A Quote by Clayton Christensen
The transformation at the corporate level was achieved by selling off business units in old markets and by creating new business units to pursue the new opportunities. But the individual business units themselves within those transformed corporations were almost inert to change.
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It's like in biological evolution: The population will evolve, even though individuals can't. The same thing happens in the corporate world: The population of business units within corporations evolves, even though individual business units can't. That's because the capabilities of business units reside in their processes and their values, and by their very nature, processes and values are inflexible and meant not to change.
The world is a nested space, and so we have our brain as a person, and people are members of teams, and teams are part of business units, and business units are parts of corporations, and corporations are part of industries, which are part of economies.
You can invest to create the new growth business while the core business is still growing, because new business units don't need to get big fast. But when the core business stops growing, investing to create new growth businesses becomes impossible.
When business became big business - conglomerates employing hundreds and even thousands of people - companies divided themselves into still smaller units.
There's been a lot of disappointments with the Iraqi army, no doubt about that. Some units have performed well, especially their special operations units. But a lot of their units have not.
When I consider what people generally want in calculating, I found that it always is a number. I also observed that every number is composed of units, and that any number may be divided into units. Moreover, I found that every number which may be expressed from one to ten, surpasses the preceding by one unit: afterwards the ten is doubled or tripled just as before the units were: thus arise twenty, thirty, etc. until a hundred: then the hundred is doubled and tripled in the same manner as the units and the tens, up to a thousand;… so forth to the utmost limit of numeration.
People nowadays think of gamebooks as rather old hat - and, after all, it was twenty years ago. In their heyday, though, they were a phenomenon, selling upwards of a hundred thousand units per title. And it's not as old hat as you might think: the same design skills I used in those days apply equally when I'm creating modern videogames.
All we can thus far say about the duration of the units of [the business cycle] and each of [its] two phases is that it will depend on the nature of the particular innovations that carry a cycle,... and the financial conditions and habits prevailing in the business community in each case.
Most men are individuals no longer so far as their business, its activities, or its moralities are concerned. They are not units but fractions.
Eventually, when I sell enough units, as they say in the record business, I will stop touring. I'll concentrate on what I like to do... stay in the studio.
The business is about coming up with a business plan and using your relationships and networking and seeing your dreams come true. Everyone on this show has their own business. Fifteen minutes of fame is fleeting. It's about learning the business and creating a new business.
Another thing I've observed is how critical the role of the CEO is when a technology truly is disruptive. In looking back on companies that have successfully launched independent disruptive business units, the CEO always had a foot in both camps. Never have they succeeded when they spin something off in order to get it off the CEO's agenda. The CEOs that did this had extraordinary personal self-confidence, and almost always they were the founders of the companies.
The key thing is to invest in the future, and what that means is - when you're deploying technology or you're a technology business - is to make sure that you're keeping on the innovation cycle, where you're both creating and adopting the new business practices and the new techniques in order to drive your business the right way.
The key thing is to invest in the future and what that means is when you're deploying technology or you're a technology business, is to make sure that you're keeping on the innovation cycle, where you're both creating and adopting the new business practices, and the new techniques in order to drive your business the right way.
By getting to smaller and smaller units, we do not come to fundamental or indivisible units. But we do come to a point where further division has no meaning.
By all indications, American business leaders are more adept at creating business strategies than they are skilled at human capital management. American entrepreneurs are world-beaters when it comes to creating new businesses, and corporate managers are adept at using the latest marketing, financial, and technological practices.
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