Lesson 04 of 6
The Outsider Advantage
Leaders recruited from outside a company, or outside its industry entirely, are repeatedly the ones willing to make the structurally necessary but politically difficult calls insiders avoid.
See it in action
IBM
How an outsider CEO stopped the board from breaking up IBM — and turned a hardware giant into a services powerhouse.
Ford Motor Company
The only Detroit automaker that avoided a government bailout — by mortgaging everything it owned, including the blue oval logo, first.
LEGO
How a toy company that had diversified itself to the edge of bankruptcy rediscovered the brick — and became the most profitable toy company in the world.
General Motors
The largest industrial bankruptcy in U.S. history — and the 40-day restructuring that turned “Old GM” into a leaner company that could survive.
Best Buy
Amazon was turning Best Buy’s own stores into showrooms for its cheaper prices. The fix was to guarantee Best Buy would never lose on price at all.
Chrysler
A $1.1 billion loss, a $1-a-year CEO salary, and a government loan guarantee Congress approved by a single vote.
Chipotle Mexican Grill
A wave of E. coli outbreaks erased two decades of “Food With Integrity” branding — and $10 billion in market value — in a single quarter.
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