Sublime

Think about it: The ephemeral perception of a business is based largely on images, superficial headlines in the press, the momentary challenges—all of those hiccups and diversions that take our eye off the proverbial ball.The eternal reality of a business, in contrast, is its ability to provide good products or services that meet client needs at a

In the realm of high tech, pragmatist CEOs are not common, and those there are, true to their type, tend to keep a relatively low profile. Dan Warmenhoven at NetApp, Jeff Weiner at LinkedIn, John Chen at Sybase, John Donahoe at eBay, even such visible leaders as Meg Whitman at HP and Michael Dell at Dell—low on drama, high on integrity and commitme

But the company is able to crank out high-quality work year after year because its core capabilities are rooted in its processes and values rather than in its resources. I sense, however, that these capabilities of McKinsey also constitute its disabilities. The rigorously analytical, data-driven processes that help it create value for its clients i

Finally, at the top of this pyramid is disruptive innovation.

And you'll also hear lots of talk about how it is that large, enterprise companies such as Adobe, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, and Netflix have been able to avoid this fate.