Own the Future: 50 Ways to Win from The Boston Consulting Group

The world faces social, political, and economic turmoil on an unprecedented scale—along with unsettling levels of turbulence and volatility. Market leadership today is less of a predictor of leadership tomorrow. Therefore, senior executives today must strive to own the future. In Own the Future, The Boston Consulting Group, one of the world’s most prestigious and innovative management consulting firms, offers a roadmap. Drawing on the firm’s experience advising organizations on how to achieve and sustain competitive advantage, this book offers 50 ideas to help readers chart their organization’s path to future leadership. The articles are organized along ten attributes critical to success in the current environment—adaptive, global, connected, sustainable, customer-first, fit to win, value-driven, trusted, bold, and inspiring. The future may be unknowable, but The Boston Consulting Group offers insights from its 50 years of practice on how readers can position their organization to win—to change the game and to own the future.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgments ix Introduction 1 I Adaptive 7 1 Why Strategy Needs a Strategy 11 Martin Reeves, Michael Deimler, Claire Love, and Philipp Tillmanns 2 Adaptability: The New Competitive Advantage 19 Martin Reeves and Michael Deimler 3 Systems Advantage 27 Martin Reeves and Alex Bernhardt 4 Adaptive Leadership 33 Roselinde Torres, Martin Reeves, and Claire Love 5 Competing on Capabilities 41 George Stalk, Jr., Philip Evans, and Lawrence E. Shulman II Global 53 6 Globality: The World beyond Globalization 55 Harold L. Sirkin, Jim Hemerling, and Arindam K. Bhattacharya 7 The New Global Challengers 61 Marcos Aguiar, Arindam K. Bhattacharya, Thomas Bradtke, David C. Michael, Tenbite Ermias, Whitney Haring-Smith, David Lee, Michael Meyer, Andrew Tratz, Masao Ukon, and Bernd Waltermann 8 Winning in Emerging-Market Cities 67 David Jin, David C. Michael, Paul Foo, Jos´e Guevara, Ignacio Pe˜na, Andrew Tratz, and Sharad Verma 9 What the West Doesn’t Get about China 75 George Stalk, Jr. and David C. Michael 10 The African Challengers 81 Lionel Ar´e, Sami Chabenne, Patrick Dupoux, Lisa Ivers, David C. Michael, and Yves Morieux III Connected 89 11 The Digital Manifesto 91 David Dean, Sebastian DiGrande, Dominic Field, and Paul Zwillenberg 12 Data to Die For 99 Simon Kennedy and David Matheson 13 The Collision of Power and Portability 105 Philip Evans 14 China’s Digital Generations 3.0: The Online Empire 111 David C. Michael, Christoph Nettesheim, and Yvonne Zhou IV Sustainable 117 15 The Benefits of Sustainability-Driven Innovation 119 David Kiron, Nina Kruschwitz, Martin Reeves, Knut Haanaes, and Eugene Goh 16 Creating Practical Consumer Value from Sustainability 125 Knut Haanaes, Catherine Roche, Jonathan Sharp, and Marty Smits 17 Potential Impacts of the New Sustainability Champions 131 David C. Michael, Kim Wagner, Knut Haanaes, Eugene Goh, Diederik Vismans, Jeremy Jurgens, and Lyuba Nazaruk V Customer First 135 18 Breaking Compromises 137 George Stalk, Jr., David K. Pecaut, and Benjamin Burnett 19 Brand-Centric Transformation: Balancing Art and Data 143 Dylan Bolden, Antonella Mei-Pochtler, Rohan Sajdeh, Gaby Barrios, Erin George, Keith Melker, and Deran Taskiran 20 Unlocking Growth in the Middle: A View from India and China 151 Zhenya Lindgardt, Christoph Nettesheim, and Ted Chan 21 Treasure Hunt 159 Michael J. Silverstein VI Fit to Win 169 22 High-Performance Organizations 171 Vikram Bhalla, Jean-Michel Caye, Andrew Dyer, Lisa Dymond, Yves Morieux, and Paul Orlander 23 Shaping Up: The Delayered Look 179 Ron Nicol 24 Getting More from Lean: Seven Success Factors 183 Pascal Cotte, Adam Farber, Amyn Merchant, Petros Paranikas, Harold L. Sirkin, and Michael Zinser 25 The Demand-Driven Supply Chain 189 John Budd, Claudio Knizek, and Bob Tevelson 26 Pricing Fluency 195 Sylvain Duranton, Jean-Manuel Izaret, and Rich Hutchinson 27 The IT Organization of the Future 201 Jeanne W. Ross, Stephanie L. Woerner, Stuart Scantlebury, and Cynthia M. Beath VII Value-Driven 207 28 The Experience Curve Reviewed 211 Bruce Henderson 29 The Rule of Three and Four: A BCG Classic Revisited 215 Martin Reeves, Michael Deimler, George Stalk, Jr., and Filippo L. Scognamiglio Pasini 30 The CEO as Investor 221 Gerry Hansell and Dieter Heuskel 31 Focusing Corporate Strategy on Value Creation 227 Jeffrey Kotzen, Eric Olsen, Frank Plaschke, Daniel Stelter, and Hady Farag 32 Powering Up for Postmerger Integration 235 Jean-Michel Caye, Jeanie Daniel Duck, Daniel Friedman, Dan Jansen, Joe Manget, Alexander Roos, and Peter Strüven 33 Resilience: Lessons from Family Businesses 243 Nicolas Kachaner, George Stalk, Jr., and Alain Bloch VIII Trusted 251 34 Social Advantage 253 Martin Reeves, Dieter Heuskel, and Thomas Lewis 35 From Reciprocity to Reputation 259 Philip Evans 36 The Return of the Politician 263 Dieter Heuskel and Martin Reeves 37 Collaboration Rules 267 Philip Evans and Bob Wolf IX Bold 275 38 Thinking in New Boxes 279 Luc de Brabandere and Alan Iny 39 Rethinking Scenarios: What a Difference a Day Makes 285 Luc de Brabandere and Alan Iny 40 Business Model Innovation: When the Game Gets Tough, Change the Game 291 Zhenya Lindgardt, Martin Reeves, George Stalk, Jr., and Michael Deimler 41 The Deconstruction of Value Chains 299 Carl W. Stern 42 Time-Based Management 303 Thomas M. Hout and George Stalk, Jr. 43 The New ‘‘Low Cost’’ 307 Nicolas Kachaner, Zhenya Lindgardt, and David C. Michael 44 The Hardball Manifesto 315 George Stalk, Jr. and Rob Lachenauer 45 Leading Transformation 319 Andrew Dyer, Grant Freeland, Steve Gunby, and Cynthia Blendu X Inspiring 325 46 Jazz vs. Symphony 327 John S. Clarkeson 47 Probing 331 Jonathan L. Isaacs 48 Smart Simplicity 335 Yves Morieux 49 Strategic Optimism: How to Shape the Future in Times of Crisis 343 Hans-Paul Bürkner 50 Lessons from My Three Decades with the Change Monster 349 Jeanie Daniel Duck Contributors 355 Index 365