Leading The Revolution
Leading the Revolution, from the pen of one of the premier business thinkers of our times, Gary Hamel, talks about innovation in business models. The book states clearly that we are in the end of the incrementalism, and only those companies which are capable of creating industry revolutions will prosper in the new economy. Gary Hamel then goes on to say what businesses can do to get this revolution started in their company. He also details the criticality of innovation and discusses how true innovation is the demolition and re-creation of an entire business concept.
Through an in-depth examination of what business-concept innovation really involves Hamel leads the readers to see their own revolutionary future, and trains them in becoming activists; he also details how to transform ideas into reality. Not merely a round-up call, his book gives aspiring activists a comprehensive plan of action. He also illustrates examples from real-life corporate rebels, like John Patrick and David Grossman at IBM, Ken Kutaragi at Sony, and Georges Dupont-Roc at Shell. His message is loud and clear "Industry revolutionaries are like a missile up the tail pipe. Boom! You're irrelevant!"
The book is divided into four parts, which include Core Strategy: It is the essence of how the firm chooses to compete. II- Strategic Resources: These are unique firm-specific resources; Customer Interface; IV- Value Network: It surrounds the firm, and which complements and amlifies the firm's own resources.
In Chapter 3, Hamel writes, "In the new economy, the unit of analysis for innovation is not a product or a technology-it's a business concept...I doubt you can find a dozen individuals in your company who share a common definition of your company's existing business concept. How could they if they can't even identify the elements of a business concept? Though consultants talk incessantly about 'business models,' I've never met one who has a coherent definition of what a business model actually is. It's hard to invent a new business concept if you can't agree on its components...To be an industry revolutionary, you must develop an instinctive capacity to think about business models in their entirety."