Marketbusters

There’s no way around it. Companies must grow to survive. But the dismal failure rate of most growth strategies speaks volumes about how poorly understood — and therefore grossly mismanaged—this vital business process really is.

In this hands-on guide, Rita Gunther McGrath and Ian C. MacMillan outline a systematic, field-tested method for identifying specific types of growth opportunities, choosing the best option for a company’s competitive situation, and executing that strategy in a way that achieves spectacular growth. Best of all, the authors show that these opportunities can easily be found within a firm’s existing customer base, offerings, internal processes and competitive arena.

McGrath and MacMillan argue that the key to exploiting these opportunities lies in strategic moves they call “MarketBusters”: approaches that dramatically reconfigure profit streams in an industry and upend conventional competition. Based on an intensive three-year research program, MarketBusters reveals forty marketbusting moves used by firms to successfully transform their market spaces. The book maps these moves to five strategic lenses through which companies can analyze their current business, and includes targeted “prospecting questions” and corresponding tools to guide executives as they mine areas for growth opportunities.

The authors also describe a simple analytical tool to assist executives in ensuring they have prepared their organizations to successfully execute the chosen strategy. Vivid company examples from industries as diverse as manufacturing, software, retail, and pharmaceuticals illustrate each move in practice, and cautionary tales reveal common pitfalls that could cause well-intentioned strategies to backfire.

Filled with tools, checklists, and techniques proven to work in even the most unforgiving competitive environments, MarketBusters is the indispensable field guide to realizing sustained, profitable growth.