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Who
Says Elephants Can't Dance?
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Inside
IBM's Historic Turnaround
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Available also as an executive summary from Soundview.
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From the Publisher |
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In 1990, IBM had its most profitable year ever. By
1993, the computer industry had changed so rapidly the company was on
its way to losing $16 billion and IBM was on a watch list for extinction
-- victimized by its own lumbering size, an insular corporate culture,
and the PC era IBM had itself helped invent.
Then Lou Gerstner was brought in to run IBM. Almost everyone watching
the rapid demise of this American icon presumed Gerstner had joined IBM
to preside over its continued dissolution into a confederation of
autonomous business units. This strategy, well underway when he arrived,
would have effectively eliminated the corporation that had invented many
of the industry's most important technologies.
Instead, Gerstner took hold of the company and demanded the managers
work together to re-establish IBM's mission as a customer-focused
provider of computing solutions. Moving ahead of his critics, Gerstner
made the hold decision to keep the company together, slash prices on his
core product to keep the company competitive, and almost defiantly
announced, "The last thing IBM needs right now is a vision."
Who Says Elephants Can't Dance? tells the story of IBM's competitive
and cultural transformation. In his own words, Gerstner offers a
blow-by-blow account of his arrival at the company and his campaign to
rebuild the leadership team and give the workforce a renewed sense of
purpose. In the process, Gerstner defined a strategy for the computing
giant and remade the ossified culture bred by the company's own success.
The first-hand story of an extraordinary turnaround, a unique case
study in managing a crisis, and a thoughtful reflection on the computer
industry and the principles of leadership, Who Says Elephants Can't
Dance? sums up Lou Gerstner's historic business achievement. Taking
readers deep into the world of IBM's CEO, Gerstner recounts the
high-level meetings and explains the pressure-filled, no-turning-back
decisions that had to be made. He also offers his hard-won conclusions
about the essence of what makes a great company run.
In the history of modern business, many companies have gone from
being industry leaders to the verge of extinction. Through the heroic
efforts of a new management team, some of those companies have even
succeeded in resuscitating themselves and living on in the shadow of
their former stature. But only one company has been at the pinnacle of
an industry, fallen to near collapse, and then, beyond anyone's
expectations, returned to set the agenda. That company is IBM.
Lou Gerstener, Jr., served as chairman and chief executive officer of
IBM from April 1993 to March 2002, when he retired as CEO. He remained
chairman of the board through the end of 2002. Before joining IBM, Mr.
Gerstner served for four years as chairman and CEO of RJR Nabisco, Inc.
This was preceded by an eleven-year career at the American Express
Company, where he was president of the parent company and chairman and
CEO of its largest subsidiary. Prior to that, Mr. Gerstner was a
director of the management consulting firm of McKinsey & Co., Inc. He
received a bachelor's degree in engineering from Dartmouth College and
an MBA from Harvard Business School.
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From The Critics |
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The New York Times Book Review
The book leaves the reader thinking that a few more Gerstners around in
the '90s might have prevented the bubble from swelling so large -- and
popping with such a bang.
Publisher's Weekly
Gerstner quarterbacked one of history's most dramatic corporate
turnarounds. For those who follow business stories like football games,
his tale of the rise, fall and rise of IBM might be the ultimate
slow-motion replay. He became IBM's CEO in 1993, when the gargantuan
company was near collapse. The book's opening section snappily reports
Gerstner's decisions in his first 18 months on the job-the critical
"sprint" that moved IBM away from the brink of destruction. The
following sections describe the marathon fight to make IBM once again "a
company that mattered." Gerstner writes most vividly about the company's
culture. On his arrival, "there was a kind of hothouse quality to the
place. It was like an isolated tropical ecosystem that had been cut off
from the world for too long. As a result, it had spawned some fairly
exotic life-forms that were to be found nowhere else." One of Gerstner's
first tasks was to redirect the company's attention to the outside
world, where a marketplace was quickly changing and customers felt
largely ignored. He succeeded mightily. Upon his retirement this year,
IBM was undeniably "a company that mattered." Gerstner's writing
occasionally is myopic. For example, he makes much of his own openness
to input from all levels of the company, only to mock an earnest (and
overlong) employee e-mail (reprinted in its entirety) that was critical
of his performance. Also, he includes a bafflingly long and dull
appendix of his collected communications to IBM employees. Still, the
book is a well-rendered self-portrait of a CEO who made spectacular
change on the strength of personal leadership. |
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about IBM, Books about Business, Louis V. Gerstner |
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ORDER THE BOOK |
Available also
as an executive summary from Soundview.
Click Here |
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