This is one of my all time favorite business books.

Jim Collins and his team of researchers used strict benchmarks to identify a group of eleven companies that made the leap from good to great and then sustained that greatness for at least fifteen years.  The greatness had to be independent of their industry.  The team then identified eleven other direct comparison companies in the same industries as the eleven that had become great and six additional companies that had made an initial leap from good to great but the leap was then unsustained.   The team then spent five years extensively studying and analyzing the 28 companies. 

Their goal was to figure out what was in the "Black Box":  What enabled a company to become great and to sustain that greatness?  The team did not set out to prove a theory.  They set out to discover one and ended up discovering many.

The resultant book is itself GREAT!  It is very well written and a joy to read.  Collins is an expert storyteller.  He weaves in examples and stories that firmly anchor the deductions that the team made from their research.  The fact that the concepts in the book were derived from making sense of the empirical data collected is what makes this book so incredibly powerful and useful. 

It is worth repeated reads because each time you can get more out of the data and concepts presented.  In fact, I first borrowed it from the library, liked it so much that a few months later I wanted to reread it.  I again checked it out but was enjoying it so much I found myself wanting to highlight sections so I went out and bought the book.

Recently when I was working with a client on defining the Hedgehog Principal for her business, I decided I wanted to review Collin's presentation of the concept.  This time I listened to the book on CD. I found that listening to the CD brings a whole new light to the information.  I have now purchased the CDs too!  The book is read well.

Jim Collins has also written a follow up for the Social Sectors which I have not yet read.