Win Win Corporations

Why did Ratan Tata decide to pay for all the victims of 26/11 whether injured in the Taj or anywhere else? Why did HDFC ’s Aditya Puri insist that employees leave for home by 5.30 p.m.? How did HUL develop a cheaper, better product to beat its competitor, Nirma? What do Taj Hotels, HDFC, HUL, L&T and BPCL have in common? They are the win-win corporations! Based on over a decade of research, Shashank Shah takes these truly outstanding Indian companies and studies how they do business. Each of these companies has exceptional practices when it comes to stakeholder management. Whether the stakeholder is an employee, customer, investor, vendor or even society at large, these companies reveal how looking at everyone else’s interests doesn’t really mean compromising on your own. Often, the two complement each other and that is what makes a win-win solution for everyone. This book gives an inside look into what motivates exceptional companies and how they are a cut above the rest. Full of fascinating anecdotes, leadership philosophy and background stories of organizations, Win-Win Corporations is an inspiring read into what makes companies great.

In a world of contracting markets and diminished consumer demand, The Cambridge Group founder Rick Kash and Nielsen Company CEO David Calhoun show companies how to find new customers and bigger profits. How Companies Win makes The Cambridge Group’s proprietary demand model—a strategy which multi-million dollar corporations pay premium rates to access—available to the general public for the first time. Taking the reigns from Larry Bossidy’s Execution, W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne’s Blue Ocean Strategy, and Kash’s own The New Law of Demand and Supply, this is a must-have for succeeding in business in the twenty-first century.

The Power of Two presents the best way for your company to increase competitive advantage. By forming close collaborative relationships with a small set of customers and suppliers you can achieve a significant cost advantage over your competitors, increase your market share and achieve significant top line growth.

Explains how companies must pinpoint business strategies to a few critically important choices, identifying common blunders while outlining simple exercises and questions that can guide day-to-day and long-term decisions.

The Business of Less rewrites the book on business and the environment. For the last thirty years, corporate sustainability was synonymous with the pursuit of ‘eco-efficiency’ and ‘win-win’ opportunities. The notion of ‘eco-efficiency’ gives us the illusion that we can achieve environmental sustainability without having to question the pursuit of never-ending economic growth. The ‘win-win’ paradigm is meant to assure us that companies can be protectors of the environment whilst also being profit maximizers. It is abundantly clear that the state of the natural environment has further degraded instead of improved. This book introduces a new paradigm designed to finally reconcile business and the environment. It is called ‘net green’, which means that in these times of ecological overshoot businesses need to reduce total environmental impact and not just improve the eco-efficiency of their products. The book also introduces and explains the four pollution prevention principles ‘again’, ‘different’, ‘less’, and ‘labor, not materials’. Together, ‘net green’ and the four pollution prevention principles provide a road map, for businesses and for every household, to a world in which human prosperity and a healthy environment are no longer at odds. The Business of Less is full of anecdotes and examples. This brings its material to life and makes the book not only very accessible, but also hugely applicable for everyone who is worried about the fate of our planet and is looking for answers.

Does the character of our leaders matter? You may think this question was answered long ago. Countless business authors and analysts have assured us that great leadership demands great character. Time and again, we’ve seen that truth play out, as once-thriving organizations falter and fail under the guidance of leaders behaving badly. Why, then, do so many executives remain skeptical about the true value of leadership character? A winning strategy and a sound business model are what really matter, they argue; character is just the icing on the cake. What’s been missing from this debate is hard evidence: data that shows not only that leadership character matters for organizational success, but how it matters; and concrete evidence that it leads to better business results. Now, in this groundbreaking book, respected leadership researcher, adviser, and author Fred Kiel offers that evidence—solid data that demonstrates the connection between character, leadership excellence, and organizational results. After seven years of rigorous research based on a landmark study of more than 100 CEOs and over 8,000 of their employees’ observations, Kiel’s findings show that leaders of strong character achieved up to five times the ROA for their organizations as did leaders of weak character. Return on Character goes on to reveal: • How leadership character is formed, how it creates value, and how that value spreads throughout the organization • How low-character leaders undermine the success of even the best business plans • How leaders at any level can develop the habits of strong character and “unlearn” the habits of poor character The book also provides a character-building methodology—step-by-step advice and techniques for assessing your own character habits and improving your performance and that of your organization. Return on Character provides the blueprint for building your own leadership character and creating a character-driven organization that achieves superior business results.

Business Success Requires Strategy First In Strategy First, Brad Chase, the mind behind some of Microsoft’s largest and most successful initiatives, explains why building robust strategies is the imperative to business success. Chase leads readers through his easy-to-use strategy model, Strategy = E x mc2, which teaches readers the art of strategy—how to build and execute winning strategies relative to the competition. To supplement the model, Chase provides 5 key tips to strategy prosperity and over 50 examples from a broad range of businesses that help the reader think about how they can use his Strategy First toolkit. The author will inspire readers to examine the effectiveness of their current strategies, using the model that has served him in his distinguished career. Chase began his Microsoft tenure in 1987, where his award-winning marketing campaign promoting Windows 95 broke numerous records and his efforts as MSN.com’s leader prompted a turnaround of the site’s success. Chase ended his tenure at Microsoft in 2002 and since then has served as an advisor and/or board member to many companies, such as GE, Brooks, Expedia, and the Boys and Girls Clubs. Chase has also shared his Strategy First approach across the nation through speeches to executives at large and small businesses, incubators, and students at topflight MBA programs and at conferences.

The book looks at the corporate management system and how it affects company performance. The main theme revolves around the notion that when a company values its workers and their satisfaction, that company can achieve success. The book is unique in its quantitative perspective and analysis and examines whether a corporate management system can be regarded as a source of a firm's competitive advantage by creating a sustainable competitive advantage and firm performance. The book examines how, in the context of Japanese multinational corporations (MNCs), corporate management can be part of an MNC's strategy in enhancing its capabilities, both in the home and abroad, in Japan and in Thailand. Also, it analyses the reason for the demise of two major Indian companies, Dunlop and Hindustan Motors in terms of their unsympathetic management systems.