The Brains and Brawn Company: How Leading Organizations Blend the Best of Digital and Physical
by Robert Siegel
The grounded, clear-sighted guide you need to blend digital and traditional business functions for long-term competitive advantage
Business leaders are continually told they need to embrace digital disruption wholeheartedly to thrive in the 21st Century. Legacy companies, we hear, are all doomed to fail unless they double down on the latest digital innovations, and disruptors are ordained to take over the world. Digital innovation is the answer to everything.
False! Nothing in life or business is ever that simple.
In The Brains and Brawn Company: How Leading Organizations Blend the Best of Digital and Physical, venture capitalist and Stanford Business School lecturer Robert Siegel brings the digital innovation conversation back to down to earth. He shows that, while important, digital is only part of the answerand it's never the only answer. The vast majority of successful leaders from both incumbents and disruptors focus as much on things like logistics, manufacturing, and distribution as they do on digital innovation. In fact, many established companies are successfully countering young upstarts in other creative ways, and many new organizations are learning from their older brethren.
Siegel shows how to create lasting profits and growth in the smartest way possible: by creating a solid partnership between digital innovation and traditional business operations—in other words, by marrying brains and brawn. He lays out the core competencies that today's industry leaders have mastered and explains how:
Charles Schwab uses cutting-edge analytics to better serve millions of investors without violating its original code of values.Align Technology transformed orthodontia by developing creative new business models along with new products.Kaiser Permanente taps into the power of empathy to improve patient satisfaction while controlling costs.Instacart balances ownership and partnerships to balance the needs of four key constituencies.Target, Best Buy, and Home Depot found different ways blend the best aspects of physical retail with innovative e-commerce.Desktop Metal is innovating high-volume yet affordable production methods that can revolutionize manufacturing.Filled with original research and case studies of Daimler, 23andMe, Instacart, AB InBev, Google, and many other companies, The Brains and Brawn Company: How Leading Organizations Blend the Best of Digital and Physical provides practical, proven insights and advice for bridging the gulf between digital vs. physical, disruptor vs. incumbent, startup world vs. Fortune 500, and tech culture vs. industrial culture.
The Brains and Brawn Company: How Leading Organizations Blend the Best of Digital and Physical provides everything you need to set your company apart from your competitors in real and measurable ways—and take the lead in your industry for years to come.
Hardcover
English
Brand New
Back Cover
"If you''re still wondering whether your company is destined to be a disruptor or an incumbent, you may be asking yourself the wrong question. Robert Siegel''s The Brains and Brawn Company is a must read for any leader looking to fearlessly embrace the advantages of both mindsets--and push the boundaries of what their organization can accomplish." - Alex Gorsky , Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Johnson & Johnson "In this timely book, Robert Siegel brilliantly challenges the common wisdom about competitive advantage, providing a new, essential roadmap for emerging stronger, creating value, and achieving success. The Brains and Brawn Company is a must-read for both established and future company leaders." - Julie Sweet , CEO Accenture "Simply put - a masterful work by Robert Siegel. His writing reflects the real world of trade-offs, technology, and truths. Digitalization matters, innovation matters, creativity matters. But ultimately what matters most to every business is its focus on customers and clients. An intense focus on clients paired with a commitment to put the interests of clients at the forefront of every decision is the ultimate winning approach in business. I found myself reading chapters multiple times as I marveled at the way Siegel''s experience, expertise, and insights come to life in the text. The Brains and Brawn Company is an ideal presentation of balance that every business leader can benefit from." - Walt Bettinger , CEO and President, The Charles Schwab Corporation " The Brains and Brawn Company is a thoughtful exploration of what it takes to succeed as a company in the digital world. Drawing on extensive research and conversations with business leaders, Robert Siegel provides actionable insights from new innovators and well-established titans who focus a disruptive lens on their own industries." - Anne Wojcick i, CEO, 23andMe "Robert Siegel has done an outstanding job of clarifying that success in today''s world will require a unique blend of both digital and physical skills and capabilities. It''s not an either/or decision, the future winners will embrace the power of brains AND brawn." - Brian Cornell , Chairman and CEO, The Target Corporation "We are in a new era of unmistakable disruption, and every business must change how they operate to survive and thrive. Robert Siegel''s The Brains and Brawn Company couldn''t have come at a better time as startups and incumbents alike are now positioned to rewrite traditional rules of business in the digital age." - Aaron Levie , Chief Executive Officer, Co-founder and Chairman of Box " The Brains and Brawn Company provides the blueprint for succeeding in our ever-evolving modern economy and society. It shows leaders how to build productive companies where digital and physical realities coexist in mutually beneficial ways." - Dara Treseder , SVP, Head of Global Marketing & Communications, Peloton "We live in an increasingly fast-paced business world. Platforms dominate several industries and separation between digital and physical is no longer possible. Consequently, companies must measure themselves against new criteria. Robert Siegel has defined the most relevant attributes for companies to assess their competitive strength. Every CEO in the world should evaluate their own company along the Brains and Brawn framework." - Mathias D
Author Biography
Robert Siegel is a lecturer at Stanford Graduate School of Business. His work includes teaching graduate classes, teaching Executive Education classes at Stanford GSB for such companies as Nike, Merck, Weichai, and Shiseido, and doing extensive research on such companies as Google, Schwab, AB Inbev, GE, and SurveyMonkey. He's also a partner at Silicon Valley venture capital firms XSeed Capital and Piva, and he sits on the boards of several startups.
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