This is one of my favorite business books. I refer to it periodically to help ground me in the fundamental foundations of business. It tells you why everyone in a business should care about cash, inventory, product mix, merchandising, pricing, return on assets, customer focus, product quality, velocity, and growth.
It’s a very simple, straight-forward (and short) read. And he brings all the pieces together to help you understand your company’s “total business.” When we do our extended performance management discovery work, we like to look at how those drivers interrelate across all the functions within the business and to the ecosystem beyond.
I’ve seen some negative reviews of this book on Amazon.com, saying it’s “overly simplified,” but that is the value. Business can be very complex theses days and it pays to simplify things – or at least clarify them. Asking “how does this initiative impact profitable revenue growth” is a very valuable question.
I like reading Ram Charan’s stuff – and I enjoyed an article about him in the April edition of Fortune Magaine – see
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2007/04/30/8405482/index.htm
I’d like to meet Dr. Charan one day. If you’re reading this, sir, and happen to be passing through Washington Dulles or Reagan airports (or even BWI), I’d be happy to buy you a coffee and show you our methodology. I’d even pay for a cheap one-way ticket just to get past security!
On a side note, we here at the Business Foundation are honored that Oracle has (probably inadvertently) given us the nod in naming their new Fusion Middleware World Tour. See http://www.oracle.com/events/fusion-middleware-forum/index.html
Remaining 2007 dates in North America: December 5 in Denver and December 7 in Milwaukee.
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