Dealing with Darwin: How Great Companies Innovate at Every Phase of Their Evolution

by Geoffrey A. Moore

Book Overview

Geoffrey Moore is one of the most respected and bestselling names in business books. In his widely quoted Crossing the Chasm, he identified and addressed the greatest challenge facing new ventures. Now he's back with a book for established businesses that need to learn how to adapt. Illustrating his arguments with more than one hundred examples and a full-length case study based on his unprecedented access to Cisco Systems, Moore shows businesses...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1591841070
• ISBN13: 9781591841074
• Release Date: December 2005
• Publisher: Portfolio
• Length: 281 Pages
• Weight: 1.20 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.4" x 9.2"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

A cogent survival guide for the evolution of business

In a competitive, capitalist economy, nothing is more prized than the whiz-bang invention, the why-didn't-I-think-of-that product or service that defines a market, delights consumers and gushes profits. Yet for all the ink spilled over innovation, remarkably few businesspeople understand exactly how to mint revolutionary new products. Innovation expert Geoffrey A. Moore delves under the hood of the new economy to create this roadmap to creative thinking. Although the text at times bogs down in jargon and a dizzying degree of detail, he cites plenty of sharp real-world examples, including an inside view of Cisco Systems. We recommend this user's manual to innovation to anyone who thinks that survival is not an end goal, but just a place to get started.

Just a graduate student's thoughts...

I am by no means an expert in change management. In fact, I have just taken one course in this topic and chose to review this book as an assignment because of the catchy name. However, this book was very informative and reader friendly. Geoffrey Moore writes about innovation as a means to keep up with an ever changing business environment. Furthermore, he backs up each idea with a myriad of examples that reveal why certain companies have been able to thrive amidst a dismal economy. Before reading this book, I knew little of this field of management. Now, I can look at companies differently and appreciate how they have been able to deal with Darwin and survive.

Geoffrey Moore returns to his best form

In all organisations creating a common understanding of the market challenges you face is an essential step on the path to success. In this book Geoffrey goes beyond his normal domain of emerging markets and provides a universal theory with accompanying models for the creation of sustained competitive advantage. A must read for all senior executives

A unique book, that sums up and advances needed ideas

I have always enjoyed Geoffrey Moore's books which unfortunately trounced over the same old ground of the technology adoption cycle from different perspectives. This book starts out the same way, but unlike most business books gets better as it moves on. Overall, parts two and three of this book should be required reading for anyone in Product Strategy, Product Marketing or General Management. Why, well these chapters provide a complete review of the major strategies and tactics involved in managing a business. Section two talks about innovation strategies based on your company and the state of the market. The clear delineation of strategies for growth, mature, and declining markets provides a framework for plotting the structure and intent of your strategy. In growing markets: disruptive, application, or product innovation. In mature markets: Line extension, value engineering, enhancement, integration, marketing experiential, process or value migration innovation. In declining markets: Organic renewal, acquisition renewal, or harvest and exit. The clarity of Section II is a breath of fresh air as many strategy books either focus on only one of these types of innovation, or try to talk over your head with the idea that if you don't understand what they are saying, then you must not be strategic enough. This section is clear, directive, filled with examples and a great way to look at strategic direction and choice. However, Section III of this book has the real gems and the culmination of Moore's ideas and thinking. Here Moore addresses the topic of how to reallocate and evolve the enterprise to achieve its strategy and innovation goals. This is not your typical discussion of change management and change readiness. While Moore refers to them, he jumps right to the hard management decisions required to release, reallocate and reduce resource investments (money, people, attention) required to grow top and bottom line. Moore's idea and description of how to 'recycle' resources gives a fresh approach to how everyone in the company can win in a time of change. Section III is the best part of the book and the one where I made the most notes about what my company can do to be successful. While these ideas are not unique to Moore, you would have to read at least four or five separate books and integrate their ideas to create a similar explanation and reference found in Section III. Most business books tail off rapidly as the chapters move on. In fact, the first section of this book was so much of a repeat of Moore's other books I almost put it away. This book however gets better as you move through it. If you have not read Moore's other books, then I would suggest reading the whole book. If you are familiar with his work than read the prologue, first chapter and then jump to section II and III.

Crevice or Chasm?

Those who have read one or more of Moore's previous books (notably Inside the Tornado, Crossing the Chasm, and Living on the Fault Line) already know what a clear thinker and eloquent writer he is on the subject of high-tech markets, especially in terms of formulating appropriate strategies and tactics at a time when ever-accelerating change is the only constant within those dynamic markets. In Dealing with Darwin, he develops in much greater depth his response to this question: "How do great companies innovate at every phase of their evolution?" He is convinced (as am I) that there is a process of natural selection which determines why some companies prosper and most others do not. Moore cites the concept of value disciplines which Michael Treacy and Fred Wiersema first introduced in their brilliant book, The Discipline of Market Leaders: Choose Your Customers, Narrow Your Focus, Dominate Your Market. He then identifies four clusters of innovation zones: Product Leadership, Customer Intimacy, Operational Excellence, and Category Renewal. The challenge for decision-makers in any organization (regardless of its size or nature) is to select innovation zone in which to establish and sustain "break away" separation from its competitive set. Moore suggests that this decision be made in terms of three factors: 1. Core competence: different organizations have different assets to exploit 2. Competitive analysis: different sets of competitors leave different openings to exploit 3. Category maturity: Different stages of the category-maturity life cycle reward different forms of innovation Moore acknowledges an "odd pairing" of innovation leadership at the top with innovation "bubbling up from the bottom." Initiatives from both must be in proper alignment. Obviously, it is not easy to establish such an alignment and even more difficult to sustain it. Of course, Moore is well aware of that. "Managing innovation requires executives to foster a bottoms-up stream of innovation opportunities...Managing innovation also implies maintaining a portfolio of strategies because different categories will respond to different types of innovation. This creates a level of complexity that can create confusion in the broader organization, with teams being asked to pursue one form of innovation here and another there." What to do? In Chapter Four, Moore offers an innovation-types model. It can help ensure consistent and effective execution across the portfolio, and help management "to orient the organization to the logic behind the different choices and the importance of keeping them distinct from one another." I presume to add two requirements of management. First, that it facilitate effective communication, cooperation, and collaboration between and among all teams. Also, that it ensure that separate initiatives are consistent with the primary innovation strategy. Of special interest to me is what Moore has to say about managing inertia in Part Three (Chapters Nine