Only the Paranoid Survive


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Paperback
240 pages
ISBN 9780385483827 Published March 1999
Broadway Business
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Only the Paranoid Survive
How to Exploit the Crisis Points That Challenge Every Company
By Andrew S Grove 

Related Blog Posts
Business Book Humiliations
Posted Aug. 3, 2010 3:43 a.m. by sally-haldorson
In - 800 CEO Read Blog

Penguin's Portfolio imprint specializes in business books, and their Portfolio Javelin blog ("Business, Business Books, and the Business of Books") is a great read for any of us business book geeks. Yesterday, Will Weisser, Vice President and Associate Editor of Portfolio, wrote an entry inspired by a post in the Guardian's blog in which the author, Robert McCrum, confessed, despite his education and exposure to great books, that he had never read Middlemarch by George Eliot (if you too have not read Middlemarch, I highly recommend remedying that this summer--it's one of my favorites.) McCrum then invites readers to share their book humiliations by listing the books that they regret never having read.

In his post, Weisser agrees to play along, but specifies that he has "focused on the business category for 15 years but still haven’t read some of the most acclaimed and influential business books, the ones we use as benchmarks and role models."

Weisser's list of regrets:

Barbarians at the Gate by Bryan Burrough and John Helyar

Den of Thieves by James B. Stewart

In Search of Excellence by Tom Peters and Bob Waterman

The Innovator’s Dilemma by Clay Christensen

Only the Paranoid Survive by Andy Grove

Why We Buy by Paco Underhill

The HP Way by David Packard

Then he was kind enough to mention our book, The 100 Best Business Books of All Time, as a great resource for determining which books you've missed out on. (When preparing the "lost chapter" of The 100 Best, we added Barbarians at the Gate by Burrough and Helyar, and it would be the perfect book to take on vacation yet this summer.)

Intrigued by this challenge, I posed the question to Jack, our in-house encyclopedia of business books, what Business Book Humiliations he may still have. He replied that Michael Porter (author of Competitive Advantage and Competitive Strategy comes to mind. Personal History by Katharine Graham was Dylan's choice. If I had to choose one, it would be Men and Women of the Corporation by Rosabeth Moss Kanter.

What's your business book humiliation, the one business book you most regret never having read?



Jack Covert Selects - Denial
Posted Feb. 12, 2010 5:59 a.m. by 800-ceo-read

Denial: Why Business Leaders Fail to Look Facts in the Face—and What to do About It by Richard S. Tedlow. Portfolio, 272 Pages, $26.95, Hardcover, March 2010, ISBN 9781591843139

Professor Richard Tedlow, author of two of my favorite books, Andy Grove and Giants of Industry, has written a book that tells memorable stories of business leaders who were in denial and whose businesses (think Sears, Coke) were subsequently affected by their inability to see the forest for the trees. This new book, Denial, begins entertainingly with the story of Henry Ford.

In the early 1920s, Henry Ford was crushing his competition: the Model T was a spectacular success. Tedlow tells us that “It took seven years for the company to sell its millionth Model T. Only a year and a half later, it sold its two-millionth. Four million were sold by 1920. The number of units sold doubled by 1923.” At the same time, the automotive industry was changing as the country went from a war economy to greater prosperity. Ford wouldn’t listen when his people warned him about Alfred Sloan, at General Motors, who believed that the consumer wanted something more than a black car. In fact, Ford fired an executive who wrote a memo about GM and called for Ford to change in order to compete. Henry Ford was in complete denial.

There are plenty of business books about the dangers of ignoring your competition—I’m thinking of Clayton Christensen’s The Innovator’s Dilemma and Andy Grove’s Only the Paranoid Survive, both of which warn of disruptive innovation and being able to predict moments of competitive crisis. Tedlow’s Denial looks at why so many companies get it wrong. He also offers common signs to watch out for so your organization avoids this trouble—or at the very least can find a way out of the forest.



Reviewing Reviews
Posted Sept. 26, 2008 6:30 a.m. by dylan
In Uncategorized - 800 CEO Read Blog

Heather Green has written a wonderful review of Jeff Howe's Crowdsourcing: Why the Power of the Crowd is Driving the Future of Business for the September 29 issue of BusinessWeek. After observing that "Books about the crowd are becoming a crowd unto themselves," Green writes:

What sets Howe's book apart is his focus on business, an examination of different crowdsourcing models, and a deep dive into academic research to explain why people work together. It's a welcome and well-written corporate playbook for confusing times...

In his most recent article for Portfolio, "In Praise of Big Brother," Roger Lowenstein casts a somewhat leery eye at Stephen Baker's The Numerati. He begins:

Stephen Baker envisions a world in which our email and blog postings, our credit-card and grocery purchases, our pulse rates and facial expressions, and even our physical movements (handily tracked by our cell phones) will be fed to a new Brahmin class of math geeks devoted to sending us customized shopping choices, targeted political ads, real-time medical alerts, and the names of potential dating partners, not to mention (lest we be shirking on the job or hiding an illness) alerts to our bosses and insurance companies.

While that sounds awfully scary to me, the author is of the mind that this technology will one day empower us. Regardless of how you feel about these issues, the book does seem very informative and worth a read. Lowenstein describes Baker a "charming writer," and ends the review by calling the book "eye-popping and chilling."

David K. Hurst reveiws four books in the Autumn issue of strategy + business's Books in Brief. The first, Richard Bookstaber's Demon of Our Own Design, was awarded the top spot in the Finance & Economics category of our first annual book awards. The other three books are Stall Points: Most Companies Stop Growing--Yours Doesn't Have To by Matthew Olson and Derek Van Bever, Michael O'Leary: A Life In Full Flight by Alan Ruddock, and Tad Waddington's Lasting Contribution: How to Think, Plan, and Act to Accomplish Meaningful Work.

Fortune's Jia Lynn Yang has picked "eight volumes [that] belong in everyone's briefcase." Of course, Fortune doesn't make this list available online, but the chosen titles are:

Birth of a Salesman: The Transformation of Selling in America by Walter A. Friedman

Presenting to Win: The Art of Telling Your Story by Jerry Weissman

Hug Your Customers: The Proven Way to Personalize Sales and Achieve Astounding Results by Jack Mitchell

Selling to Big Companies by Jill Konrath

The New Strategic Selling: The Unique Sales System Proven Successful by the World's Best Companies by Robert B. Miller & Stephen E. Heiman

Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In by Roger Fisher & William Ury

Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini

How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie

Rich Karlgaard has written an update to his "Books to Get Rich By" for Forbes. (You can find the original list of 53 books here.) The lists are broken up into six categories: History and Heroes, How Capitalism Works Today, Instructional Tips, Management Secrets, Food for the Soul, and Useful Entertainment. While the list is too long to list all of the titles, I have listed the entire "Management Secrets" section below.

Only the Paranoid Survive: How to Exploit the Crisis Points That Challenge Every Company by Andrew S. Grove

Killing Sacred Cows: Overcoming the Financial Myths That Are Destroying Your Property by Garret B. Gunderson

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey

The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable by Patrick Lencioni

Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In by Roger Fisher, William Ury & Bruce Patton

What Got You Here Won't Get You There: How Successful People Become Even More Successful by Marshall Goldsmith

Never Eat Alone: And Other Secrets to Success, One Relationship at a Time by Keith Ferrazzi

The Speed of Trust: The One Thing That Changes Everything by Stephen M.R. Covey with Rebecca M. Merrill

Did you notice that Stephen Covey picked up an initial sometime between 7 Habits and Speed of Trust? (edit: As the brilliant Seth Godin has pointed out in the comment section, Stephen M.R. Covey is the eldest son of Stephen R. Covey. I had not known this previously. Don't let it be said business books aren't a family business.) Notable titles from other sections are John Kao's Innovation Nation and Fareed Zakaria's Post American World from "How Capitalism Works Today," Dan Pink's Adventures of Johnny Bunko from "Instructional Tipps," Randy Pausch's Last Lecture form "Food for the Soul," and Michael Lewis's Blind Side from "Useful Entertainment."



Best Business Books via U.S. News and World Report
Posted May 18, 2007 9:06 a.m. by todd-sattersten
In Lists - 800 CEO Read Blog

U.S. News and World Report has a huge special report on the Best Business Books. Their opening says:

Hundreds of business books are published each year. Chances are at least one has the answers you're looking for. But how to find it? U.S. News spoke with 14 leaders from all walks of business life—from academics to entrepreneurs to corporate execs—about the five books they consider indispensable reading for managers.

When magazines do these lists we always create a summary so people can see the picks in one quick view. The commentary that each leader gives is always interesting, so make sure you click through on the author's name if you see something that interests you.

Good To Great made four appearances on the list and Collins is one of leaders providing reading recommendations. Porter's Competitive Strategy appears twice. Otherwise, the picks are unique. I personally like Jeff Pfeffer's picks and reasons the best.

Best Business Books

Chris Anderson (editor-in-chief of Wired, author of The Long Tail)

Jack Brennan (CEO of Vanguard)

Robert Bruner (Dean of Darden School of Business, University of Virginia)

Jim Buckmaster (CEO of craigslist)

Jim Collins (author of Good to Great)

Mark Cuban (owner of the Dallas Mavericks)

Thomas Donaldson (professor at Wharton School of Business)

Carly Fiorina (former CEO of Hewlett-Packard)

Jackie Fouse (CFO of Alcon)

Robert Joss (dean of Stanford Graduate School of Business)

Jeffery Pfeffer (professor at Stanford Graduate School of Business)

John W. Rogers Jr. (chairman and CEO of Ariel Capital Management)

Hector Ruiz (chairman and CEO of AMD)

Deborah Wright (CEO of Carver Bancorp)

Note: I left a couple books off because the leaders were self-promoting themselves or others associated with them.



The 100-Mile Walk Interview
Posted Jan. 23, 2006 5:00 p.m. by todd-sattersten
In Audio - 800 CEO Read Blog

I got a great conversation with Sander and Jonathan Flaum about their new book The 100-Mile Walk: A Father and Son on a Quest to Find The Essence of Leadership. They have what they call their nine P's of leadership (People, Purpose, Passion, Performance, Persistence, Perspective, Paranoia, Principles, Practice) and we talk about a number of them.

What makes the book and this podcast so great is hearing two very different perspectives on what it means to be a leader. We talk about finding meaning, Sandy Koufax, and "how we'll never get it right".

mp3, 40:26, 27.8MB

Sander's Book Picks

Jonathon's Book Picks




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