The Game-Changer: How You Can Drive Revenue and Profit Growth with Innovation » (Bargain)

A. G. LAFLEY is the chairman and CEO of P&G, which is consistently recognized as one of the most admired companies in the world and a great developer of business leaders. A.G. was named CEO of the year in 2006 by Chief Executive magazine and serves on the boards of GE and Dell. His first opportunity to manage a business came when he was in the Navy and in charge of retail and services businesses for ten thousand Navy and Marine Corps people and their families. After the Navy he went to Harvard Business School, and then joined P&G following graduation. He started as a brand assistant for Joy in 1977 and was appointed CEO in June of 2000.

RAM CHARAN is the coauthor of the bestseller Execution and the author of What the CEO Wants You to Know, Know-How, and many other books. Dr. Charan grew up in India, where he first learned the art and science of business in his family's shoe shop. After earning his M.B.A. and D.B.A. from Harvard Business School, he taught for a number of years at both Harvard and Northwestern. He now advises the leaders and boards of companies around the world, including GE, DuPont, Nokia, Verizon, and the Thomson Corporation. What people around the world proclaim are Ram's practicality and the value he provides in helping them solve business problems. For more information on Ram Charan and his work, visit his website.

How you can increase and sustain organic revenue and profit growth . . . whether you're running an entire company or in your first management job.

Over the past seven years, Procter & Gamble has tripled profits; significantly improved organic revenue growth, cash flow, and operating margins; and averaged earnings per share growth of 12 percent. How? A. G. Lafley and his leadership team have integrated innovation into everything P&G does and created new customers and new markets.

Through eye-opening stories A. G. Lafley and Ram Charan show how P&G and companies such as Honeywell, Nokia, LEGO, GE, HP, and DuPont have become game-changers. Their inspiring lessons can help you learn how to:

Make consumers and customers the boss, not the CEO or the management team
Innovate to grow a mature business
Develop higher growth, higher margin businesses
Create new customers and new markets
Revitalize a business model
Reach outside your own business and tap into the abundant brainpower and creativity of the world
Integrate innovation into the mainstream of your managerial decision making
Manage risk
Become a leader of innovation

We live in a world of unprecedented change, increasing global competitiveness, and the very real threat of commoditization. Innovation in this world is the best way to win-arguably the only way to really win. Innovation is not a separate, discrete activity but the job of everyone in a leadership position and the integral, central driving force for any business that wants to grow organically and succeed on a sustained basis.

Fortune magazine

Lafley brought a whole lot of creativity and rigor to P&G's innovation process.

Game-Changer: A Definition     vii
Our Goal     xi
How and Why Innovation at Procter & Gamble Changed Its Game     1
What P&G's Innovation Transformation Means for You     18
Drawing the Big Picture
The Customer Is Boss: The Foundation of Successful Innovation     33
Where to Play, How to Win: How Goals and Strategies Achieve Game-Changing Innovation     69
Leveraging What You Do Best: Revitalizing Core Strengths with Innovation     95
Making Innovation Happen
Organizing for Innovation: Building Enabling Structures     119
Integrating Innovation into Your Routine: From Generating Ideas to Go to Market     154
Managing the Risks of Innovation     185
The Culture of Innovation
Innovation Is a Team Sport: Courageous and Connected Culture     221
The New Job of the Leader: Innovation and Growth     253
Conclusion: How Jeff Immelt Made Innovation a Way of Life at GE     283
Afterword     301
Acknowledgments     307
Index     311