Mavericks at Work Book Review
Mavericks at Work
William C. Taylor & Polly Labarre
Book Review
Lau Wa Kwan, Edwin
11532323G
MM511 Managing Organizations and People (2011/2012 Term 1)
Introduction
In the past 10-20 years, the environment changed vigorously due to globalization and rapid development of internet. If organizations just follow the old success formula, probably it will go out of business. In the book “Mavericks at Work”, William C. Taylor & Polly Labarre mentioned how “Mavericks” leaded their company to success in this fast changing environment. According to Oxford Dictionary, Mavericks means “an unorthodox or independent-minded person”. This book showed how Mavericks’ unorthodox thinking leaded companies to success.
4 mains areas were focused in this book, “Rethinking Competition”, “Reinventing Innovation”, “Reconnecting with Customer” and “Redesigning Work”. These 4 topics can be seen as innovative way of planning, leading, controlling and organizing functions of management.
Part One: Rethinking Competition
In the 21st Century, competition is much more vigorous than before. Many companies put too much focus on how to compete with its competitors. Their competitive strategies were to provide the same product or service as their competitor does. Quality and cost are the only difference between different competitors. It will finally lead to loss loss situation. In part one, we can see how the Mavericks perform differently in planning process.
Analysis on the market and identify a competitive strategy
Different from the other competitors, the Mavericks tried to find a market that is not discovered by other companies. ING was one of the successful Mavericks. In the year 2000 all banks targeted customers with large amount of money for high risk investment purpose. ING targeted the customers who only wanted to deposit a small amount in the bank for saving purpose. After ING found this new market, it used a focus differentiation strategy so that their
William C. Taylor & Polly Labarre
Book Review
Lau Wa Kwan, Edwin
11532323G
MM511 Managing Organizations and People (2011/2012 Term 1)
Introduction
In the past 10-20 years, the environment changed vigorously due to globalization and rapid development of internet. If organizations just follow the old success formula, probably it will go out of business. In the book “Mavericks at Work”, William C. Taylor & Polly Labarre mentioned how “Mavericks” leaded their company to success in this fast changing environment. According to Oxford Dictionary, Mavericks means “an unorthodox or independent-minded person”. This book showed how Mavericks’ unorthodox thinking leaded companies to success.
4 mains areas were focused in this book, “Rethinking Competition”, “Reinventing Innovation”, “Reconnecting with Customer” and “Redesigning Work”. These 4 topics can be seen as innovative way of planning, leading, controlling and organizing functions of management.
Part One: Rethinking Competition
In the 21st Century, competition is much more vigorous than before. Many companies put too much focus on how to compete with its competitors. Their competitive strategies were to provide the same product or service as their competitor does. Quality and cost are the only difference between different competitors. It will finally lead to loss loss situation. In part one, we can see how the Mavericks perform differently in planning process.
Analysis on the market and identify a competitive strategy
Different from the other competitors, the Mavericks tried to find a market that is not discovered by other companies. ING was one of the successful Mavericks. In the year 2000 all banks targeted customers with large amount of money for high risk investment purpose. ING targeted the customers who only wanted to deposit a small amount in the bank for saving purpose. After ING found this new market, it used a focus differentiation strategy so that their