Categories: Articles

Good To Great By Jim Collins Adapted To Social Sector

First off, Reveries Magazine has their email blast, Cool News Of The Day, which is a must-read. I was just reviewing the issue from this Monday and came across the article, Jim Collins Redux. Jim Collins is the famed business author of Built To Last and Good To Great. Both tomes are considered business book must-haves. Strangely, I am currently listening to the audio version of Good To Great, so this piece really caught my eye.
It turns out that many leaders in the social sector were trying to figure out how to apply the lessons of Good To Great to their dealings but found it increasingly difficult to execute concepts like Level Five Leadership within an organization that relies on many other mitigating factors.
Collins recently self-published a 36-page add-on to deal with this issue titled, Good To Great And The Social Sectors. The new book sells for about ten bucks at Amazon.com and here’s a paragraph from the Reveries piece:
“‘Non-profit leaders often complained’ that an autocratic style was not an option for them, and obviously driving profits was not exactly their focus, either. An especially ‘telling moment’ actually came to Jim Collins more than a decade ago, while addressing a group of church leaders, after advising them that they needed ‘to think bluntly about succession plans and how to ensure that their values persist after they leave.’ A pastor ‘leaped to his feet’ and said ‘Our founder was born 2,000 years ago … And he lives to this day!’ The audience laughed and Jim Collins decided he ‘liked the challenges of stretching his ideas in to new settings.’ He started writing his new pamphlet in 2003, in collaboration with ‘an informal advisory group of more than two dozen leaders in law enforcement, education, health care, consulting and music.’ The initial print run is just 50,000 copies, and based on early demand, says Jim, ‘We’ll need to print more.'”
You can grab a copy here: Good To Great And The Social Sectors By Jim Collins.
I would love to see this version: Good To Great And The Advertising And Marketing Sectors. Jim, are you listening?

Mitch Joel

Mitch Joel lives at the intersection of technology, business transformation and consumer culture. He is the Executive Director of Next Era Institute, a strategic intelligence platform helping leaders understand the forces reshaping business, technology, culture and society. The Institute identifies which shifts matter, explores their wider significance and translates them into strategic direction and momentum. Mitch is also a globally recognized keynote speaker. He has delivered thousands of presentations across both B2B and B2C industries to organizations including Google, Walmart, LEGO, Shopify, Microsoft, Procter & Gamble and Unilever. Strategy Magazine has called him “one of North America’s leading visionaries.” Mitch built his career by working directly inside the waves of change that reshaped modern business. He founded and built a digital marketing agency that worked with some of the world’s largest brands and was later acquired by WPP, where he served as President of a firm operating in 25 countries with almost 3,000 employees. Mitch is the bestselling author of Six Pixels of Separation and CTRL ALT Delete, and the host of Thinking With Mitch Joel, one of the longest-running business podcasts in the world. His writing and commentary appear in outlets including Harvard Business Review, Fast Company and Inc. Magazine. He is a member of Dr. Marshall Goldsmith’s 100 Coaches and was named to the Thinkers50 Radar. Mitch also hosts Groove – The No Treble Podcast, documenting the oral history of electric bass players. Mitch is also Co-Founder of ThinkersOne, a platform that enables companies to bring personalized thought leadership from world-class experts into meetings, events and off-sites in focused 15-minute bursts.