2005 Q3 Book Review
Survival is not Enough
by Seth Godin
We reviewed an earlier book by this author in 1999 titled Permission Marketing. In his latest book Mr. Godin focuses on the need for companies to embrace change. Change is ever present in any organization but the key to changing is to evolve. According to the author, evolution can be unleashed in an organization effortlessly and gradually changing everything in its path. Even though a company has been very successful in the past, sooner or later, every winning strategy stops working. The competition catches up, technology changes or the founder quits. When that happens, one of two things occurs: either the company has enough time or enough guts to try a new winning strategy or it fades into extinction.
Extinction is a way of life. According to the author, if every business that was started this year survived, we’d run out of people to staff these companies in just a year or two. If every project initiated by your company was a success, you’d be the biggest employer in town within three years and the biggest company in the world in five. Extinction is part of the process of creation and failure is the cornerstone of evolution. With the vast majority of new products and initiatives going down in flames, the best strategy is to assume that almost everything is going to fail. Exploiting the initiatives that succeed will ensure that extinction does not occur.