Filed under: book nook, leadership & youth | Tags: good to great, jim collins
GOOD TO GREAT: Why Some Companies Make the Leap… and Others Don’t
Book Review by: Joy Isaguirre
Any book that began as a thought experiment and took five years in the making (research and writing) by a team of 20 researchers plus its author, Jim Collins, certainly deserves a great deal of attention.
My love affair with this book started when I read the first few pages. The moment it said, “The timeless principles of good to great. It’s about how you take a good organization and turn it into one that produces sustained great results.”1 I knew right then and there that it’s what I’ve been looking for, and it’s the kind of book that I really need.
(image credit: jimcollins.com)
The First Chapter is entitled ‘Good is the Enemy of Great.’
How appropriately titled and said. In a world wherein most people settle for what is good or mediocre, this book reminded me that it is alright to aim for greater things. Not simply to fan the desire and aspire for greater things, but to show that there is a way, a framework, a path that I can actually follow in order to start helping people in the journey towards greatness.
The Second Chapter is one of my favorites from the book. It speaks about the embodiment of a Level 5 Leader, the kind of leader that we truly need but rarely see nowadays. Modest, trains their successors in order to achieve greater things, and not the celebrity type of leaders that we often see in organizations today. While reading this chapter, two names came to mind. I believe that if we have more of this kind of Level 5 Leaders serving in different organizations, especially in the government, the Philippines and the next generation will not only prosper but will become great again.
Our church is currently in a transitional period. Most of the elderly people and a lot of the leaders either have gone abroad or have established daughter churches wherein they are now serving full time. What’s left is our dedicated senior pastors on the brink of retirement, committed and supportive but clueless elders/deacons, and a group of talented + funny + dedicated + kids who undeniably have great potentials but doesn’t know their purpose or have a clear direction.
It is very timely that I got to read this book. It’s both a blessing and a great source of encouragement for me. It answered some of my long standing questions and confirmed some of my views regarding organizations and leadership.
The Third Chapter speaks about getting the right people on the bus, getting the wrong people off the bus (which I found out years back is very difficult for our leaders in the church to do), and then figuring where to drive the bus. A perfect example of this situation was mentioned in Chapter 3, wherein Wells Fargo acquired Crocker Bank back in 1984. They made some annual cut, regardless of tenure or position. This may come out as ruthless to some but in the end it worked and made remarkable difference in that company.
As one Wells Fargo executive aptly puts it, “The only way to deliver to the people who are achieving is to not burden them with the people who are not achieving.”2 It is very exhausting to be working with good people but on the wrong position. In small local churches today, there seems to be a wrong mindset that as long as the person serving is a pastor or a member of the elders/deacons, they should be placed in key leadership and/or administrative positions without first determining if they are designed and trained to handle the said position. As long as they serve in the church, they are committed and filled with the Holy Spirit, they should be allowed to take on the responsibilities without ample training or study (doing the course work).
This kind of system will continue to steal precious time and really overburden others. In the end, the people who are in the right position will not only get tremendous burn-out and end up with low self-esteem, but they will start to question if they’re actually on the right bus. This has been my personal cry for years, a long standing burden. I dearly love the people that I serve and continue to respect those I work with in the ministry. However, I have a firm belief that we need to learn how to put square pegs in square holes, and round pegs in round holes.
I have learned a lot from this book. I am glad it is one of the required readings in my MTY masteral class. It provided me with great insights and clearly defined existing problems. It is my prayer and desire to impart to the next generation leaders what I learned through this book. I pray with the time I have at hand, it will be enough, so that the next generation leaders will learn and try not to commit the same mistakes. So help us Lord, please.
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1 Collins, Jim (2001). “Good to Great,” New York, Harper Collins Publishers Inc.
2 Collins, Jim (2001). “Good to Great,” Chapter 3 – First Who… Then What
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