BUILT TO LAST

The enduring great companies from Built to Last followed the good‐to‐great framework.

There was a buildup‐breakthrough flywheel process for many. It took Sam Walton 25 years of building up momentum before the transition in 1970 where Wal‐Marts grew from 38 chains to over 3,000 by the year 2000. Then there is Bill Hewlett and David Packard of Hewlett‐Packard, whose entire founding concept for HP was not what, but who – starting with each other of course. The founding meeting in 1937, begin by stating that they would design, manufacture, and sell products in the electrical engineering fields, but the question of what to manufacture was postponed.

2. Good to Great is not a sequel to Built to Last but a prequel.

Apply the finding of Good to Great to create sustained great results, as a start‐up or an established company, and then apply the findings Built to Last to go from great results to an enduring great company.

3. To make the shift form a company with sustained great results to an enduring great company of iconic stature, apply the central concept from Built to Last: Discover your core values and purpose beyond making money and combine this with the dynamic of preserve the core/stimulate progress.

4. Good to Great answers a fundamental question raised, but not answered, in Built to Last: What is the difference between a “good” BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goal) and a “bad” BHAG.

A. Clock building, not time telling

Build an organization that can endure and adapt through multiple generations of leaders and multiple life cycles.

B. Genius of AND

Instead of choosing A or B, figure out how to have A and B – purpose AND profit, continuity AND change, freedom AND responsibility

C. Core ideology

Instill core values and core purpose as principles to guide decisions and inspire people

D. Preserve the core/stimulate the progress

Preserve the core ideology as an anchor point while stimulating change, innovation, and renewal in everything else.

*Why Greatness

The real question is not, “Why Greatness?” but “What work makes you feel compelled to try to create greatness?” If you have to ask the question, “Why should we try to make it great? Isn’t success enough?” then you’re probably engaged in the wrong line of work.