Reorganize for Resilience: Putting Customers at the Center of Your Business

by Ranjay Gulati

Overview

In an era of raging commoditization and eroding profit margins, survival depends on resilience: staying one step ahead of your customers. Sure, most companies say they're "customer-focused," but they don't deliver solutions to customers' thorniest problems. Why? Because they're stymied by the rigid "silos" they're organized around. In Reorganize for Resilience, Ranjay Gulati reveals how resilient companies prosper both in good times and bad, driving growth and increasing profitability by immersing themselves in the lives of their customers. This book shows how resilient organizations cut through internal barriers that impede action, build bridges between warring divisions, and transform former competitors into collaborators.

Based on more than a decade of research in a variety of industries, and filled with examples from companies including Cisco Systems, La Farge, Starbucks, Best Buy, and Jones Lang LaSalle, Gulati exploresthe five levers of resilience:

· Coordination: Connect, eradicate, or restructure silos to enable swift responses.

· Cooperation: Foster a culture that aligns all employees around the shared goals of customer solutions.

· Clout: Redistribute power to "bridge builders" and customer champions.

· Capability: Develop employees' skills at tackling changing customer needs.

· Connection: Blend partners' offerings with yours to provide unique customer solutions.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781422117217
Publisher:	Harvard Business Review Press
Publication date:	01/04/2010
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	6.50(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Ranjay Gulati is the Jaime and Josefina Chua Tiampo Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School.

Table of Contents

Contents
Introduction
How Resilient is Your Organization?
The Key is Customer Centricity
Chapter One
Building a Resilient Organization
The Process and the Tools for Systemic Integration
Chapter Two
Lever 1: Coordination
Aligning Activities and Information Around the Customer Axis
Chapter 3
Lever 2: Cooperation
Ensuring Attitudes and Behaviors Are Customer-Focused
Chapter Four
Lever 3: Clout
Empowering Customer Champions
Chapter Five
Lever 4: Capabilities
Developing the Skills to Cope with Changing Customer Needs
Chapter Six
Lever 5: Connections
Forging External Links to Stay Strong and Flexible
Conclusion
Toward Greater Customer Centricity
Using the five levers to increase your resilience