Unstoppable: Finding Hidden Assets to Renew the Core and Fuel Profitable Growth (Hardcover)

by Chris Zook (Author)
Key Phrases: adjacency moves, using hidden assets, profit pool, American Express, Boston Scientific, United States (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"...good ideas about how companies can squeeze their core businesses for all they are worth." --The Economist, July 12, 2007

"Zook provides solid...ground-breaking, advice for finding the strengths that lie dormant within a company." --BusinessWeek, June 18, 2007

Based on a thorough analysis of a rich set of data, and supported by extended interviews with and studies of a range of corporations... --The Financial Times, April 30, 2007

Product Description
Over the next decade, two out of every three companies will face the challenge of their corporate lives: redefining their core business. Buffeted by global competition and facing an uncertain future, more and more executives will realize that they must make fundamental changes in their core even as they continue delivering the goods and services that keep them in business today. "Unstoppable" shows these managers how to look deep within their organizations to find undervalued, unrecognized, or underutilized assets that can serve as new platforms for sustainable growth. Drawing on more than thirty interviews with CEOs from companies such as De Beers, American Express, and Samsung, it shows readers how to recognize when the core needs reinvention and how to deploy the "hidden assets" that can be the basis for tomorrow's growth. Building on the author's previous books, "Profit from the Core" and "Beyond the Core", this book shows how any company in crisis can transform itself to become truly unstoppable.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 208 pages
• Publisher: Harvard Business School Press; 1 edition (May 3, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1422103668
• ISBN-13: 978-1422103661
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #122,833 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Pogo was right., June 18, 2007

By	Robert Morris (Dallas, Texas) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

In two previously published books, Profit from the Core (2001) and then Beyond the Core (2004), Chris Zook shares what several years of extensive and intensive research revealed about "how companies fail to recognize the potential of their core business and, as a result, prematurely abandon it in pursuit of hot markets or sexy new ideas, only to realize their error - often, when it is too late." He suggests a systematic way for organizations to assess their full potential and to make certain, also, that they do not fall into "this common, and typically human, trap."

In this volume, Zook draws upon an even wider and deeper wealth of research sources that include about fifty interviews, mostly of CEOs. The title is explained by the fact that he and his associates chose to study most closely those companies "that beat the odds. We also analyzed patterns of failure and estimated the odds of success offered by various paths in various situations." He goes on to observe that all of the success stories built their renewal on their "hidden assets" that had been previously been undervalued, unrecognized, and/or underutilized. "These assets were not central to the strategy of the past, but they held the key to the future. Furthermore, the older and more complex the company, the greater was the likelihood of finding promising hidden assets." In other words, many companies already "hold most of the cards for "a winning hand" but do not realize it.

I highly recommend all three of Zook's books because, together, they answer three separate but related, and critically important questions:

1. How to define and grow an organization's core assets? (Profit from the Core)
2. How to expand its boundaries into new territory? (Beyond the Core)
3. How to redefine and renew its core? (Unstoppable)

No company is forever "unstoppable" but most (if not all) companies can take full advantage of the information and counsel Zook provides in this book to find correct answers to all three of these questions achieve core renewal without "leaps to distant and hot new markets, ...being the first adopter of a pioneering new strategy,...[or making] as `big bang' acquisition." In fact, unless a given organization has "beaten the odds" by sustaining profitable growth, it should first define or redefine its core assets and then grow or renew them, before committing any resources to organizational and/or territorial expansion.

Zook is to be commended on the care with which he defines various terms. For example, undervalued business platforms "that might have once been secondary in importance but now have the potential to be the foundation for a new major core business"(e.g. IBM's Global Services Group). Also unexploited customer assets that tend to exist in three primary forms: "knowledge gathered as part of serving the customer but that, over time, accumulates an inherently greater value of its own...a unique position of trust of relationship with a set of customers [that gives] much more access and influence than has been recognized (e.g. American Express and Harman International). And finally, underutilized capabilities ("the most difficult hidden asset to discern but no less powerful") that result in losses of position to competitors in terms of cost, speed, logistics, design, and quality of customer service (e.g. the United States Postal Service's inability to invest as much as FedEx and UPS in system upgrades). "At the root of such competitive reversals we often find a yawning capability gap that was undetected, dismissed, or ignored."

I especially appreciate Zook's skillful use of various reader-friendly devices such as check-lists that focus on key points covered within a chapter: "Seven Steps to Redefining Your Core" (pages 24-25), a "State of the Core Diagnostic" (Figure 2-3 on Page 44), "Detecting Undervalued Business Platforms" (Pages 82 and 83), "Identifying Hidden Customer Assets" (Page 115), "Defining Your Core Capabilities" (Page 140), and "Ten Principles of Core Growth and Redefinition" (Page158). These and other check-lists facilitate, indeed expedite frequent review of key points later.

Although hidden assets are the "real key" to redefinition and capabilities are "the building blocks of renewal," and I agree with Zook that they are, it is important to keep in mind that transformation and renewal initiatives should never end. Zook asserts that "the real focus of business should be external - on competitors, shifts in technology, and customer dynamics." However, ironically, for many companies now searching for profitable growth, some "of their most challenging demons are internal" and their "most difficult foes" are often themselves. Unless they identify and then leverage the hidden assets they already have or to which they have easy access, they will either be out-of-business or acquired by another company within the next ten years.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Important information on how to continue to survive over the long haul..., June 3, 2007

By	Thomas Duff "Duffbert" (Portland, OR United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Nothing stays the same in the business world, and even successful businesses will face their own demise if they are not thinking ahead to their next "core" business. Chris Zook examines this redefinition of business in the book Unstoppable: Finding Hidden Assets to Renew the Core and Fuel Profitable Growth. This is an important book for all businesses, especially those who think they're on top of the curve right now...

Contents:
Unsustainable to Unstoppable; When to Redefine the Core; Undervalued Business Platforms; Untapped Customer Insights; Underutilized Capabilities; Managing Through the Growth Cycle; Appendix; Notes; Bibliography; Index; About the Author

When a company is trying to redefine their core, often they'll do one of three things. They'll either commit ever more deeply to what they currently do, they'll move into an area where they have no experience, or they'll merge with some other group to form a new mega-power. But Zook shows through research that each of those moves has a very small chance of success over the long term. The odds are much better when companies examine what they already have, and then map out how to leverage those hidden assets. They often fall into the categories of undervalued business platforms, unexploited customer assets, or underutilized capabilities. By moving in these areas where you already have traction, the company can be redefined to meet the next growth period. Zook has plenty of case study examples to back up his premise. PerkinElmer went from precision optics to genetic research using a small niche subsidiary they had. American Express took their massive data assets and redefined how they catered to customers. These and many other stories help to flesh out an important message... Change is inevitable, and it's best to be out in front of it, rather than playing catch-up in survival mode.

I can't think of too many businesses that wouldn't benefit from a structured examination of what they do and where things are going. Even if you don't feel you need to change right now, it's important to be thinking along those lines. That time *will* come, regardless of whether you want it to or not...

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Adapt or reinvent, but don't go down with the ship!, May 5, 2007

By	Jeff Lippincott "www.Jlippin.com" (Princeton, NJ USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

I have not read the author's other two books. The instant one is his latest, and from what I gather it is kind of part three of a 3-part series. But I really liked this book. I'm a volunteer SCORE counselor and earlier this week I got an email from a client who had just closed the doors to his franchise. He still owed on a multi-year lease and he wanted to know how he could minimize his losses. I mention this here because as I read this book my recommendation to the client came to mind. I recommended that even though the business was failed, it could still be sold. And I recommended that an attempt should be made to turn the business around before it was sold.

This book is about not letting a failing business go under. It is about taking the existing assets (and liabilities) of a business and using them to move in a new direction so the business will not fail. By shifting the direction the company moves in so it can get back in a growth mode (or at least a sustainable mode) the leader/manager of the business will not let the business fail.

The book is comprised of five chapters as follows:

1. Unsustainable to unstoppable.
2. When to redefine the core.
3. Undervalued business platforms.
4. Untapped customer insights.
5. Underutilized capabilities.
6. Managing through the growth cycle.

The author talks about tapping on hidden assets. Those are the assets a business has that it underutilitzes. My understanding of "hidden assets" is that they are assets that do not fit the business model of the failing business, but they exist and are owned by the business. And when the business model (or business goals) are changed, then those hidden assets show themselves and they become very valuable assets to the business. It's because of the existence of those hidden assets that an unsustainable business can be morphed and made into an unstoppable business in its quest to sustain itself and grow.

If you are interested in turnarounds, performance renewal, organization, management, and leadership, then this book will have something for you. It's all about not relying on past formulas for success when the chips are down. It about having an open mind and making the most with what you have. You'll be able to do that if you are able to redefine your business' strategy to make money. Just figure out what you've got and work with it in order to maximize profit that can be sustained. Don't ever go down with the ship - patch the hole and revamp the boat so it can sail again. Sometimes this requires just adapting. While at other times it demands reinvention. 5 stars!