Summary: Build Your Own Garage

Review and Analysis of Schmitt and Brown's Book

BusinessNews Publishing

• Publisher: Must Read Summaries
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN: 9782806239990
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Management
• Index: Business

The must-read summary of Bernd Schmitt and Laura Brown's book: `Build Your Own Garage: Blueprints and Tools to Unleash Your Company's Hidden Creativity`.

This complete summary of the ideas from Bernd Schmitt and Laura Brown's book `Build Your Own Garage` explains how in business, garages are considered to be the places where good ideas can be grown into new businesses. In their book, the authors state that every company needs an in-house garage, where creative ideas can develop, allowing the company to remain vibrant and successful in the future. This summary reveals the key to building and running a successful corporate garage and why you should build one for your company immediately.

Added-value of this summary:
• Save time
• Understand key concepts
• Expand your business knowledge

To learn more, read `Build Your Own Garage` and discover how you can ensure the future success of your company by building a corporate garage.

Summary of Build Your Own Garage (Bernd Schmitt and Laura Brown)

1. The Role of the Corporate Garage

Main Idea

Since business markets are constantly evolving, companies that simply learn and adapt never get ahead of the pack. Market leadership comes to those firms which succeed in capturing, managing and then applying creativity to deliver genuine business breakthroughs. Without a steady flow of fresh and innovative ideas, the best an organization can aspire to do is grow at the same rate as its industry grows.

The garage is where the analytical side of the business comes together with the innovative side of the business to generate practical new business ideas.

Supporting Ideas

A good corporate garage harnesses the analytical side of the business and the dynamic creative side of the business to come up with new ideas that are creative – original and useful. It does this because the garage accesses three key areas of the business organization:

THE BIZZ

The analytical and rational side of business operations:

Strategy – Planning – Leadership

The bizz are the fundamental rules, proven procedures and established principles of the business. Without the bizz, creative ideas would not add value or be very useful. The three core components of the bizz are:

1. Leadership and coaching – the ability to set direction and act as a mentor, bringing out the best in everyone.
2. Business concept management – being able to develop radical new business models that fit well while being unique, efficient and profitable.
3. Organizational alignment – so the entire firm pulls in the direction of growth and profitability.

THE BUZZ

The dynamic and innovative side of business operations:

Creativity – Passion – Excitement

The buzz is the dynamic and innovative side of the business which exists above the tedium of the normal routine. In practice, the buzz is all about doing something that attracts attention, is fun and intellectually stimulating. The three core components of the buzz are:

1. Motivation – the blend of external incentives (stock options, bonuses) and internal incentives (do something interesting).
2. Communication – the ability of good ideas to come to the surface of the organization.
3. Interaction – an atmosphere where collaboration occurs through common experiences and activities.

THE STUFF

The resources used to produce goods and services:

Facilities – Know-how and skills – Processes

The stuff provides substance and adds value for the organization by taking ideas and converting them into tangible products and services. The stuff will consist of the three key resources of the organization:

1. Facilities – offices, plants and warehouses which are required to produce the goods and services.
2. Knowledge and skills – including communication skills, management skills and functional skills.
3. Business processes – the basic operational infrastructure of the organization.

In practice, the bizz makes certain something useful will be created in the garage. The buzz assures that something original will be created. And together, the dynamic balance and creative tension that exists between the bizz and the buzz will combine to create great stuff that will drive competitive advantage.

It’s the balance between all three which constitutes an effective garage. More specifically:

• If an organization has stuff+bizz, it will have solid processes and knowledgeable employees. It will, however, lack the ability to respond to new situations which require vision and initiative to exploit.
• An organization with bizz+buzz will be dynamic and efficient but it will be unable to deliver exactly what customers require.
• A stuff+buzz organization will have great resources and skilled staff but everything will be done ad hoc.

Key Thoughts

“We have to be big and small at the same time. I had to design something that would take advantage of scale. But we know for a fact that big can sometimes mean bad. So we had to design something that could maintain agility and entrepreneurial spirit.”

– Tochi Yamada, head of R&D, Glaxo Smith Kline

“Believe you can change the world, work quickly, keep the tools unlocked, work whenever, know when to work alone and when to work together; share tools, ideas, trust your colleagues. No politics, no bureaucracy; ...

Table of contents

• Title page
• Book Presentation
• Summary of Build Your Own Garage (Bernd Schmitt and Laura Brown)
• About the Summary Publisher
• Copyright