Acknowledgements
Over the many years of discovery, research, teaching, consulting and practice, during which this book has developed and matured, I have benefited immensely from the contributions of my colleagues, friends, clients and students. My most sincere thanks go to all of them. Unfortunately I cannot name every person who has influenced my work, but I would like to recognize a few in particular.
My first thanks go to those who have shared my passion for the momentum effect and have contributed most to the current expression of ideas, concepts and models presented in this book: Alan Hughes, Zohra Jan Mamod, Prashant Malaviya and Stephen Partridge.
The many projects that laid the foundations for this work benefited from the devoted efforts of dozens of people in my research teams and I would like to acknowledge the valuable contributions of Cole Aliel, Marc Alzieu, Anne-Marie Cagna, Heather Chopra, Priti Jain, Ruth Lewis, Estelle Mense, Gueram Sargsyan, Nishi Shah and Julia Yaziji.
Many thanks must also go to those who took time out of busy schedules to review the book at various stages and make detailed comments: Marc Beauvois-Colladon, Mike Brimm, Pierre Chandon, Victor Cook, Hubert Gatignon, Christoph Loch, Christian Pinson, Subi Rangan and Petra Saf.
Several colleagues at INSEAD have helped shape my ideas over various discussions around meetings, in lunches, along corridors and in offices, including the following: Erin Anderson, Reinhard Angelmar, Ben Bensaou, Miguel Brendl, Ziv Carmon, Amitava Chattopadhyay, Markus Christen, Morten Hansen, Jill Klein, David Midgley, Paddy Padmanabhan, Philip Parker, Werner Reinartz, Miklos Sarvary, David Soberman, Charles Waldman, David Weinstein and Klaus Wertenbroch. Sadly, our friend and esteemed colleague Erin Anderson left us as this book was in production and her constructive optimism is deeply missed.
INSEAD provided support for my activities through the Alfred H. Heineken Chair, and I would like to thank Dean Frank Brown and Dean Anil Gaba for their encouragements. The Heineken company created this Chair in honour of its late chairman and main shareholder, ‘Freddy’, who transformed the company, established the brand as the leading global beer and created exceptional growth. I am extremely grateful to the firm for its generous funding of the Chair and for the valuable interactions we have had over the years.
My personal understanding of market phenomena was helped by many academics whom I had the pleasure of working with as co-authors, or whose work found some resonance with my own quest. First, my advisors and colleagues on many projects, Dave Montgomery and the late Harper Boyd. And then George Day, Leslie de Chernatony, Dominique Hassens, Dipak Jain, Johny Johansson, Kamran Kashani, Kevin Keller, Philip Kotler, Christopher Lovelock, Sandra van der Merwe, Reza Moinpour, John Quelch, Seenu Srinivasan, Donald Sexton, Ed Strong, Terry Vavra, Jerry Wind and Gerry Zaltman.
In the field of strategy, many authors have shaped our response to the challenge of creating value. Those whose inspiring work has most influenced my thinking are undeniably Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne – colleagues at INSEAD – along with Jim Collins, Michael Porter and C.K. Prahalad.
Some of the concepts in this book started to emerge when we were deploying the Markstrat simulation in many large global corporations. The firm I created, StratX, was based on the success of Markstrat, and many consultants and computer developers contributed to improving and extending it. I have spent many hours working with colleagues and associates from StratX offices in Paris, Boston and Tokyo, helping clients to deliver sustainable growth through customer focus, innovation and marketing excellence. Interacting with them in different meetings and assignments has always been the source of personal learning. I would like to thank all of them and in particular Laurent Bonnier, Philippe Latapie, Remi Triolet, Jeff Schnack, John Wills, Mario Castaneda, Dana Allen, Steven Flostrand, Sabine Fabbricatore, Laurent Schmierer, Jean-Michel Chopin, Thibaud Claudeville, Patricia Cormier, Marc Dimancescu, Sebastien Lamiaux, Alan Slavik, Gavin Strok, Etienne Auvillain, Paul Ritmo, Marie-Caroline Turmel, Bruce van Barthold, Raymond Ouellet, Douglas Ross, Stephan Hasse, Donald White and Niall McDonagh.
Over the years, I have been privileged to learn from and debate with literally thousands of business executives and managers. Some were clients, others students and others friends. Many others were interviewed by members of my team. They came from all levels, CEOs to product managers, from all functions and from all types of industries. I have operated in an international environment all my life and have been fortunate to meet and exchange with business people in North America, South America, Europe, Asia and Africa. I would like to thank all of them for what they brought me in additional wisdom, and recognize some of them more specifically: Laurent Beraza, Lord Birt, Peter Blackmore, Jean-François van Boxmeer, Jonathan Browning, Jan Carendi, Pierre Douaze, Pier Carlo Falotti, Roger Greenwood, Matt Hall, Han Hendricks, Heiner Hochreutener, Michel Jacques, Rick Johnson, Rod Jones, Michel Lambert, Jim Nyquist, Alan Pedder, Allan Polack, William Powell, Georg Reiff, Steve Ridgeway, Michael Rubenstein, Johannes Schmidt, Sir David Scholey, Geoff Skingsley, Philippe Vivien and Emmanuel Wolff.
Many thanks to all those in Pearson and in Wharton Business School Publishing who organized the publication of this book with great expertise, and especially Elie Ball, Anna Campling, Keith Cline, Martha Cooley, Emma Easy, Liz Gooster, Chelsey Marti, Tim Moore and Richard Stagg.
I am deeply indebted to Suzanne Sellier Di Sano and Joan Bryant, who went through the tedious details of the book, checked, corrected and helped me in so many ways.
My gratitude goes to those whose journalistic skills greatly contributed in making this manuscript more accessible and pleasant to read: Rudy Chelminsky, Elen Lewis and Laura Mazur.
And finally, this book is dedicated to my children, Sylvie and Philippe, and all the young people of goodwill like them. May this work, even in a modest way, help them to live in a better world where customers, employees and other stakeholders of the business community can prosper in harmony.