CIOIN

Jumping The S-Curve : How Great Companies Get On Top And Stay There

By Paul Nunes & Tim Breene

Published by Harvard Business Review Press.

Rs 700

There are a host of management tomes dedicated to pursuing either business excellence or quickly rising to dominant positions. Jumping the S-Curve, however is about the hows and whys of organizations that make a succession of right moves. Jumping the S-Curve, however is about the hows and whys of organizations that make a succession of right moves.
Take the Sumitomo Group, for instance. One of the largest of kieretsu (a conglomeration of businesses linked together by cross-shareholdings to form a robust corporate structure), its roots lie in a 17th century book and medicine store in Kyoto founded by Masatomo Sumitomo. Over four centuries, the Group has thrived, getting into new markets and seeking new opportunities (copper smelting, mining, forestry and banking, to name just a few).
For authors Paul Nunes and Tim Breene, Sumitomo is the exception that proves the rule: “Many companies might be fortunate enough to launch one successful venture, but the vast majority will stumble badly when that business begins to mature.”
The book spectacularly trashes many management myths, from the over-dependence on scale as a means to growth to choosing between high growth and high profit to even that old bromide about delayed gratification after years of effort. Stimulating and full of practical advice and cases, Jumping the S-Curve, should be mandatory reading for all business executives. My recommendation: Get a copy for yourself and present one to your CEO. Read on for excerpts from reviews of this book from two of your peers who recommend it as heartily as me:
At its core, the book puts forward the idea that performance and organizations follows an S-curve—start slowly as expertise is gained, scale rapidly as this advantage is translated into performance and then the plateau as others catch up and competitive advantage erodes.
Therefore, to sustain ‘outperformance’, companies need to catch multiple S-curves sequentially. The authors examine the prerequisites for this with several examples. Companies have to identify an insight, commit resources, develop deep capabilities before scaling it up and get talent to invest its skills over decades. Meanwhile they must identify the end of the current S-curve, let go of it and get on to the next one.
Interestingly, the authors identify key disruptors such as analytics, cloud computing, and mobility, which will shorten S-curves. The chief insight for me, though, was how relevant this framework is to personal performance. Applying these insights, CIOs should be able to identify platforms that deliver business benefits and achieve sustained outperformance in their careers.