If you are a business owner or a leader within an organization, you MUST read this book.
If you want to build a visionary organization, this is the book for you.
The book will completely change the way you think about the culture, structure, and many other important components of your business.
Flow: 5/5
Actionability: 5/5
Mindset: 5/5
Some of My Highlights:
“There are many ways to measure the success of a book, but for us the quality of our readership stands at the top of the list.”
“Myth 7: Visionary companies are great places to work, for everyone. Reality: Only those who ‘fit’ extremely well with the core ideology and demanding standards of a visionary company will find it a great place to work. It’s binary. There’s no middle ground. It’s almost cult-like.”
“Their greatest creation is the company itself and what it stands for.”
“They just started moving forward, trying anything that might get them out of the garage and pay the light bills.”
“…Sam Walton also started without a great idea. He went into business with nothing other than the desire to work for himself and a little bit of knowledge (and a lot of passion) about retailing.”
“J. Willard Marriott had the desire to be in business for himself, but not clear idea of what business to be in.”
“The problem is, how do you develop an environment in which individuals can be creative?… I believe that you have to put a good deal of thought into your organizational structure in order to provide this environment.”
“…the shift to seeing the company itself as the ultimate creation.”
“He created cash awards and public recognition for associates who contribute cost saving and/or service enhancements ideas that could be reproduced at other stores.”
“Tips and ideas generated by associates got published in the Wal-Mart internal magazine.”
“In the 1930s, he established art classes for all animators, installed a small zoo on location to provide live creatures to help improve their ability to draw animals, invented new animation team processes (such as storyboards), and continually invested in the most advanced animation technologies.”
“A visionary company doesn’t seek balance between short-term and long-term, for example. It seeks to do very well in the short-term and very well in the long-term.”
“F. Scott Fitzgerald pointed out, ‘The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.”
“Yes, Sony made crude heating pads and sweetened bean-paste soup to keep itself alive (pragmatism), but it always dreamed and pushed toward making pioneering contributions (idealism).”
“And, during the same era, he boldly introduced the $5 day for workers which, at roughly twice the standard industry rate, shocked and outraged the industrial world.”
“People who make the numbers and share our values go onward and upward. People who miss the numbers and share ur values get a second chance. People with no values and no numbers – easy call.”
“Visionary companies tend to have only a few core values, usually between three and six.”
“The only sacred cow in an organization should be its basic philosophy of doing business.”
“We’ve found that companies get into trouble by confusing core ideology with specific, noncore practices.”