In this episode John R Bell takes a deep dive into his book, Do Less Better, where he explains why sacrifice in the right places cuts through complexity and clears the way to competitive advantage.
In his book Bell provides a tool-kit of road-tested strategies for keeping companies lean, creating cultures of innovation, and knowing when to expand and yet, remain streamlined. The goal of the book is to teach you how to “think smaller,” when everyone around you is firmly entrenched in the “do more” strategy in order to become more agile, adaptable, and resilient than your competitors.
This book is perfect for entrepreneurs who are struggling to outweigh the competitors in their market and need a new yet effective approach to reinvent their current strategy.
About John Bell:
“I am a retired CEO of a consumer packaged goods company that was sold to Kraft back in the 90’s. After the sell to Kraft I decided to become a management consultant and I did that until I retired about two years ago. By the time I hung up my hat I’d helped a couple dozen companies including Campbell Soup, Starbucks, and Interbrew. I love to write and still like to play games such as golf and tennis.
Earlier in my career I was faced with the challenge of turning around a near bankrupt company. This company had too many products, too many brands, and too many categories. So by closing or selling the majority of the brands we trimmed that company down to a shadow of its former self. We decided that we were going to be an expert in one category and at the time that happened to be coffee. By focusing on coffee and nothing else we were able to swim out of the raging river of red ink and we called that means to the end the do less better strategy. I describe that as the opposite of doing more with less or even doing more with more and that whole idea stayed with me for the rest of my career. So when I became a consultant I saw a similar pattern of unnecessary complexity in both troubled and successful businesses and I think today business complexity has reached pandemic proportions and there has never been a greater need for simplicity and focus.” - John Bell
For a detailed summary of Do Less Better according to John Bell CLICK HERE
Related Books:
The Road to Reinvention by Josh Linkner
Aligning Strategy and Sales by Frank Cespedes
Invent Reinvent Thrive by Lloyd Shefsky
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