Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap…and Others Don’t

Following up on Built to Last, which examined how great companies sustain performance over time, this study addresses a different question: how can companies that lack strong foundational greatness achieve enduring excellence? Jim Collins and his research team identified elite companies that made the leap to great results and sustained those results for at least fifteen years. These good-to-great companies generated cumulative stock returns that beat the general stock market by an average of seven times in fifteen years—better than twice the results of a composite index including Coca-Cola, Intel, General Electric, and Merck. The team contrasted these companies with carefully selected comparison companies that failed to make the same leap. Over five years, they analyzed the histories of all twenty-eight companies in the study, examining extensive data and interview records. The research identified the key determinants that distinguish companies that achieve greatness from those that remain merely good.