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“The most frequent cause of failures in business is not people who answered the right questions incorrectly, but people who answered the wrong questions correctly. I have seen many companies “incrementalize” themselves into a corner, through a
series of small—what appeared optimal—decisions, often based on erroneous assumptions.”
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series of small—what appeared optimal—decisions, often based on erroneous assumptions.”
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“Bower had three unwritten principles: the client is everything; think the unthinkable; and it’s not about money, but influence and reputation. He applied these principles on a daily basis at McKinsey.”
― Done: The Secret Deals that are Changing Our World
― Done: The Secret Deals that are Changing Our World
“Thus, the top-management approach has these essential characteristics: 1. We make an overall diagnosis before we decide on the specific problems to be solved. 2. We determine the order in which problems should be solved. We try to persuade the client to let us put first things first. 3. In the solution of problems, we take an integrating approach and recognize that: (a) external factors are usually important in the solution of internal problems; (b) very few problems can be solved in any single department or section of the business or government agency.36”
― McKinsey's Marvin Bower: Vision, Leadership, and the Creation of Management Consulting
― McKinsey's Marvin Bower: Vision, Leadership, and the Creation of Management Consulting
“McKinsey & Company advised AT&T not to enter the mobile telephone business, predicting there would be fewer than one million cellular phones in use by 2000. In fact, by 2000, there were one hundred million mobile phones.”
― Exponential Organizations: Why new organizations are ten times better, faster, and cheaper than yours
― Exponential Organizations: Why new organizations are ten times better, faster, and cheaper than yours
“Good follow-up is just as important as the meeting itself. The great master of follow-up was Alfred Sloan, the most effective business executive I have ever known. Sloan, who headed General Motors from the 1920s until the 1950s, spent most of his six working days a week in meetings—three days a week in formal committee meetings with a set membership, the other three days in ad hoc meetings with individual GM executives or with a small group of executives. At the beginning of a formal meeting, Sloan announced the meeting’s purpose. He then listened. He never took notes and he rarely spoke except to clarify a confusing point. At the end he summed up, thanked the participants, and left. Then he immediately wrote a short memo addressed to one attendee of the meeting. In that note, he summarized the discussion and its conclusions and spelled out any work assignment decided upon in the meeting (including a decision to hold another meeting on the subject or to study an issue). He specified the deadline and the executive who was to be accountable for the assignment. He sent a copy of the memo to everyone who’d been present at the meeting. It was through these memos—each a small masterpiece—that Sloan made himself into an outstandingly effective executive.”
― The Effective Executive: The Definitive Guide to Getting the Right Things Done
― The Effective Executive: The Definitive Guide to Getting the Right Things Done
Max’s 2025 Year in Books
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