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The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail (Management of Innovation and Change) by [Clayton M. Christensen]

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Clayton M. Christensen

The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail (Management of Innovation and Change) Kindle Edition

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Named one of 100 Leadership & Success Books to Read in a Lifetime by Amazon Editors

An innovation classic. From Steve Jobs to Jeff Bezos, Clay Christensen’s work continues to underpin today’s most innovative leaders and organizations.

The bestselling classic on disruptive innovation, by renowned author Clayton M. Christensen.

His work is cited by the world’s best-known thought leaders, from Steve Jobs to Malcolm Gladwell. In this classic bestseller—one of the most influential business books of all time—innovation expert Clayton Christensen shows how even the most outstanding companies can do everything right—yet still lose market leadership.

Christensen explains why most companies miss out on new waves of innovation. No matter the industry, he says, a successful company with established products will get pushed aside unless managers know how and when to abandon traditional business practices.

Offering both successes and failures from leading companies as a guide, The Innovator’s Dilemma gives you a set of rules for capitalizing on the phenomenon of disruptive innovation.

Sharp, cogent, and provocative—and consistently noted as one of the most valuable business ideas of all time—The Innovator’s Dilemma is the book no manager, leader, or entrepreneur should be without.

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312 pages
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Harvard Business Review Press
Publication date

22 October 2013
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3917 KB
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Creating an independent organization, with a cost structure honed to achieve profitability at the low margins characteristic of most disruptive technologies, is the only viable way for established firms to harness this principle.
Highlighted by 2,573 Kindle readers
One theme common to all of these failures, however, is that the decisions that led to failure were made when the leaders in question were widely regarded as among the best companies in the world.
Highlighted by 2,417 Kindle readers
Blindly following the maxim that good managers should keep close to their customers can sometimes be a fatal mistake.
Highlighted by 2,343 Kindle readers

Product description

Review

A Wall Street Journal and Businessweek bestseller. Named by Fast Company as one of the most influential leadership books in its Leadership Hall of Fame. "His book, one of the most significant business books of the past 50 years, became a mammoth bestseller, and its title entered the language." -- Fortune magazine "Christensen's The Innovator's Dilemma is the foundational read for managing disruptive innovation." -- Steve Blank, Silicon Valley serial-entrepreneur and academician, as seen in strategy+business magazine "This is an important read, even if you're at the very early stages of growing a startup." -- Drew Houston, CEO, Dropbox Praise for The Innovator's Dilemma and Clayton M. Christensen: Forbes "[Clayton Christensen is] one of the most influential business theorists of the last fifty years." The Financial Times "The Innovator's Dilemma achieves a rare feat: It is at once a satisfying intellectual solution to a long-standing business puzzle and a practical guide for executives and investors." Wired "... Required reading in Silicon Valley, where it has been championed by the likes of Steve Jobs, George Gilder, and Andy Grove." The Huffington Post "A seminal book." Bloomberg Businessweek "A holy book for entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley ..." Fortune "The notion of 'disruptive technology' is one of the timeliest ideas of the Internet age. Coined by Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen, it's at the heart of his influential book The Innovator's Dilemma." --This text refers to the hardcover edition.

About the Author

Clayton M. Christensen is the Kim B. Clark Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School. He is the author of eight critically acclaimed books, including the bestsellers How Will You Measure Your Life?, The Innovator's Solution and Disrupting Class. Christensen is the co-founder of Innosight, a management consultancy, Rose Park Advisors, an investment firm and the Innosight Institute, a non-profit think tank.

--This text refers to the hardcover edition.

From AudioFile

When new technologies become available, how do established companies take advantage of these innovations without disrupting existing relationships with customers and stockholders? The managerial formula that solves this dilemma is far from simple, but this abridgment of the author's 1997 book will be easily understood by anyone interested in technological revolutions. The clarity of these broad-brush ideas is just plain fascinating. The reader's gravity and dramatic precision will be distracting for many people, but only for the first few minutes. After that, the big ideas in this program take over and captivate the listener's attention. T.W. © AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From Booklist

The author, an associate professor at Harvard Business School, asks why some well-managed companies that stay on top of new technology and practice quality customer service can still falter. His own research brought a surprising answer to that question. Christensen suggests that by placing too great an emphasis on satisfying customers' current needs, companies fail to adapt or adopt new technology that will meet customers' unstated or future needs, and he argues that such companies will eventually fall behind. Christensen calls this phenomenon "disruptive technology" and demonstrates its effects in industries as diverse as the manufacture of hard-disk drives and mass retailing. He goes on to offer solutions by providing strategies for anticipating changes in markets. This book is another in the publisher's Management of Innovation and Change series. David Rouse --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From the Publisher

A Business Week Bestseller --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

Amazon.com Review

What do the Honda Supercub, Intel's 8088 processor, and hydraulic excavators have in common? They are all examples of disruptive technologies that helped to redefine the competitive landscape of their respective markets. These products did not come about as the result of successful companies carrying out sound business practices in established markets. In The Innovator's Dilemma, author Clayton M. Christensen shows how these and other products cut into the low end of the marketplace and eventually evolved to displace high-end competitors and their reigning technologies.

At the heart of The Innovator's Dilemma is how a successful company with established products keeps from being pushed aside by newer, cheaper products that will, over time, get better and become a serious threat. Christensen writes that even the best-managed companies, in spite of their attention to customers and continual investment in new technology, are susceptible to failure no matter what the industry, be it hard drives or consumer retailing. Succinct and clearly written, The Innovator's Dilemma is an important book that belongs on every manager's bookshelf. Highly recommended. --Harry C. Edwards

--This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From the Back Cover

In this revolutionary bestseller, innovation expert Clayton M. Christensen says outstanding companies can do everything right and still lose their market leadership—or worse, disappear altogether. And not only does he prove what he says, but he tells others how to avoid a similar fate.

Focusing on “disruptive technology,” Christensen shows why most companies miss out on new waves of innovation. Whether in electronics or retailing, a successful company with established products will get pushed aside unless managers know when to abandon traditional business practices. Using the lessons of successes and failures from leading companies, The Innovator’s Dilemma presents a set of rules for capitalizing on the phenomenon of disruptive innovation.

Find out:

When it is right not to listen to customers.
When to invest in developing lower-performance products that promise lower margins.
When to pursue small markets at the expense of seemingly larger and more lucrative ones.

Sharp, cogent, and provocative, The Innovator’s Dilemma is one of the most talked-about books of our time—and one no savvy manager or entrepreneur should be without.

--This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B00E257S86
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Harvard Business Review Press; Reprint edition (22 October 2013)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 3917 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Print length ‏ : ‎ 312 pages

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Clayton M. Christensen

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Clayton M. Christensen is the Kim B. Clark Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School. In addition to his most recent book, Competing Against Luck, he is the author of nine books, including several New York Times bestsellers — The Innovator's Dilemma, The Innovator's Solution, Disrupting Class, and and most recently How Will You Measure Your Life?. Christensen is the co-founder of Innosight, a growth-strategy consultancy; Rose Park Advisors, an investment firm; and the Christensen Institute, a non-profit think tank. In 2011 and 2013, he was named the world’s most influential business thinker by Thinkers50.

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Abhishek

One of the best books on management ever written

Reviewed in India 🇮🇳 on 11 June 2022

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It's as close to the "scientific method" as possible in the field of management. And it should be must read for anybody working in an innovating company. The insights are just too many and too useful to be described in a single review.

Reviewed in India 🇮🇳 on 23 April 2022

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Its a really nice read to understand process of innovation in business world with understanding the constraints & market dynamics. It's a intergrated comprehensive book which covers all aspects of innovation & its importance.

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Surendra Jagtap

Good read over technology disruptions.

Reviewed in India 🇮🇳 on 22 January 2022

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Few examples of technology disruptions are very much touching.

Reviewed in India 🇮🇳 on 27 April 2022

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It has potentially helped me in my negotiations regarding my patented technology, which I will undertake shortly. Looking forward to apply the principles.

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Devesh Verma

Heartbreak for Engineers

Reviewed in India 🇮🇳 on 23 September 2018

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It's a great book with in depth analysis and fortified with copious amounts of data.
My only problem is with the title , more apt title would have been : "Dilemmas of Innovator's Manager"
This is book about disruptive innovation, and I understand that this is book for managers, but all the tech is treated as merely incidental , the blood , sweat and tears of engineers who would have brought these technologies to fruition , most probably while working in "their own time" - the time which should have been spent with their families or taking care of their health , is reduced to a simple ascending curve , which was simply incidental , something which happened on it's own accord.
Long after reading this book following lines from the book stay with me , An executive and his skip level boss talking to him :
"But does engineering think we can do it ?"
"They stay it'll be a stretch , but you know them . They always say that"

28 people found this helpful

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Koushik Chatterjee

Gift of Honour

Reviewed in India 🇮🇳 on 21 August 2020

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We shared this book to a set of panellists. Delighted to make it available to them as a token of appreciation.

Delivery in 4 days (took 7 days) would have been preferred.

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Akash

Great Insights. Fact based.

Reviewed in India 🇮🇳 on 28 January 2019

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The book had great insights into understanding what makes successful companies fail to tackle some types of innovation even when they have navigated even more complex innovation before. However, at times the narrative was too heavy for me, and it took me a long time to finish this book.

5 people found this helpful

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Gaurav Varshney

A must read for every manager and entrepreneur

Reviewed in India 🇮🇳 on 13 May 2016

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Amazing book. Must read for every manager and entrepreneur. Provides very clear differentiation between disruptive innovation and incremental/supplementary innovation. With these insights managers may be able to frame appropriate questions and devise org structure to support any innovation that they stumble upon. Entrepreneurs may use these insights to position their product and accordingly identify and develop the market for the product. It also warns the entrepreneurs that there are huge risks of failures when they bet on sustaining innovation and attempt to compete directly with the established players, as established ones already have the might, tech know how and the developed customer base on their side.

3 people found this helpful

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Athan

A classic, for good reason

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on 5 September 2017

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The subject of this classic is disruptive technology.

With the help of many examples from industry (disk-drives being his main workhorse) the author explains what technologies are likely to disrupt, who is likely to be disrupted, why they are likely to be disrupted and what the choices are that the established players have when presented with disruption.

The most important point is that disruption generally comes from the practice of repackaging and marketing already existing, straightforward technology at a lower price point to a new customer base that is not economically viable for the established players.

For example, QuickBooks was marketed to mom-and-pop stores who could not afford to pay an accountant and it was the el-cheapo version of Quicken. It is of no use to a proper corporation. JC Bamford got started with hydraulic backhoes that were good enough for small contractors looking to dig a small ditch but wholly inadequate for the purposes of a miner. 5.25 inch disk drives were marketed to the nascent market for personal computers and were of no use to minicomputer manufacturers.

Disruptive technology is cheaper per unit, but its price / performance ratio is much worse than that of the established technology. It’s not good enough for the clients of the established players. Ergo it must be sold on its (lower) price alone, meaning that its purveyors must seek new markets. Flash memory, for example, was first used in cameras, pacemakers etc. Not in computers!

There is a large number of reasons that established players will frown upon the new technology:

1. Good companies listen to their clients. Their clients will tell them they don’t want it. They will demand performance and they will pay for performance.

2. Profitability will be lower in the lower-margin disruptive technology. Profit margins will typically mirror cost structures and will thus be higher for the higher-end product. Established players will in the short term make more money if they allocate their resources toward not falling behind their immediate competition for the higher-end product. (i.e. “sustaining” their competitive edge in the higher margin / higher tech market)

3. The processes used by the established players to sell and support the established technology may not be the right ones for the new tech.

The main thing to realize is that the technology does not live by itself. It is embedded in a “value network.” A car serves a commuter, a digger serves a mine, a disk drive is screwed down somewhere in a computer etc.

The seeds of disruption lie in the fact that the technology itself and its value network may not necessarily be progressing at the same speed.

If the technology is improving much faster than the trajectory of improvement of the “value network” (for example, if the desktop PC users demand extra disk storage slower than the industry is capable of delivering extra disk storage), then

1. The point comes when the value network of the established technology does not need the incremental improvements on which the established players are competing with one another to deliver.

2. More importantly, a point comes when the performance of the disruptive technology becomes good enough to be embedded in the value network of the established technology. So 3.5 inch disks developed for laptops can do good enough a job for a desktop, for example, without taking up the space required for a 5.25 inch disk.

It gets worse: sure, disruptive technology is deficient in terms of features / performance, but the price sensitive customers who do not care so much about performance often care a lot about reliability. (A small contractor who buys a single backhoe digger cannot afford a maintenance team.) Similarly, the unsophisticated customers of the disruptive technology may care a lot about ease of use. (Mom and pop using Quickbooks have no idea what double-entry book-keeping is!) What this means is that when the performance of the disruptive technology has become good enough for it to be embedded into the value network of the established technology, it often brings with it an advantage in reliability and ease of use.

So at that point the disruptive technology is cheaper, more reliable and easier to use than the established technology, all while delivering adequate performance.

And that’s how purveyors of the established technology (who have been at war with one another to deliver on the ever-increasing performance their customers have been demanding) find themselves at a disadvantage versus the disruptors when it comes to reliability and ease of use right about when their customers tell them they won’t pay for extra performance or features any more.

The disadvantage of the lower-tech disruptor has created an advantage and it’s game, set and match!

What’s an established player to do? If I’m running a super successful company and I spot a new technology what am I to do?

One thing I should not do is listen to my underlings. The dealers who sell my cars will not want a customer who just walked into the dealership to buy a V8 to drive out in a small electric car. The salespeople will keep asking me for the most expensive product because they will be paid a commission on their margin and will keep pushing me “north-east” on the price / performance chart. Resistance to disruptive technology often comes from the rank-and-file.

I also should not listen to my shareholders. Small markets (and all disruptive technology starts small) do not solve the growth problems of large companies.

First and foremost, I must understand that the challenge I face is a MARKETING challenge. The tech I’ve got covered. The resources too.

If my company’s processes and my company’s values (defined as “the standards by which employees make choices involving prioritization”) are aligned with the marketing challenge, I’m in luck: chances are that for my company this new technology will eventually become a “sustaining” technology.

I can get my wallet out and buy EARLY a couple of the new entrants. Early enough that my money is not buying process or values or culture, but merely assets/resources and ideally walking and talking resources (the founders) who will adopt the processes and values of my organization.

Alternatively, I can carve out some great people from my organization and:
1. Give them responsibility for the new technology and assign to them the task of identifying the customers for this new technology
2. Match the size of this new subdivision to the current size of the market.
3. Allow them to “discover” the size of the opportunity, rather than burden them with having to forecast it: “the ultimate uses or applications for disruptive technologies are unknowable in advance”
4. Let them fail small, as many times as necessary
That’s what IBM did when they ran their PC business out of Florida and what HP did when they realized ink jets would one day compete with laser printers!

If, on the other hand, my company’s processes or my company’s values are not aligned with the marketing challenge, then I need to buy a leader in the new technology, and have a finger in every pie. And I need to protect my acquired company from my organization. This is, obviously, a bigger challenge (and one my shareholders may not embrace, as their dollars are as good as mine, but the author stays away from this discussion!) As the succession in technologies plays out, I will then eliminate large parts of my current organization. The author cites an occasion on which this is exactly how things played out.

And there you have it! I think that’s the author’s answer to “The Innovator’s Dilemma”

Obviously, that’s a very quick sketch. You’ll have to buy the book to see the complete story (and to be convinced, I suppose). Be warned that in the interest of keeping the various chapters self-consistent you may find some repetition, but overall this is a very quick read.

I’m aware of people who really dislike Clayton Christensen. I’ve even come across a Twitter account that’s dedicated to trashing him. But I, for one, was convinced that he’s describing a valid concept with many applications.

Also, as a guy who established a disruptive business within an established player I totally experienced both the dismay of my superiors when they realized that “small markets don’t solve the problems of large organizations” and the discomfort of trying to shoehorn my project into the rather baroque established processes.

So I have lived through many of the steps the book describes and I reckon they are described very accurately. The research shows!

31 people found this helpful

@Timothy_Hughes

Disrupt or Be Disruptive

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on 9 October 2018

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The first business book I read was "In Search of Excellence" by Peters and Waterman. It profiles a bunch of companies and why they are great. The problem is, those companies don't exist anymore. The very thing that Peters and Waterman wrote about that made them great, also made them fail. In Clayton Christensen's book he tries to unpick what it is that makes a great company and what is it that makes a company fail. He uses the computer hard drive market as his test cases. A market that needed constant innovation, both from a product and company prospective, for those products and companies to survive. If you are in business or in a start-up you should really read this to learn from other people's mistakes.

5 people found this helpful

Kilt_monster

A book founded on rigorous research

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on 21 October 2017

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In his business career Christensen was fascinated by the question "Why do otherwise well functioning companies fail?"; that is; why when companies are innovating they nonetheless miss the boat in the innovation that goes on to dominate the present era of a market. To answer this he studied and analysed the disk-drive industry; sifting lots of data to come up with common patterns and interviewing prior executives, innovators etc.. This book is the sum of his research.

As with his other book "How will you value your life" the lessons here are quite simple, but behind them is much research consideration and insight. He pitches what he calls 'The theory of disruption' which explains how many new technologies manage to knock established ones off their perch. The book is a bit dated now and a reader in 2017 might think 'hmm, well that's a bit obvious' *but* bear in mind at the time this was written this was the *only* manual on this topic! The knowledge is still applicable; it can explain how PCs became laptops, laptops became smart phones, became tablets, became smart-watches...

A worthwhile read to challenge the way you think about business and innovation.

3 people found this helpful

R de Bulat

stimulating

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on 20 April 2013

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This book explains the double edged sword of innovation. One the one hand, why large organisations find it hard to tackle the disruptive innovations of new businesses and why leaders of new markets, having grown large on innovation, succumb to the next new thing, especially in technology. Christensen tackles the problems and offers some solutions, but I was particularly interested in the book from the point of view of a small business owner trying to compete with larger and richer organisations in my field of work. From my perspective, this book is encouraging and useful as a guide to how being small and flexible, especially in times of change, it is possible to enter new markets, providing services that larger organisations cannot replicate, or have no interest in replicating due to low profit margins. The book is squarely aimed at managers in large organisations, rather than small business, so it is not a straightforward process of reading it for great business advice, but I found it stimulating and informative - well researched and supported by data evidence and case studies. I am sure that it is useful for anyone studying business management, but it may just help the little guy find a way to take on the bigger organisations and win.

3 people found this helpful

Anonymous

Some interesting theories which can be applied

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on 27 July 2013

Verified Purchase

The author makes a number of important points, two of which stood out for me:

1. The distinction between a product being the best it can be and what a customer actually needs from it. There are numerous examples given of where the technical specifications of products such as disk drives improved far beyond what customers needed. Beyond a certain point customers weren't prepared to pay much extra for further advancements. The result was commoditised pricing.

2. The distinction between what you are good at making and what the market wants. A good example was the manufacturers of cable excavators not understanding how small building contractors worked, and thus continuing to produce what they could, not what the market increasingly wanted. The result was that they almost all went out of business.

If you run or own a business, this is a useful book to read. It doesn't have to run a manufacturing business - my firm does software services, and yet there are still relevant lessons in this book.

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