From a recent McKinsey Quarterly newsletter:
| Spurious frameworks and torrents of data often obscure the basic principles of good strategy. To beat the market, companies must exploit imperfections that stop (or at least slow) its workings. Such competitive advantages are scarce and fleeting because markets drive a reversion to mean performance … . Good strategies therefore emphasize difference … | |
| From Why best practice isn’t the best strategy |
But more importantly, an analysis of ROIC and EV/IC for top, middle, and bottom quintile companies from 2001 to 2009 shows an drop in ROIC of almost 75% (from above 15% to below 4%) and a drop of EV/IC of almost 85% (from about 3.2 to 0.5).
Best practices aren’t enough anymore. We need next practices.
As a side-note, the next Next Practices Xchange, hosted by the Mpower Group and one of the few forums dedicated to the discussion of next practices, is November 4, 2011.