Have you ever watched, or been involved in, a business
failure, where, despite the best efforts of hardworking people, the business
doesn’t survive? Scott Sonenshein lived through it, as he describes in the
Introduction to his engrossing book Stretch. (In some books, the reader can skip the
intro- not this one; the introduction is a must-read part of the book.) He was
hired by start-up Vividence in Silicon Valley at the very apex of the tech
boom. Despite prestige VC backers,
top-tier hires and $50 million, Vividence didn’t make it. As his career
continued, that experience led to an interest in why some well-funded
operations don’t succeed, while other, more resource constrained, do.
Peter Senge wrote about reinforcing cycles as part of his
book The Fifth Discipline, which I consider one of the finest business
books ever penned. In it, Senge describes the downward cycle that some
companies fall into, and why it is so difficult to reverse. Sonenshein explores
those cycles from different point of view- an organization and resource perspective- and
develops concepts for the reader to consider on how organizations – and
individuals- can take a fresh look at resource availability and achieve much
more success with fewer resources.
In full disclosure, I had the pleasure of working with Randi
Sonenshein, Scott’s wife, who is a highly-accomplished executive in her on
right (and a delightful person) and assisted Scott in writing Stretch.
And I met Scott on a few occasions. (He is now a Professor of Management at
Rice University). Further, while I wasn’t part of Silicon Valley, my employer
at that time he was at Vividence was a product and service provider to numerous
established tech firms as well as start-ups, and thereby I had a first-row seat
as some of our customers flourished and some vanished. Those experiences
clearly shape not just one’s thinking but entire career.
The core concept that the author develops is that of
opposing approaches and mindsets: one that we might label as the conventional
U.S. approach of more and better results are obtained by having or acquiring
more or better resources. He labels that approach chasing, and the practitioners chasers.
The alternative approach is stretching
(and stretchers) which requires
looking at the available resources in unique and thoughtful ways to get better
results from better utilization.
Mr. Sonenshein explores those two viewpoints and the effect
each has on society, enterprise and the individual. The book title likely gives
away that he concludes that stretching is almost always better. The book is
liberally peppered with examples of business leaders who’ve employed stretching
to optimize resources. While some stretched from lack of an alternative – the
beautiful example of young black woman Sarah Breedlove Walker, born in the
post-Civil War-South, lifting herself, and then other black women, out of
abject poverty by starting a business from almost nothing; other examples
feature enterprises like D. G. Yuengling and Son, which could have afforded to
devote additional resources to launch a growth strategy, but chose instead to
stretch existing resources, acquire used equipment and the like. As opposed to some
of its competition at the time – Sonenshein calls out Stroh brewery’s
aggressive growth via acquisition strategy only to crash- Yuengling remains as
America’s oldest continually operating brewery.
In closing chapters, he provides various techniques to
examine existing resources to ferret out alternative uses, warns of traps to
avoid, and how stretching as individuals can lead to personal growth.
Stretch is not only useful, it is an entertaining
read.
I totally enjoyed it, and it goes in my personal library of
business books worth keeping as a reference. Probably next to The Fifth
Discipline.
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