Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies (Paperback)

The authors explain their research methods of this six-year research project into visionary companies. "Visionary companies are premier institutions - the crown jewels - in their industries, widely admired by their peers and having a long track record of making a significant impact on the world around them." The authors used the term 'visionary', rather than just 'successful' or 'enduring', to reflect the fact they have distinguished themselves as a very special and elite breed of institutions. In order to compose these visionary companies the authors started with a set of criteria which those companies had to meet: (1) Premier institution in its industry; (2) widely admired by knowledgeable businesspeople; (3) made an indelible imprint on the world in which we live; (4) had multiple generations of chief executives; (5) been through multiple product (or service) life cycles; (6) founded before 1950. With these criteria in mind the authors select 18 visionary companies from a wide range of industries, plus 18 comparison companies (which are not weak or bad companies either).

So what do these visionary companies have in common? They have core ideologies consisting of more than a bunch of nice-sounding platitudes. A visionary company's core ideology consists of core values ("The organization's essential and enduring tenets") and purpose ("The organization's fundamental reasons for existence beyond just making money"). But the authors comment that ocre ideology alone cannot make a visionary company. Ultimately, a visionary company is build up from a core ideology complemented with a drive for progress and a preservation of the core complemented with a stimulation for progress.

The authors then turn their attention to the specific methods of preserving the core and stimulating progress that distinguishes visionary companies from the comparison companies. They split these methods up into: (1) Big hairy audaciou goals (BHAGs) ("Commitment to challenging, audicious goals and projects toward which a visionary company channels its efforts."); (2) Cult-like cultures ("Great places to work only for those who buy in to the core ideology; those who don't fit the ideology are ejected like a virus (preserves the core)."); (3)Try a lot of stuff and keep what works ("High levels of action and experimentation that produce new and unexpected paths of progress and enables visionary companies to mimic the biological evolution of specias (stimulates progress)."); (4) Home-grown management ("Promotion from within, bringing to senior levels only those who've spent significant time steeped in the coe ideology of the company (preserves the core)."); and (5) Good enough never is ("A continual process of relentless self-improvement with the aim of doing better and better, forever into the future (stimulate progress).")

In the final chapters the authors provide a summary of the book, which they refer to as the vision framework: Articulating a vision = core ideology (core values and core purpose) + envisioned future (10 to 30 year BHAG and vivid descriptions). There are also some tools to create all these items in this framework. In this 3rd edition there is also 'a message for the new economy' in which the authors conclude that the dot-com craze is based on 'Built to Flip' and not 'Built to Last' ideas. They provide some questions for to check whether your organization is built to last or built to flip. This chapter is a waste paper.

I honestly cannot believe that I read this book just a month after I read Tom Peters and Robert H. Waterman's 'In Search of Excellence' (1982). They have so much in common, it is uncanny - habits, example companies, research methods, etc. I must admit that I prefer Peters and Waterman's book better, but I can understand if readers do not feel that way. Nevertheless, this is a good book into the habits of successful companies, although the habits are somewhat 'soft', and difficult to implement in existing companies. The biggest criticism McKinsey & Co had on this book: "We really love 'Built to Last' here, but unfortunately it's useless. ... all the companies in 'Built to Last' were always great. They were never average. But that's most of the world." As an reply to this criticism Collins has recently written 'Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap ... and Others Don't' (2001). My greatest criticism on this book is the amount of repetition and therefore I recommend others to go for the e-articles 'Build Your Company's Vision' and 'Turning Goals into Results', both by the authors of this book. I also recommend Jim Collins' latest article 'Level 5 Leadership' (2001) which is based on his latest book 'Good to Great'. This book is written in simple US-English.

According to Jim Collins and Jerry Porras, it does not matter what the company ideology is, as long as it is passionately believed by the management and employees. I find this a dubious claim, and not supported by the data. The ideological frameworks of the companies that were studied are not interchangeable, not for the trivial reason that the ideology of another company happens not to be the one believed by each of them. Boeing is unlikely to spend money on a program to cure river blindness in Africa. Why does Merck do this? Clearly, a pharmaceutical firm does well to invest in a reputation for medical generosity that flows from a passion for making people well? Merck is purchasing precisely the trust that pays-off in the medical market place. Trust reduces transaction costs, and in some cases is almost as good as a monopoly. Boeing, on the other hand, must buy a brand name attached to their dedication to engineering excellence. It does matter what companies are passionate about.

My company operates on the Internet. Our pledge includes the words: "The tragedy of the commons is the propensity of users to take more from the commons than they give. We undertake to contribute more to the commons than we take. Our presence shall make the Internet safer, more useful and greater fun." Why is this a suitable ideology for our company? The answer is not that this is one we happen to believe in, and feel passionate about - although we do. Rather, this ideology is strategically fitting. We enhance to our brand name, and therefore the value of our software, by adding our reputation to the web applications we write.

In one of our daughter businesses we are a broker of information from merchants to consumer (information about products that are available) and from consumer to merchant (we generate real time demand curves for a large range of commodities). We have pledged not to become a trader. Why? In ethical terms, we should not be a trader because our insider information would give rise to conflict of interest. The trust that we gain by not being a trader, and hence remaining a disinterested supplier of market information, enables us to broker Coasian agreements with reduced transaction costs between the parties on the Internet. The advantage is large. It is on the Internet commons that trust is scarce. We are able to purchase this by foregoing some potentially profitable trades, and that pays us more in the long term in our role as an information service provider.

Our ideology was designed to give us the greatest possible strategic advantage in our markets. That is not to say we do not believe in our ideals, but that the nature of our ideology is important. It does matter what we believe. It matters what you believe, and it matters that you understand that it matters.

I strongly recommend "The Modern Firm" by Roberts. Read this alongside "Built to Last". Roberts is a harder read, but he gets under the logic of corporate dynamics better than Collins and Porras. Because "Built to Last" is characterized by an ubiquitous analytical paucity, Jim Collins and Jerry Porras' interpretations of their data are not always correct. That is a pity. Their findings are exciting, inspiring even, and the book despite its limitations is a good read.