The Innovaator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail
Clayton M. Christensen
1997 Harvard Business School Press
252 pages
從公司借的。It's lucid, well-researched, and the reasoning and case studies make a compelling argument. I enjoyed reading it.
Christensen 寫的第一本書就讓他一炮而紅。這本書的中心論點在於探討為甚麼體質健全，並由優秀經營者管理的成功的公司往往會走向衰退。Christensen 以電腦硬碟這個 industry 為主要案例，但也舉了不少其他案例。一般的論點不外是過於自滿、決策層心態保守過時、組織僵化等等，但作者認為許多成功公司的衰敗並不能歸咎於這些原因。相反的，這些公司有傑出的經理、積極投入研發並和客戶互動密切。他們的失敗是因為不知道該如何善用所謂的 disruptive technology. Christensen defines disruptive technologies as the ones that "bring to market a very different value proposition than had been available previously." 舉例來說，筆電跟傳統桌上型電腦相比效能差很多，但筆電的可攜性是它獨特的優點，它可能靠著這項獨特優點受到青睞而創造出一個新興市場，對於 PC 來說 laptop 就是個 disruptive technology. 假如 laptop 的效能與價位不斷進步到能夠滿足 PC 市場主要客戶的需求，這時它將進一步蠶食 PC 的市場。如果 PC 廠商不能有效利用筆電這個 disruptive technology，它們終將被市場淘汰。
Christensen believes that it is the inability of the company to market disruptive technologies that ultimately brings down a successful company. The reason why so many great companies fail when faced with disruptive technology, Christensen argues, is because "the very management practices that have allowed them to become industry leaders also make it extremely difficult for them to develop the disruptive technologies that ultimately steal away their markets." Good managers in good companies listen closely to their customers and try their best to make products that suit the customers' needs. However, with disruptive technologies there is usually no apparent market for them. Disruptive technologies at first often do not meet the requirements of existing customers, and new customers in new markets who value these technologies' special attributes must be discovered. Seeking new customers in an unknown market is inherently risky. On top of that, the profit that can be made in the new, and therefore likely small market is usually not enough to sustain the desired growth rate of a large successful company. Given limited amount of resources, the resource allocation process and the decision making process in a well-managed company naturally and imperceptibly weed out the more risky projects involving disruptive technologies and support those projects that are safe bets.
The author's advise to managers faced with disruptive techologies?
1) Setup an independent organisation to develop and market the disruptive technologies. This organisation needs to be small enough to get excited by small markets and small profits. This way, the organisation will find customers who value the attributes of the disruptive technologies, and will therefore naturally direct resources to flow to them.
2) Plan for failure. Markets that don't yet exist can't be analysed. Initial efforts at commercialising a disruptive technology should be a process of discovery, making mistakes and learn from them. Don't bet all resources on one execution.
3) Don't wait for breakthroughs in the disruptive technology that will make it meet the demand of current mainstream market and existing customers. Attributes that are useless to mainstream markets could be attributes on which the new markets will be built.
作者還有一個我覺得很有趣的論點。他說公司的最高管理階層總想認為是他們在做最終決定，但實際上他們所能做的決策卻受制於中階管理層。Middle management 會先對下屬的提案進行初步過濾，刷掉他們認為不符合公司目標的，再把有希望成功並獲得上級支持的交給高層做決定。因此無形中最高層決策者只會看到的中階經理「認為」他們會喜歡的提案，而這些提案往往會是為了滿足既有客戶和奪取已知市場。
