The Practical Leader

MARCH 13, 2024

As I wrote about the accountability mess , a good person in a bad system or process sets that them up for failure — and blame. About 85% of the time the fault is caused by the system, processes, structure, or practices of the organization. These core systems either boost or block performance.

System 52

System Organization Levitt Root Cause Analysis 52

Harvard Business Review

JANUARY 13, 2014

In 1960, marketing legend Ted Levitt provided perhaps his seminal contribution to the Harvard Business Review : “ Marketing Myopia.” To avoid that, Levitt exhorted leaders to ask themselves the seemingly obvious question – “What business are you really in?” Finally, a humanized business has a motivating purpose.

Levitt 12

Levitt Christensen Competitive Advantage Welch 12

Harvard Business Review

SEPTEMBER 13, 2012

In 1960, the editor of the Harvard Business Review, Theodore Levitt, wrote that the failure of railroads could be explained in part by the myopic view that they were in the railroad business and not the transportation business, which left them vulnerable to competition from cars, trucks, and planes.

Health Care 16

Health Care Levitt Film Chemicals 16

Harvard Business Review

MAY 5, 2016

Aggravated and depressed by the decline of their core memory business in the 1980s, Intel’s top management struggled for strategic clarity. Grove’s 1980 question remains as ruthlessly relevant to C-suites as Ted Levitt’s 1960 classic, “What business are you in?” Profitable customers matter most.

Levitt 8

Levitt Disaggregation Kaizen Call Center 8

Harvard Business Review

JUNE 14, 2017

Some firms have managed it, in healthcare and in other arenas — think of QuintilesIMS as a source of pharmaceutical sales data, Nielsen as the authority on TV viewer habits, and the U.S. They address an underlying stakeholder need such as managing the total cost of care. Increasingly, for most HCIT firms, data is a commodity.

Health Care 9

Health Care Levitt Competitive Advantage Pharmaceuticals 9

Harvard Business Review

MAY 19, 2015

Edison’s breakthrough was guided by a fundamental insight: any given product is only as powerful as the system in which it is deployed. Solar panels without integrated storage are not much more valuable than lightbulbs without an electric grid; Tesla Energy, then, is an aggressive move toward creating the energy system of the future.

Strategy 8

Strategy Levitt Energy System 8

Harvard Business Review

NOVEMBER 18, 2015

As Ted Levitt pointed out 55 years ago, companies develop significant myopia over time, only seeing things that are squarely in the mainstream of their market. Disruptive innovation theory holds that incumbents need to create substantial organizational space to commercialize ideas that don’t fit existing systems.

Disruptive Innovation 8

Disruptive Innovation Christensen Levitt Innovation 8