Career Imprints

Book excerpt: Based on her research of 800 biotechnology companies and 3,200 biotechnology executives, Harvard Business School professor Monica Higgins discovered that one firm–Baxter–was the breeding ground for today’s most successful biotechnology ventures. This phenomena of one organization spawning an industry has also been seen in the high-tech (Hewlett-Packard) and semiconductor industries (Fairchild). However, until now there has been no suitable explanation of why and how these organizations were able to create the next generation of industry leaders. Career Imprints shows why Baxter was so successful in spawning senior executives and offers an understanding of what it takes for an organization to produce leaders that will dominate an industry for years to come. In this important book, Higgins shows that an organization’s "career imprint"3⁄4the result of company systems, structure, strategy, and culture3⁄4that employees take with them throughout their careers is the key to creating great leaders. By understanding these factors, staff, human resource executives, and CEOs can analyze their own organization’s career imprint and develop leaders.