The Three-Box Solution

A Strategy for Leading Innovation

By: Vijay Govindarajan

Narrated by: Jack Garrett

How to innovate and execute.

Leaders already know that innovation calls for a different set of activities, skills, methods, metrics, mind-sets, and leadership approaches. And it is well understood that creating a new business and optimizing an already existing one are two fundamentally different management challenges. The real problem for leaders is doing both simultaneously. How do you meet the performance requirements of the existing business - one that is still thriving - while dramatically reinventing it? How do you envision a change in your current business model before a crisis forces you to abandon it? Innovation guru Vijay Govindarajan expands the leader's innovation tool kit with a simple and proven method for allocating the organization's energy, time, and resources-in balanced measure-across what he calls "the three boxes":

• Box one: The present - Manage the core business at peak profitability
• Box two: The past - Abandon ideas, practices, and attitudes that could inhibit innovation
• Box three: The future - Convert breakthrough ideas into new products and businesses

The three-box framework makes leading innovation easier because it gives leaders a simple vocabulary and set of tools for managing and measuring these different sets of behaviors and activities across all levels of the organization. Supported with rich company examples - GE, Mahindra & Mahindra, Hasbro, IBM, United Rentals, and Tata Consultancy Services - and testimonies of leaders who have successfully used this framework, this book solves once and for all the practical dilemma of how to align an organization on the critical but competing demands of innovation.

©2016 Vijay Govindarajan (P)2017 Recorded Books

Not suitable for listening. Returned it

This book is Not suitable for listening - I returned it after five minutes listening. Bummed

Buy the book, not the audio book

The information in the book is great - a strategy for organizing business imperatives. A balance of focusing on the core business of the present day to continue generating revenue, future business investments required today so that you win tomorrow, and shedding past practices that are holding you back.

However, I first purchased the audio book, and desperately attempted to listen, but couldn't bear it. The voice actor is not a match for the content, sounding like a hollow announcer who has no understanding of the material being presented, along the lines of an infomercial or industrial training video. I ended up purchasing the book, so I could learn the content without the distraction of an overly dramatic voice presentation.

Way longer than it needs to be

This book clearly has some great content, great stores and some key themes. That said, the book probably could be summarized in a few chapters. It isn’t enough relevant content for an entire book. It seems like they go into more detail in some of the stories just to fill up pages of the book, versus really thinking about what parts of the stories are really relevant to the point the author is making. This book could be edited and improved dramatically.