I just finished reading Small Giants: Companies That Choose to Be Great Instead of Big
It’s a good companion piece to Good to Great
Not good for my beauty sleep.
But this post is about Small Giants, not big ones. It’s not exactly fair to compare this book to Good to Great, but it’s hard not to. Unlike G2G, Small Giants doesn’t have the 20 researchers looking at years of returns and comparing it to similar companies in the same industry. More, Small Giants is a series of interesting anecdotes about the companies and the entrepreneurs who create them.
All of the companies profiled made a decision not to grow at a certain point. In fact, some of them actually scaled back. In a country where we’re told grow or die, these companies provide an interesting counter-argument.
There are some truly interesting companies profiled in the book, from Anchor Brewing to Clif Bar to Ani DiFranco’s Righteous Babe Records.
What’s great about this book–and great about entrepreneurship in general–is there’s no one way to do anything, no one route to success. One of the companies profiled is CitiStorage, run by Inc. columnist Norm Brodsky. I enjoy Brodsky’s column, but I often disagree with his policies and beliefts: there’s no point to marketing? Don’t hire family members of employees when your wife works in your company? However, you can’t argue with his success.
The only downside of this book is that it’s not as organized as I may have liked. G2G tells tight stories about the companies it profiles, while the connection between some of Small Giants stories seems tenuous.
However, that’s a small complaint for a book that most entrepreneurs will find inspirational, compelling, and a must-read.
