Rating: 
Summary: must read for 21st century human
Review: Alvin Toffler has indicated customization is future trend. He is(was) right. The future of competition shows what, why, and how ( sometimes, who) about the future of product and service. What a corporation must do in order to integrate cusomter's experience into their production process and how to organize the company in order to do it. A must read book for 21st century human, why? because any interaction is an experience and if you extend the metaphor of product, any interaction is a 'product'. If you have been of good reputation, you will 'sell' well on whaterver you say or do. Because people 'buy' it.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointing
Review: C.K. Prahalad must be getting a bit long in the tooth. Or perhaps he has had difficulty in recent years finding a co-author as talented as Gary Hamel. Whatever his excuse, his latest book is a disappointing throwback to specious management bestsellers of the 80s and 90s. Prahalad's book is long on clichés and short on insight. The central thesis of the book is a rehash of Kotler's better articulted work on the prosumer. Given all of their emphasis on "value co-creation" the book seems woefully short on profitability and ROI numbers. I couldn't find any case studies that showed the value in value co-creation. At the same time, truly innovative and competitive "value co-creation" businesses - Linux, Apache and the whole open source software movement which Microsoft now finds so threatening - are barely mentioned. Are we just to take the authors' word for it that companies adopting a "C-type" structure are automatically profitable? Hmm. Maybe it depends on whether these firms adopt "X,Y, or Z-type" management. Can lucrative consulting gigs be far behind?
Rating:
Summary: A transforming and revolutionary wealth of insights
Review: Co-written by C. K. Prahalad (Harvey C. Fruehauf Professor of Business Administration, University of Michigan Business School) and Venkat Ramaswamy (Michael R. and Mary Kay Hallman Fellow of Electronic Business and Professor of Marketing, University of Michigan Business School), The Future Of Competition: Co-Creating Unique Value With Customers offers readers a stimulating look at a fascinating shift away from the firm-centric view of value creation, toward the possibilities opened by new technologies that allow consumers themselves to interact with and directly add value to their chosen product. Drawing upon real-life examples, and focusing on the key foundations of co-creation - dialogue, access, risk assessment, and transparency, The Future Of Competition offers a transforming and revolutionary wealth of insights into commercial and marketplace trends of the present and the near future.
Rating:
Summary: Poorly written and off focus
Review: I bought this book with a specific goal in mind - - finding specific examples of how companies are inviting their customers into the design of their products and services in innovative ways. There is a little bit of that in here - - but you must muddle through poorly highly academic/esoteric/jargon-laden prose to find it (For example: "Thus, a key variable in the quality of the transaction experience is consumer heterogeneity"). Beyond that, the book goes way off focus at times, spending pages, for example, to discuss how a company built an information network that let its employees worldwide find a solution together for a particular customer problem. That is neither new, nor "co-creating value WITH CUSTOMERS." Most disappointing of all - - there is lots of discussion about what companies are doing, but virtually no ROI info attached to prove that what they are doing is really better for the companies' bottom lines or shareholders. What the authors are saying about the future of the relationship between companies and their customers is fundamentally true. It is a shame they did not engage a stronger writer and/or editor who could help them make their case more persuasively.
Rating:
Summary: a real disappointment
Review: I was left with the feeling that all of this has been said before in one form or another, Where it was ' new' there are other who have already explored the space ( eg The Suport Economy by Shoshana Zuboff) There are two many big words hidding little concepts. The case studies are simplistic and look to the past rather than casting light on the future. This will be another 'fad" and like all fads find its place in the dustbins of business books
Rating:
Summary: Amplifies weak signals to present a new frame of reference
Review: Preceding review by that "reader from Dallas" simply demonstrates how sometimes consumers from outside of the target market of an offering might mistakenly mix into the community to misrepresent and bad-mouth the premise and potential of a genuinely well-meaning product/service/idea. It's especially sad because the authors explicitly state in the preface of the book, who the book is for, what it tries to achieve, and what it does not claim to be. Such frank disclosures and disclaimers are not something we are accustomed to in this crowded yet-another-snake-oil business books marketplace. How often do we come across a business book that is as deeply engaging, intellectual, coherent, and provocative as this one? At any rate, we live in a connected world and it is simply impossible to predict where, how, what your intended (and non-intended) consumers are saying about your product. By the way, this insight itself is one of the central points the authors make in that book. Contrary to what that reader from Dallas argues, the book actually meets and exceeds the premise and objectives it sets for itself. Let me highlight some of these:
"This book sets the agenda for top management for co-creating the future."
"Our task is here to 'amplify weak signals' from a diversity of institutions, industries, and countries, and to represent readers with a new frame of reference for value creation."
"While we do not suggest a revolution, we do see wide departures from traditional ways of sensing, thinking, and doing."
"Throughout this book, we use a lot of examples as thinking props to convey our perspective and key ideas, not to illustrate best practices." Given all these disclaimers, it is not fair to criticize a book for not being what it never claims to be in the first place. I advise the readers to carefully read the preface before considering buying or reading the book. If you determine you fit the profile of the intended readers and engage the book with the right mind set, you will be well rewarded with your investment.
Rating:
Summary: Amplifies weak signals to present a new frame of reference
Review: Preceding review by that "reader from Dallas" simply demonstrates how sometimes consumers from outside of the target market of an offering might mistakenly mix into the community to misrepresent and bad-mouth the premise and potential of a genuinely well-meaning product/service/idea. It's especially sad because the authors explicitly state in the preface of the book, who the book is for, what it tries to achieve, and what it does not claim to be. Such frank disclosures and disclaimers are not something we are accustomed to in this crowded yet-another-snake-oil business books marketplace. How often do we come across a business book that is as deeply engaging, intellectual, coherent, and provocative as this one? At any rate, we live in a connected world and it is simply impossible to predict where, how, what your intended (and non-intended) consumers are saying about your product. By the way, this insight itself is one of the central points the authors make in that book. Contrary to what that reader from Dallas argues, the book actually meets and exceeds the premise and objectives it sets for itself. Let me highlight some of these:
"This book sets the agenda for top management for co-creating the future."
"Our task is here to 'amplify weak signals' from a diversity of institutions, industries, and countries, and to represent readers with a new frame of reference for value creation."
"While we do not suggest a revolution, we do see wide departures from traditional ways of sensing, thinking, and doing."
"Throughout this book, we use a lot of examples as thinking props to convey our perspective and key ideas, not to illustrate best practices." Given all these disclaimers, it is not fair to criticize a book for not being what it never claims to be in the first place. I advise the readers to carefully read the preface before considering buying or reading the book. If you determine you fit the profile of the intended readers and engage the book with the right mind set, you will be well rewarded with your investment.
Rating:
Summary: Content good, style weak
Review: The content of this "text" is rich with pointers for those who will format strategic decisions in the future. However, it would seem to challenge the reader to probe the true value of the writers. As the reviewer from Dallas infers, the message is there but the packaging leaves something to be desired. As a university professor who teaches strategic thinking, I see this book as one of the reasons that executives and MBA students resist reading academic pieces: the task is greater than the payoff!!
Rating:
Summary: Content good, style weak
Review: The content of this "text" is rich with pointers for those who will format strategic decisions in the future. However, it would seem to challenge the reader to probe the true value of the writers. As the reviewer from Dallas infers, the message is there but the packaging leaves something to be desired. As a university professor who teaches strategic thinking, I see this book as one of the reasons that executives and MBA students resist reading academic pieces: the task is greater than the payoff!!
Rating: 
Summary: New framework, new jargon, but nothing else is new
Review: The future is here. Competition is getting tougher and customers are more difficult to please. On the other hand everything is connected, objects are embedded with sensors and software and information flows instantly to all corners of the world , thanks to the communications revolution. This book essentially looks at a networked world where customers and companies are inseparable and are constantly in interaction. In this paradigm, the framework of DART - Dialogue, Access, Risk Assessment and Transparency is introduced and the book proceeds to explain each of these in detail. The word Co-creation will get included in your daily vocabulary sooner than you expect. Lots of diagrams and case studies are thrown into every chapter. But frankly, there is no concept that is radically different from some of the pioneering works on similar topics already published. To list a few : -Customer.Com by Particia Seybold
-How to Grow when Markets Don't by Adrian Slywotzky
-The Innovator's solution by Clayton Christensen
-Adapt or Die : Turning your Supply Chain into an Adaptive Business Network by Bob Betts , Claus Heinrich
-Experimentation Matters: Unlocking the Potential of New Technologies for Innovation by Stephen Thomke
-Priceless: Turning Ordinary Products into Extraordinary Experiences by Diana Lasalle, Terry A. Britton
-The Agenda: What Every Business must do to Dominate the Decade by Michael Hammer Most of the case studies in this book are repetitions from these or are similar in concepts or processes in creating value for ( or along with) the customer. The authors have duly acknowledged and referred to an elaborate list of books and articles under "Aids to Exploration". But my point is that after going through some of the key works listed above, this book fails to impress on originality. Towards the end of the book, Knowledge Management is brought in as one of the strategic tools that can be integrated into the co-creation framework. It is certainly interesting to go through the book though it is a combination of old ideas in a new packaging. Young MBAs will find lots of new jargon that can be put to profitable use in job interviews.
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