How The Mighty Fall: And Why Some Companies Never Give In
Jim Collins

Decline can be avoided.

Decline can be detected.

Decline can be reversed.

Amidst the desolate landscape of fallen great companies, Jim Collins began to wonder: How do the mighty fall? Can decline be detected early and avoided? How far can a company fall before the path toward doom becomes inevitable and unshakable? How can companies reverse course?

In How the Mighty Fall, Collins confronts these questions, offering leaders the well-founded hope that they can learn how to stave off decline and, if they find themselves falling, reverse their course. Collins' research project--more than four years in duration--uncovered five step-wise stages of decline:

Stage 1: Hubris Born of Success

Stage 2: Undisciplined Pursuit of More

Stage 3: Denial of Risk and Peril

Stage 4: Grasping for Salvation

Stage 5: Capitulation to Irrelevance or Death

By understanding these stages of decline, leaders can substantially reduce their chances of falling all the way to the bottom.

Great companies can stumble, badly, and recover.

Every institution, no matter how great, is vulnerable to decline. There is no law of nature that the most powerful will inevitably remain at the top. Anyone can fall and most eventually do. But, as Collins' research emphasizes, some companies do indeed recover--in some cases, coming back even stronger--even after having crashed into the depths of Stage 4.

Decline, it turns out, is largely self-inflicted, and the path to recovery lies largely within our own hands. We are not imprisoned by our circumstances, our history, or even our staggering defeats along the way. As long as we never get entirely knocked out of the game, hope always remains. The mighty can fall, but they can often rise again.

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How The Mighty Fall: And Why Some Companies Never Give In

Amazon Rating:
US$16.31
(As of Sep 08 23:00 , info)

2 reviews from Entrepreneur blogs:

The 4-Hour Workweek and Timothy Ferris 23 Aug 10:
... In the below five-minute discussion, NY Times bestselling author Ramit Sethi and I discuss the pros and cons of self-publishing vs. getting a “real” publisher: In Closing For established and successful authors, like Seth Godin or Jim Collins, self-publishing in print or digital is a supremely viable option. Jim Collins self-published his last print book, How the Mighty Fall, and was featured on the cover of BusinessWeek magazine to help push it up the bestseller ranks. Seth could do the same. Why is this possible? Because they have incredible reputations that were built, in part, on top of the traditional publishing machine. The Big Six and their close cousins are in real trouble. ...
Inc. 11 Dec 09:
... figured out ways to profit from economic uncertainty. “Innovation is not about market timing, ” he reminds readers. “It’s about creating something that fulfills an unmet need. ” Recommended by Jack Covert. Delivered with Collins’ trademark passion and clarity, How the Mighty Fall is a critical reminder to business leaders that decisions aimed at spectacular growth may sow the seeds of an organization’s destruction. The author deconstructs the overarching leadership flaws (hubris, denial of risk, etc. ) that doom companies—including some of ...

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4 reviews from Productivity blogs:

The 4-Hour Workweek and Timothy Ferris 23 Aug 10:
... In the below five-minute discussion, NY Times bestselling author Ramit Sethi and I discuss the pros and cons of self-publishing vs. getting a “real” publisher: In Closing For established and successful authors, like Seth Godin or Jim Collins, self-publishing in print or digital is a supremely viable option. Jim Collins self-published his last print book, How the Mighty Fall, and was featured on the cover of BusinessWeek magazine to help push it up the bestseller ranks. Seth could do the same. Why is this possible? Because they have incredible reputations that were built, in part, on top of the traditional publishing machine. The Big Six and their close cousins are in real trouble. ...
Michael Hyatt 02 Mar 10:
... has asked me to host “Backstage Leadercast. ” I will be in the “Green Room, ” interviewing the speakers as they come and go. This will be broadcast on the Web before the event, during the breaks, and after the event. I will be talking with: Jim Collins: Author of Good to Great, How the Mighty Fall, and co-author of Built to Last; Chip Heath: Author of Made to Stick (along with his brother), columnist for Fast Company, and Stanford Professor; John C. Maxwell: Leadership expert and best-selling author of The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership and Put Your Dream to the ...
Michael Hyatt 10 Nov 09:
... In How the Mighty Fall, author Jim Collins answers the question, “How can large successful companies fail after decades of growth and stability?” Tim Irwin asks a similar question about leaders in his new book, Derailed: Five Lessons Learned from Catastrophic Failures of Leadership (Thomas Nelson, 2009). In a moment, I will tell you how to get a free copy. In his Preface (p. xiii), Patrick Lencioni, author or The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, writes, In my work as a consultant, I can honestly say I have never discovered a company I thought was just too dumb to succeed. Nor have I yet ...
Michael Hyatt 22 Oct 09:
... Nelson author John Maxwell in 2000 as the “Maximum Impact Simulcast. ” What started out as a half-day, classroom style event with John has since become a full-day, experiential conference featuring many renowned speakers. This year’s lineup includes: Jim Collins: Author of Good to Great, How the Mighty Fall, and co-author of Built to Last John C. Maxwell: Leadership expert and best-selling author of The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership and Put Your Dream to the Test Steve Uzzell: Award-winning corporate photographer and former staff member of National Geographic Mark Sanborn: ...

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1 review from Tech startups blogs:

This Week in Startups 27 Jun 09:
... Bing, and sent security company Clear to the “Deadpool. ” Next week’s homework assignment is to read the book “How the Mighty Fall, ” by Jim Collins. Â Maybe you can be Jason’s star student on the air and earn your ticket to the TechCrunch50. ...

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