The Phoenix Effect

Book excerpt: International turn-around gurus describe how to rescue a company from the brink of disaster Why, even in the best of economic times, do so many apparently healthy companies fail? The surprising answer offered by the authors of this breakthrough book is "denial," or more specifically, the inability of top management to acknowledge that they've been backing a losing strategy and to take the necessary, often traumatizing, steps required to set their companies on the right course. Using cogent case studies and lessons learned from working with Fortune 500 executives who have survived tough turnarounds, Pate and Platt vividly describe what happens when good strategies go bad. Drawing upon their experiences at top firms, they develop proven real-world turnaround strategies, tools, and techniques and show readers how to put them to work in their companies.