Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #104078 in Books
• Published on: 1998-05-26
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 352 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
For years, the prevailing wisdom in business was that profitability was a by-product of market share; get the biggest piece of the market and profit will surely follow. But in the last 10 years, this formula has time and again proved itself wrong. Companies such as DEC, GM, Ford, United Airlines, Kodak and Sears have all demonstrated that market share does not necessarily lead to profitability.

The Profit Zone looks at how profit happens in today's customer-driven economy. The authors demonstrate why market share often leads to a "no-profit zone" and identify 22 profit models that have helped dozens of companies consistently make money. Included are in-depth looks at companies--Disney, GE, Microsoft, Intel, Charles Schwab--that have successfully redesigned their businesses and dramatically increased the value of their companies. Instead of focusing on market share, these innovators first looked at their customers' needs and how they could profit from fulfilling them. The book considers example after example of how the profit zone works, from Disney's theme parks to Schwab's marketing and selling of mutual funds. The final chapter is a handbook that allows managers to apply the ideas to their own companies. Clearly written and immensely practical, The Profit Zone deserves a place on every manager's bookshelf. --Amazon.com

Synopsis
This text examines the profit-strategy approaches of ten of the world's most influential business personalities, including Microsoft's Bill Gates, Andrew Grove, of Intel, and the late Roberto Goizueta, of Coca-Cola. Where is the profit zone today? Where will it be tomorrow? How do you get there before your competitors do? This book seeks to answer these questions.

From the Back Cover
The book that answers the most fundamental question in business: "Where will I make a profit tomorrow?"

"The Profit Zone could safely come with a guarantee that it would increase a company's profit if management read it and acted on it." Philip Kotler, Kellogg School, Northwestern University

"For all managers, The Profit Zone provides insights and lessons aplenty. It makes practical and usable some compelling theories for how to win in today's marketplace. Your eyes won't glaze over with this title." John A. Byrne, Business Week

"Show(s) how to achieve profitable results by developing superior insight into customer and adapting a company's business design to stay ahead of customer needs." Samuel J. Palmisano, general manager of the IBM personal Computer Company

"The Profit Zone addresses the key questions of business - why and how our customers will pay for our profit. The combination of deep analysis and example is illuminating and exhilarating." Roger Rainbow, vice-president, Global Business Environment, Shell International Ltd

"The authors build on what you already know or intuit about profitability, and take you to the next level of understanding - the level you can normally only reach if you invest hundreds if not thousands of hours of effort and brain power." Fields Wicker-Miurin, non-executive director, United News and Media; formerly Director of Strategy and Finance at the London Stock Exchange

"Riveting portraits of how some of our great executives - Roberto Goizueta, Andrew Grove, Bill Gates, Jack Welch, and Michael Eisner - have reinvented their companies." Michael Useem, Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania

"The Profit Zone is so insightful that most managers will pray that their competitors never read it." Richard D'Aveni, Amos Tuck School of Business, Dartmouth College, and author of Hypercompetition

"The Profit Zone is by far the best, most informative, and most instructive business book I've read in over a decade." David L. Sliney, president, Lamco Ventures, I.I.C.

Customer Reviews

The Place to Be

In Part One, the authors argue that "market share is dead" as an overall strategy goal. Instead, to achieve sustained growth in profits and shareholder value, companies need a "customer-centric business design" which anticipates and addresses constantly shifting customer priorities. There is no single design which fits all circumstances. but the most effective designs will start with customer priorities.

In Part Two, the co-authors shift their attention to several "reinventors" who have achieved extraordinary success. Most are familiar: Welch, Hayek, Goizueta, Schwab, Grove, Eisner, Hatsopoulos, Barnevik, and Gates. However, and this is an excellent example of the book's unique and substantial value, Slywotzy & Morrison note that "the principles and techniques of reinveniting a company's business design to get it into the industry's profit zone...apply with equal force to small companies, to divisions of larger companies, and to the middle managers who run them. In fact, the reinventors we will be reading about in the future are already honing their skills at innovative business designs today." The authors then examine several smaller firms such as Madden Communications, Cardboard Box, Inc., and Clozaril Patient Management System.

In Part Three, the authors provide a "handbook" which explains in detail how innovation works.This book is relevant to all organizations (both for-profit and non-profit) which seek to increase their economic value. Non-profits must also make critically important decisions (such as those involving allocation of resources) if they are to achieve their objectives. The appendices provide additional guidance so that the reader can implement whichever of the book's ideas and suggestions are most relevant.

If optimizing your organization's profits is your destination, here's a map to get there.

Keep your eye on the ball!
In the first part of the book Slywotzky and Morrison argue convincingly that the profit zone has shifted from the player with the greatest market share to the player who has the best business model. This model must be designed to meet customer needs and provide higher profitability. And, the business model must flexible enough to change as the landscape of profitability shifts.

Customer centric thinking is key to being in the profit zone. Slywotzky and Morrison explain that many upper level management types are not easily able to make the shift to customer centric thinking because of two reasons:

1. For twenty or more years of their career they were successful at focusing on improving products, increasing market share, and growing revenues. They functioned well in this world. Change to new thinking patterns is difficult.
2. Young companies focus on customers, but mature companies many times lose site of this. When companies are mature they focus more on themselves (internal budgets, resource concerns, politics and more).

Once the concepts of how to enter the profit zone is explained in detail, the book provides several examples of companies that were able to reinvent themselves and succeed.

Overall an excellent book about keeping your eye on the ball. In this case the "ball" is profits!

The Re-Discovery of Common Sense: A Guide To: The Lost Art of Critical Thinking

12 Breakthrough Questions for Looking Backward in Time
This outstanding book has 12 incredible questions. Answer these questions and you will be as successful as Bill Gates, Jack Welch, and Roberto Goizueta, as this incredible book points out using them as examples! Here are a few samples to whet your appetite: (1) Who are my customers? (7) What is my current business design? (12) What is my company worth? In only 15 pages, you can answer these questions for yourself. What a great deal! I think you should quickly order this book and solve these problems for yourself. You'll be amazed how much you learn.