Let Go To Grow: Escaping the Commodity Trap (Hardcover)

Praise for Let Go To Grow

"Over the next ten years large companies will be hit with a wide array of harrowing new business challenges—commoditization being at the top of that list.

Let Go To Grow elegantly outlines the critical new innovation, standardization, and globalization strategies that corporations can use to hurdle these obstacles and thrive in the coming years."

—George F. Colony, CEO, Forrester Research, Inc.

"This is a very important book for CEOs and top executives who are facing brutal, global competitive pressures, which is probably a majority. Let Go To Grow describes a strategy that will allow you as a business leader to do what you do best, while sidestepping the commoditization that's driving down profit margins in so many businesses. This book reflects not only what IBM is thinking, but also what other companies ranging from Dell to FedEx to Wal-Mart are doing to win in extremely competitive markets. Read this book for practical real-world insights, not for any academic theories."

—William J. Holstein, Editor-in-Chief, Chief Executive magazine

"Let Go To Grow is a must-read for executives who are trying to use strategy and management practices to drive innovation and productivity gains. It puts concepts like componentization, outsourcing, and off-shoring in a much more strategic context than anything else I've read. The book clearly shows how winning companies have gone from optimizing value chains to managing global "value webs" for competitive advantage. The argument is enhanced significantly by specific practical case examples featuring leading companies like Dell, eBay, GE, Procter & Gamble, and Toyota."

—Tony Friscia, President and CEO, AMR Research

"Sanford and Taylor carefully analyze the global marketplace and offer a progressive new strategy for transforming an underperforming business...A pioneering blueprint for the 21st-century business."

—Kirkus Reports

Drive sustained growth!

—Use on demand techniques to gain unprecedented speed, flexibility, and adaptability

—Construct dynamic "value webs" that leverage innovation from any source

Deregulation, globalization, and the Internet are driving rampant commoditization in virtually every industry. To escape that trap and grow profitably, you must "let go" of traditional control mechanisms. In their place, you must build new models, relationships, and platforms that capture and deliver value from multiple sources, inside and outside the enterprise.

In Let Go To Grow, IBM senior executive Linda Sanford and long-time entrepreneur Dave Taylor show exactly how to do that.

Sanford and Taylor systematically review the On Demand Business processes, people strategies, technology shifts, governance practices, and leadership vision you'll need to maximize profitability in tomorrow's business environment. They introduce powerful new techniques for balancing and measuring three key drivers of top-line growth: productivity, collaboration, and innovation.

You'll discover how to gain unprecedented flexibility by constructing your business around components, platforms, and standardized interfaces. The authors demonstrate how to expand your growth space, liberate your cost structures, and build profits—not just revenues. Drawing on the experiences of companies ranging from GE to eBay, Toyota to IBM, this book focuses on practical implementation, offering a proven, start-to-finish approach for moving from vision to results.

• Create a virtuous cycle of growth.
  Discover how great companies are escaping commoditization and the vagaries of economic cycles.

• Improve, balance, and measure the key drivers of top-line growth.
  Use on demand techniques to supercharge productivity, collaboration, and innovation.

• Drive unprecedented agility with proven on demand strategies.
  "Open up" your firm: source and coordinate capabilities dynamically, on-the-fly.

• Build flexible "value webs" that liberate your cost structures.
  Master powerful new ways to refocus precious resources on growth.

• "Componentize" your business functions, processes, and services.
  Simplify the creation of any new business configuration, from supply chain management to customer service.

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