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Summary: Special -- a rarity among business books
Review: Professor Christensen has managed to write an insightful and readable book that is changing the way that executives approach technology. A must read for anyone wishing to success in today's business world.
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Summary: I changed my mind. FANTASTIC !
Review: Professor Christensen showed the real business world, and how hard is change things and minds. IBM, DIGITAL, SEARS and SEAGATE faced with new technologies and they didn't know how to deal with it. And your company, they will know?
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Summary: An insightful look at business history, economics & biology
Review: Christensen looks at the business trajectories of the disk drive and steel industries from a biological perspective and discovers a kind of universal punctuated equilibrium he calls "disruptive technological change." He convincingly demonstrates how great companies that do everything "right" will stumble if they don't recognize and address the forces of disruptive technological change. While his thesis (that the best business practices will lead to failure) is initially counter-intuitive, Christensen provides a simple frame for explaining how the forces of innovation fundamentally direct the course of industry success and failure.
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Summary: Wonderful insights and recommendations
Review: This book is excellent reading for anyone trying to take their company into new areas, such as e-commerce. The recent real-life case studies make the material very easy to grasp.Starts a little slow, but the recommendations for implementing disruptive technologies are right on the money. If you've been there, you can definitely relate and get some great ideas for the next time.
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Summary: Incredible but depressing -- "Must read" for technologists
Review: What's most incredible is that this book has been out for several years and is only starting to get noticed. Although Christensen does sidestep a few issues in order to make his point, for the most part the book is an incredibly accurate analysis of the way business ACTUALLY works. The depressing part is that, if you believe Christensen, there doesn't appear to be a lot that can be done within an established company to deal with "disruptive technology" other than to fold up your tent and move elsewhere.
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Summary: One of the 5 high-tech marketing books I've finished.
Review: I work in high-tech marketing, and while not the best in the biz, I do make money for my customers. Normally I toss marketing books after two chapters, as pop business or just nonsense. I read this one through because it was a modernized, thoughtful analysis of a universal problem: businesses, like people, get in a rut. This writer has carefully described how success is a trap that prevents a company from catching the next innovation. If I were a manufacturer, it would be particularly frightening, but I have also advised customers in retailing to read it. (Just to be cruel to the "latest information" buffs, please note that much of this was noted by Marcus Aurelius, and more recently by Machiavelli. Readers who are scared of fundamental truths should run for the nearest copy of Wired.)
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Summary: I am living the Innovator's Dilema every day!
Review: I am a Marketing Manager at a hard drive company -- my second hard drive company. This book explains EXACTLY why paradigm shifts occur in our business. The author focuses on the hard drive industry because our products have six-month market life cycles where being one week or $1 behind the competition can be the difference between selling 10-million units or selling next to zero. Hard drives are the most complicated technology inside a computer. Hard drive companies are run by PHD's and Stanford MBA's. But, in the last year our industry has lost hundreds of millions of dollars. We are on the verge of our next paradigm shift and several companies will be forced out of business in the next few years. Read this book and understand how our crazy business works. Then apply the lessons in your humdrum everyday industry.
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Summary: ill conceived pop trash
Review: ...need I say more
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Summary: A distortion of the real world to fit a simple theory
Review: Christensen has re-observed that mature companies have difficultly dealing with the low end of their market. Because of my personal experience my comments are limited to his analysis of the disk drive industry. He force fits his observations to his therory; in my opinion his observations have little connection with the industry's real history. In one sense his theory fails the Occam razor test; a much simpler theory is raised in "Capital Market Myopia," a Havard Business School paper which notes that in the 80's the Capital market funded too many companies - 80 or so companies all of whom expected 20% market share. Each plan by itself made sense and was fundable, but the totality was doomed to massive failure. I can't comment on his other examples, but if his rigor is consistent, then I suspect his history is equally flawed. In the end, what is so novel about the observation that large companies have difficultly dealing with the low end of their market - that's the automobile story in compacts; IBM's story in minicomputers, etc.? Save your money!
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Summary: Great strategic insights
Review: Christensen brilliantly makes the point that poor management is not always the cause of company failure. Often, even top-notch management is insufficient for survival in a technology environment. I highly recommend this book for every manager who is responsible for strategic decisions in technology-driven markets. Once the strategy is established, I recommend the book Survival of the Smartest as a guide to executing the strategy.
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