No company ever shrank to greatness, conclude Dwight Gertz and João Baptista. Drawing upon their new study of more than 1,000 large companies, the authors argue that managers must move beyond the current wave of downsizing, restructuring, and reengineering. Contrary to current management fads, they contend that companies must grow to be great. Managers now involved in downsizing must consider long-term goals for growth alongside short-term measures for slimming. Gertz and Baptista shatter popular corporate myths by revealing that growth opportunities are everywhere, across all business sectors -- even in stable industries and in companies "too big to grow." Using case studies, Gertz and Baptista analyze successful high-growth firms such as Starbucks, Staples, USAA. They examine not only the strategies followed by these companies -- customer franchise management, superior new product development, and channel management -- but also what they did to make these strategies successful. They discuss how, regardless of differences in strategic approach, the transformations achieved by these firms are based on the same three "foundations for growth": superior customer value, outstanding economics across the value chain, and excellence in process execution. They demonstrate how these three foundations work together, forming a powerful framework through which to attain corporate goals. Distilling these findings into useful tools for the evaluation of any strategy, Gertz and Baptista show how those facing the difficult task of turnaround can get back to growth. By examining improvements at four companies within the context of their growth framework, they analyze the combination of inspiration, leadership, and technique which has enabled these firms to prosper. Shifting the focus from cost-cutting to growth is a challenge that thousands of companies must now face. Gertz and Baptista have given CEO's, managers, and consultants in every industry a clear framework from which to build sustainable growth in revenues and profits. This book is a practical and colorful guide for those who want to grow to be great.

Successful leaders don't rest on the laurels. Leadership must be a living process, and life means growth. "Great Leaders Grow" shows leaders and aspiring leaders precisely which areas to focus on so they can remain effective throughout their lives.

An uncomplicated guide to growing the world's finest cannabis.

Ten years of research uncover the secret source of growth and profit … Those who center their business on improving people’s lives have a growth rate triple that of competitors and outperform the market by a huge margin. They dominate their categories, create new categories and maximize profit in the long term. Pulling from a unique ten year growth study involving 50,000 brands, Jim Stengel shows how the world's 50 best businesses—as diverse as Method, Red Bull, Lindt, Petrobras, Samsung, Discovery Communications, Visa, Zappos, and Innocent—have a cause and effect relationship between financial performance and their ability to connect with fundamental human emotions, hopes, values and greater purposes. In fact, over the 2000s an investment in these companies—“The Stengel 50”—would have been 400 percent more profitable than an investment in the S&P 500. Grow is based on unprecedented empirical research, inspired (when Stengel was Global Marketing Officer of Procter & Gamble) by a study of companies growing faster than P&G. After leaving P&G in 2008, Stengel designed a new study, in collaboration with global research firm Millward Brown Optimor. This study tracked the connection over a ten year period between financial performance and customer engagement, loyalty and advocacy. Then, in a further investigation of what goes on in the “black box” of the consumer’s mind, Stengel and his team tapped into neuroscience research to look at customer engagement and measure subconscious attitudes to determine whether the top businesses in the Stengel Study were more associated with higher ideals than were others. Grow thus deftly blends timeless truths about human behavior and values into an action framework – how you discover, build, communicate, deliver and evaluate your ideal. Through colorful stories drawn from his fascinating personal experiences and “deep dives” that bring out the true reasons for such successes as the Pampers, HP, Discovery Channel, Jack Daniels and Zappos, Grow unlocks the code for twenty-first century business success.

Should companies be run for profit or purpose? This book shows how they can deliver both-based on rigorous evidence and an actionable framework. This edition, updated to include the pandemic and latest research, explains how managers, investors and citizens can put purpose into practice-and overcome the difficult trade-offs that hold them back.

A handbook for growing a victory garden when the enemy is global warming Written by regenerative farmer Acadia Tucker, Growing Good Food calls on us to take up regenerative gardening, also known as carbon farming, for the good of the planet. By building carbon-rich soil, even in a backyard-sized patch, we can capture greenhouse gases and mitigate climate change, all while growing nutritious food. To help us get started, and quickly, Tucker draft plans for gardeners who have no space, a little space, or a lot of space. She offers advice on how to prep soil, plant food, and raise the most popular fruits and vegetables using regenerative methods. She shares the gardening tools you need to get started, the top reasons gardens fail and how to fix them, and how to make carbon farming count when the only dirt you have is in pots. The book includes calls to action and insights from leaders in the regenerative movement, including David Montgomery, Gabe Brown, and Tim LaSalle. Aimed at beginners, the book is designed to inspire an uprising of citizen gardeners. Growing Good Food suggests what could happen if more of us saw gardening as a civic duty. By the end of it, you'll know how to grow some really good food and build a healthier world, too. Growing Good Food: A citizen's guide to backyard carbon farming is part of Stone Pier's "Growing Good Food" series. It joins Growing Perennial Foods: A field guide to raising resilient herbs, fruits, and vegetables, also written by Acadia Tucker.