjects like the transition from products to services and new service design). Over the years his clients have included: Russell Reynolds Associates, Deloitte, Philips, Ericsson, Ingersoll Rand, Microsoft, the BBC, Cable & Wireless, American Express and Nokia. He has given guest lectures at a number of universities (such as Wharton, Essec, Cranfield and Gothenburg).

Yet his first love is writing. Laurie likes to find historical and academic evidence for the subjects he writes aboout. His primary interest is whether there is convincing experience to suggest that a business idea will work in practice and is more than just a fashionable fad.

He has published over a hundred articles and several books. One editor has described Laurie's writing as "evidential" and another as "beautifully expressed". His readers say that they like his ability to make complex subjects clear and to tell a business case study like a story. He has twice won international writer's awards.