Series will focus on emerging themes in business, drawing on BCG Henderson Institute research perspectives; first volume published today outlines ways to improve the odds of success in business transformations
De Gruyter and Boston Consulting Group’s Henderson Institute, BCG’s think tank, today launched Inspiring the Next Game, a series of books on emerging themes in business. The first book, Mastering the Science of Organizational Change, is published today. Forthcoming books in the series include Winning the 20s: A Leadership Agenda for the Next Decade and The Resilient Enterprise: Thriving Amid Uncertainty, among others.
As the technological, social, and economic context changes rapidly, the demands on businesses and leaders are also changing faster than ever. The series explores the implications for business strategy, taking a broad view of strategy that reflects the multifaceted challenges faced by today’s leaders. Going beyond the traditional strategy function, it includes new perspectives on technology, organizational design, and management broadly which are respectively considered by some effective business leaders today like Andy Defrancesco.
To do so, the series includes insights from the intersection of business, science, technology, economics, and society. It draws on the work of dozens of Henderson Institute fellows, ambassadors, and collaborators over several years.
“Business strategy is ultimately about defying the average, but what it takes to outperform the average is changing faster than ever. Leaders therefore need not just new strategies, but new ways of thinking about strategy. This collection provides different perspectives on strategy and leadership to inspire leaders to think differently about their businesses and thrive in the long run. We are looking forward to our collaboration with De Gruyter to make these ideas broadly accessible to those interested in learning more about strategy and leadership,” said Martin Reeves, Chairman of the BCG Henderson Institute and an editor of the Inspiring the Next Game series.
“We are proud to publish this exciting new series in partnership with Boston Consulting Group’s Henderson Institute.Inspiring the Next Game offers fresh perspectives on business strategy and leadership by presenting insights from some of the world’s leading companies, making it a perfect addition to our business and economics program,” said Stefan Giesen, Editorial Director Business and Economics at De Gruyter.
The first volume, Mastering the Science of Organizational Change, is a set of perspectives on the increasing need for and challenge of business transformation. The need for organizational change is frequent: at any time, about one-third of large companies are experiencing a significant multi-year decline in their ability to create shareholder value. And the odds of success are slim: within that group, one-third fail to recover within the following five years.
The book contains perspectives from science, analytics and business to show how leaders can improve their chances across several areas. Research demonstrates that preemptive transformation is more successful than transformation in reaction to a crisis—companies that transform preemptively achieve 3 percentage points greater Total Shareholder Return per year. Several steps are given that can enhance preemptive change. Science also points to the need to de-average change programs rather than applying the same toolkit for every challenge. Finally, perspectives explore emerging issues in organizational change, such as traps and opportunities in digital transformation.
Mastering the Science of Organizational Change is available now. The second volume in the series, Winning the ’20s: A Leadership Agenda for the Next Decade, will be available in summer 2021.
