Why the Most Original Minds in Business Win

by William C. Taylor (Author), Polly G. Labarre (Author)

From the Reviews

This is a business book thankfully written by people in the business of writing. The writers' lexicon and grammatical use well exceeds that ordinarily used by the "big names" in corporate America who too often attempt to engage in writing about business. This is comforting.

In Mavericks at Work, Fast Company cofounder William C. Taylor and Polly LaBarre, a longtime editor at the magazine, give you an inside look at the "most original minds in business" wherever they find them: from Procter & Gamble to Pixar, from gold mines to funky sandwich shops. some well known and others making for fresh and inspiring copy for the jaded business reader.  There's an underlying theme here - that old school business methods will lead to financial quagmires. In that context the likes of Ford (yesterday's hero company in books like Built to Last) look like today's losers.

William Taylor and Polly LaBarre argue that the real head-to-head competition in business today isn't process versus process, or even idea versus idea, but rather "values system versus values system." The business leaders who inspire them and who, they argue, are leading the way into the future, are the ones who have rethought the very idea of business, the market, and both internal and external collaboration. A big part of their book applies the model of open-source software and technology-development to the business, and describes how various corporations have harnessed technology and the world's intellectual resources to solve business problems.

But the technological angle is only part of what makes someone a "maverick at work." Another major focus of the book is on companies that have created an energetic and innovative corporate culture that truly inspires employees and delights customers.

This book is basically cut into four components: (1) business should be contrarian; (2) group thinking far surpasses the thoughts of individuals; (3) businesses succeed when they increase/improve customer relations; and (4) businesses are only as good as their employees.

The premise is that the successful businesses of the future must not follow the success stories (models) of the past. Instead, if the business has an asset of value -- e.g. technology, personal service industry -- and implements the above-recited four components, it may succeed. The authors imply that if same business uses the old model, it shall fail.
Want to stop doing business as usual? Then take some lessons from the 32 maverick companies Taylor and LaBarre profile.

It's often hard to tell, when reading a book like this one, whether the authors have really hit on an important insight grounded in solid evidence and research, or instead invented a marketable idea and cherry-picked instances and examples that "prove" their point. Although perhaps the passage of time is the only way to tell for sure, I argue "Mavericks at Work" really has seized on something important. That makes this a valuable read, not only for current and wannabe-future business leaders, but for anyone who ... well ... works for a living.