The Myth of Excellence : Why Great Companies Never Try to Be the Best at Everything

Rating:
Summary: Enjoyable, Insiteful, and Highly Relevant
Review: A very good book, not only easy to read but enjoyable and motivating as well. I believe these guys are right on the money with their research and analysis. I agree with the interrpretations of the research data and found myself saying "Yes, that's just how I feel." in response to many of the stories of customer interactions.

I believe that this book addresses the most important areas of business today and identifies what consumers are "screaming" for - SERVICE, RESPECT, etc. Most of this book is common sence - it's amazing how uncommon it is that these principles are put into practice. We are at a transition in the business world where product quality is easily duplicated by many competitors. Customer service and the customer "experience" will be the deciding factor in the decades to come. I would hope that all businesses would buy this book and work towards being the kind of companies used in the case studies here. What a pleasure it would be if all of our day to day dealings were with companies of this caliber!

The authors recognition of the end of the Information age and movement into a new age where "appreciation and reverence for life" become the motivating factors for those who wish to succeed, shows just how in-tune they are with the world around us. This recognition will be invaluable to all businesses as time goes on - now, who will take advantage of it and use it wisely?

I highly reccommend this book for everyone from the CEO to the consumer. People are asking (demanding) for RESPECT, as they should, and the businesses that understand this and embrace this will be the future winners.

Rating:
Summary: THE ULTIMATE GUIDE TO PROFITABILITY
Review: As a counsellor and teacher in business management for thirty years, and having completed diagnostic assessments on large and small businesses, locally, nationally and internationally, my opinion of "The Myth of Excellence" comes from first-hand knowledge and experience.

The authors have broken down the key areas of marketing into five basic components: access, experience, price, product and service. For the reasons the book identifies, it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, to "be the best" in all these areas. Based on case studies and interviews with over 10,000 consumers, it has become evident that the consumer is no longer impressed by a company's catching promotional messages or "world class performance." Today's consumer places little value in cliches that say little and promise nothing. What they do want, and have every right to expect in addition to value for their dollar, is efficient service, honesty, trust, recognition and fairness. From customer service reps through the ranks to CEO's, consumers want someone to listen to them and follow through with prompt, efficient action.

One huge mistake often make by companies, both large and small, is the complacent attitude of managers/owner who believe, "since doors of my business are open, the customer will come." As the authors point out, many businesses are run by inept management who do not listen to Mr. or Ms. Public's concerns or messages, nor, quite frankly, do they care what they have to say. Successful companies who make it to the top in the corporate world, and continue to grow, have already learned an important lesson: if they want to increase sales, minimize costs and increase bottom-line profitability, they better pay very close attention to what the customer is telling them. While many businesses believe they are "successful" for no other reason than the doors remain open and the financials indicate a slight profit, a vast majority of businesses lack sufficient management skills (which includes marketing)to make the business grow to the point where it achieves maximum profitability. Very simply put, they learn to make all the mistakes in the book on their own money - profit goes out the door...along with the customer!

The authors of this book have certainly done their homework on this book. It is well-written, clearly understood, and based on sound, reliable research. "The Myth of Excellence" is highly recommended reading to any and every individual in the world of business today.

Rating:
Summary: Myths Of Conquering Markets!
Review: Crawford (executive vice president, Cap Gemini Ernst & Young) and Mathews (futurist, FirstMatter) suggest that companies that strive for excellence in everything they do often fail to achieve success in anything that is important to their market success. Instead, based on their study of more than 10,000 consumers and interviews with major international executives, they argue that organizations should rank their goals and select one transaction component (price, product, service, access, experience) in which to excel and one in which to differentiate; in the remaining three they should strive to meet the industry standard. The authors also discuss the importance of respect, trust, fairness, and honesty to business success. They illustrate their consumer relevancy model in discussing the success of various companies, e.g., McDonald's, Best Buy, Krispy Kreme, and Southwest Airlines. The following chapter titles reflect coverage: "The New Model for Consumer Relevancy;" "Would I Lie to You?: The Overrated Importance of Lowest Price;" and "Why Good is Good Enough: Choice and the Issue of Product Bandwidth." A succinct writing style and excellent contemporary examples enhance the presentation. Although written for business practitioners, the book should be required reading for upper-division undergraduate business majors. An excellent Internet site supplements the volume. Recommended for academic and professional collections

Rating:
Summary: A tour de force!
Review: Everyone in business thinks they really know their customers and what they want? Today's customers are leading a revolution against business as usual: They are demanding that companies recognize them as individuals NOT numbers and conduct business on their terms. These terms lead to new Marketing methods.

The Myth of Excellence breaks down marketing methods into five attributes: access, experience, price, product, and service. The book argues that successful businesses are those that excel in one of these areas, are good in another, and are at least average in the rest. The book tries to answer two vital questions: What do customers really want? And how can companies best serve them? They use examples of how Wal-Mart, dominants on price and maintains a good selection of products, while Target excels at product selection and makes price its secondary. Like the undiscovered country companies are finding out a new type of consumer, one whom very few companies understand, much less manufacture products for or sell products or services to and leads into the "Myth of Excellence."

A tour de force! FinancialNeeds.com

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Analysis
Review: I loved the analysis and explanations. At first I missed the relevancy of the conceptual models. The examples of the attributes were both enjoyable and well researched and the tables at the conclusion where extremely interesting and insightful. The authors make valid points with regard to consumer relevancy.

Rating:
Summary: No great revelations
Review: I was excited by all the postive reviews posted here. Unfortunately I was dissapointed when I read this book. Little of the time is spent proving their basic premise. Most of the book contains examples that are similar to other excellence books written in the past. The authors spend most of their time telling us about a few companies that are excellent in one of their five categories. That is fine in itself but I wanted to know more about the downside of being excellent in multi categories. The authors talk about leaving money on the table when companies try to be excellent accross the board. But I did not see financial evidence presented, just a theory about lost profits. I do like the basic premise on focus on one thing and think it is essentially correct. However, it is a stretch to say that they have proven anything about the myth of excellence. Most businesses focus on one of the five elements they use in the book. The book is probably more aptly named " The need to focus" not the myth of excellence. Basically the authors tell us that consumers do not expect companies to excel at everything and therefore trying to is a waste of money. I guess that is good advice but I did not see too many examples in the book of companies that try to be excellent at everything and have failed.

Rating:
Summary: Myths Of Conquering Markets
Review: No matter how simple the author's theory and logic is, many highly paid intellilgent business executives still have no comprehension of the themes covered in this book. So many companies are so out of tune to what their customers really want.

This book revolves around the theme of "Consumer Relevancy", which described by the authors as the process of aligning business operations and offering to new and targeted markets and moves them forward over time. In my own words it means actually asking the client what they really want and expect from a company in order to retain the consumer over a long period of time.

The book has many real case studies taken from a wide spectrum of companies in the Anglo-Saxon world but felt they could have used more non-US case studies. Actually understanding how these select businesses have come to seek out and really understand their customer base to improve the process and profits gives one inspiration to think about their own business or company.

Fred Crawford and Ryan Mathews evalute a company on a scale of 1-5 (5 is the highest)in five select catagories:access,experience, price, product and service. An enterprise should strive to have a rating of "5" in just one catagory, while trying for "4" in another and not letting the rest of the go below a "3". This study has shown that it is a waste of energy and resources trying to have a "5" in every catagory.

Toward the end of the book they discuss the future and predicting future trends, which they conceed is almost impossible but it is a necessary process to dream and imagine how you think this could be or should be to concieve new ideas.

This is a great book for any business person to read, regardless of their department or rank.

Rating:
Summary: Genuine Marketing pays off
Review: The success of any company always depend on the discipline of marketing, breaking off the malpractice adopted by and large by many companies. Respect, service, trust, genuine quality are the values to strengthen from the grass root levels. Fred Crawford and Ryan Mathews with a in-depth research of many companies reveals that customer service is the key to success and the customer experience is the prime dedicating factor consideration in time to come. The book is an insight to the companies to offer the best by examining their products and executing them with par excellence to stand by the competitive edge. Myth of Excellence is way of the wizard to gain the confidence of the customers. The idea to give a commission and link to something 'free' is a common notion. The rates pulled up to a 20% and than the discount offered only stems out indecent bargain ethics. Brand name and quality are in demand and customers often resort to the quality and service of the consumer products. Catching promotions do attract but the consumer stays unimpressed if quality, service & trust is not offered.Trust is the key of a merchant's scale to shoot up the success chart. This book is a read for CEOs and Company marketing Dept executives to play their roles and create a brand offering the best of the best to keep the customer list hooked to their line of products. Appreciation of the customers motivates the team for a success. This book is a good read for CEO's of Companies whofall below standards and it stands a handy resource guide to marketers who wish to excel and stand a 'class apart' wading the competition to be on top. I recommend this book as it has the value guidance for Companies who want to reach the 'winning edge'- Whatever be the product!

Rating:
Summary: Lacks the punch
Review: The title of the book needs some change. It primarily deals with consumer product companies and retail chains. The attributes selected for research are Price, Product, Access, Service and Experience - mostly at POP interactions of Customers at retail outlets. It does not deal with business processes or practices within and across a wider Industry range.

The title suggests that this research is about "Great Companies". The definition of "Greatness" is nowhere defined and we do not have enough evidence to suggest that the data collected from over 5000 Customers is relevant to test the hypothesis.

While the initial chapters try to define a framework and most Companies are mapped to their primary and secondary attributes, the distinction of "excellence" on these attributes gets blurred on some occasions. Many cases can perhaps be conveniently moved across chapters, each devoted to one primary attribute. This may be in part due to the highly qualitative and descriptive approach to the analysis and the inability to bring out the core findings within the limited pages.

I am unable to understand the fundamental difference between the proven "Positioning" methodology and the findings of this book. If a conventional Multi-Dimensional Scaling were adopted, would the results be different? .

For those interested in consumer products and retail, some well-narrated cases will not disappoint.

Rating:
Summary: Unremarkable
Review: This book updates us on some very interesting and important buying patterns that are emerging. It goes on to point out five areas of differentiation for any organization. There are a few handy tools and loads of examples.
*** If you read 5+ buiness books a year make this one.