The Catalyst: How You Can Become an Extraordinary Growth Leader

How ordinary managers in any economy
can do extraordinary things to build
sustainable growth engine

The Catalyst speaks to all managers who have ever been handed ambitious growth targets but little guidance on how to hit them. Managers like you who, year in and year out, face “the terror of the plug.” The boss expects you to deliver a daunting revenue target but offers little advice on how to get there. Even worse is “growth gridlock,” when your company won’t support your great ideas until you prove they’re good–which is impossible since you can’t get the proof until you’ve tried them out first. Stuck between a rock and a hard place, you spend your time persuading with PowerPoint presentations instead of pursuing opportunities.

What does it take to overcome such seemingly insurmountable roadblocks? How can you crack the code to discover and pursue new opportunities? How can smart organizations recruit growth leaders, train them, and learn from them instead of getting in their way? These are the questions explored in The Catalyst. Based on years of research, this inspiring book reveals that the most potent drivers of growth are unsung heroes who often go unnoticed: ordinary middle managers who do extraordinary things.

Intrigued by how some people were able to consistently deliver the numbers–despite both internal obstacles and highly challenging conditions in the marketplace–the authors discovered not only how they did it, but also the personal and psychological characteristics of those who succeeded. They distilled the lessons into practical tools, including:

• Turn lemons into lemonade: How what may appear to be flat or dead-end businesses can be turned into growth-oriented enterprises that create cool new products and tap new audiences.
• Get a bigger box: How not to just “think outside the box,” but create a bigger box by being wired for opportunity.
• Get rid of the monkey: Why the real monkey isn’t Corporate on your back, but Corporate in your head.
• It could be staring you right in the face: The hidden secret of growth is not relying only on development of dramatic new products or technological breakthroughs, but finding opportunities already there that are overlooked by the
competition.
• Do It. Now!: Breaking through growth gridlock comes from “learning by doing,” not through detailed analysis and planning.

The Catalyst is for people in the middle looking to free themselves from the shackles of business as usual–and deliver the organic growth that’s demanded of them. But it’s also for CEOs and CFOs who want to release the creativity lying dormant within their businesses.

• Designing for Growth: A Design Thinking Tool Kit for Managers (Columbia Business School Publishing)
• Design Thinking for the Greater Good: Innovation in the Social Sector (Columbia Business School Publishing)
• The Designing for Growth Field Book: A Step-by-Step Project Guide (Columbia Business School Publishing)
• The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses
• Playing to Win: How Strategy Really Works
• Solving Problems with Design Thinking: Ten Stories of What Works (Columbia Business School Publishing)
• The Toyota Way: 14 Management Principles from the World's Greatest Manufacturer
• The Innovator's DNA: Mastering the Five Skills of Disruptive Innovators
• Hit Refresh: The Quest to Rediscover Microsoft's Soul and Imagine a Better Future for Everyone
• The Physics of Business Growth: Mindsets, System, and Processes (Stanford Briefs)