Most Popular Books by Jerry I. Porras

"This is not a book about charismatic visionary leaders. It is not about visionary product concepts or visionary products or visionary market insights. Nor is it about just having a corporate vision. This is a book about something far more important, enduring, and substantial. This is a book about visionary companies." So write Jim Collins and Jerry Porras in this groundbreaking book that shatters myths, provides new insights, and gives practical guidance to those who would like to build landmark companies that stand the test of time. Drawing upon a six-year research project at the Stanford University Graduate School of Business, Collins and Porras took eighteen truly exceptional and long-lasting companies -- they have an average age of nearly one hundred years and have outperformed the general stock market by a factor of fifteen since 1926 -- and studied each company in direct comparison to one of its top competitors. They examined the companies from their very beginnings to the present day -- as start-ups, as midsize companies, and as large corporations. Throughout, the authors asked: "What makes the truly exceptional companies different from other companies?" What separates General Electric, 3M, Merck, Wal-Mart, Hewlett-Packard, Walt Disney, and Philip Morris from their rivals? How, for example, did Procter & Gamble, which began life substantially behind rival Colgate, eventually prevail as the premier institution in its industry? How was Motorola able to move from a humble battery repair business into integrated circuits and cellular communications, while Zenith never became dominant in anything other than TVs? How did Boeing unseat McDonnell Douglas as the world's best commercial aircraft company -- what did Boeing have that McDonnell Douglas lacked? By answering such questions, Collins and Porras go beyond the incessant barrage of management buzzwords and fads of the day to discover timeless qualities that have consistently distinguished out-standing companies. They also provide inspiration to all executives and entrepreneurs by destroying the false but widely accepted idea that only charismatic visionary leaders can build visionary companies. Filled with hundreds of specific examples and organized into a coherent framework of practical concepts that can be applied by managers and entrepreneurs at all levels, Built to Last provides a master blueprint for building organizations that will prosper long into the twenty-first century and beyond.

A member of the AWL OD Series! This book presents a conceptual framework for organizations that will help managers and change- practitioners to better understand organizations. Drawing on that framework, the book describes an approach for diagnosing failings in organizational functioning and for planning a comprehensive set of actions needed to change the organization into a more effective system. This approach, called "Stream Analysis," is explained in detail and examples from three types of organizations are used to illustrate the explanation of the techniques of Stream Analysis.

Imagine meeting more than 300 people who've made a profound difference: not for weeks or months, but for decades. Imagine discovering what they've got in common, distilling it into a set of simple practices, and using them to transform your life. You've just imagined Success Built to Last. The culmination of the world's most thorough research project on lifelong success, this book draws on in-person conversations with hundreds of the world's most remarkable human beings. Authored by three legends in leadership and self-help - including Built to Last co-author Jerry Porras - it challenges conventional wisdom at every step.