Why change?
Chapter 1 The connected customer
The Balance of Power is Shifting
A Wake-up Call at Starbucks
Something’s Happening Here
The ATM Revolt
Power in the Network
Chapter 2 The service economy
The Great Reset
An Age of Abundance
An Emerging Service Economy
Chapter 3 Everything is a service
The Industrial Model
Service-Dominant Logic
A Product is a Service Avatar
Services are Co-created
A Process is Not a Service
Service Networks
Chapter 4 Services are complex
Demands on Companies are Increasing in Volume, Velocity, Variety
Customers Introduce Complexity and Variability into Operations
Why is it So Hard to Keep Your Service Promises?
Customers Resist Standardization
Customer Support: Efficient for You, Painful for Them
Cost and Quality are Not Mutually Exclusive
Customer Service Doesn’t Have to be Painful
Control at the Edge
Chapter 5 How companies lose touch
Why Do Companies Lose Touch?
Over-Expansion
Blind Spots
Risk-Avoidant Cultures
When in Doubt, Get in Touch with Your Customers
Chapter 6 Structural change is necessary
How Did We Get Here?
Conflicting Constraints Lead to Rigidity
Chapter 7 Complexity changes the game
Return on Assets is Dwindling
Fewer and Fewer Companies are Surviving in the Long Term
What is Causing this Increase in Death Rates?
The Red Queen Race: If You’re Not Running, You’re Falling Behind
What is a Coevolutionary Process?
Every Adaptive Move by One Organization Affects Others
Adaptive Moves Can be Competitive—and Cooperative
Adaptive Moves Can Create Opportunities for Others
Coevolutionary Relationships Can be Very Complex
Optimization is a Journey that Leads to a Few Fitness Peaks
We are Reaching a Complexity Tipping Point
The Future is Connectedness
What is a connected company?
Chapter 8 Connected companies learn
The Company as a Machine
Closed and Open Systems
Complex Adaptive Systems
The Long-lived Company
Design by Division
Design for Connection
Chapter 9 Connected companies have a purpose
Purpose Accelerates and Focuses Learning
What is the Purpose of a Company?
How Profits Can Destroy Your Company
Purpose Sets the Context for Organizations to Learn
Purpose is a Moving Target
Chapter 10 Connected companies get customer feedback
Performance is How Well You are Doing
The One Judge of Service Quality
Balancing Promise, Purpose, and Performance
Service Quality is a Moving Target
Promoters and Detractors
Building Long-Term Relationships with Customers
The Net Promoter Score
Net Promoter at Enterprise
Net Promoter at Apple
Net Promoter at Logitech
Chapter 11 Connected companies experiment
Moments of Truth
The Problem with Procedures
The Front Line is not a Production Line
The Law of Requisite Variety
Reducing Variety
Absorbing Variety
Freedom to Experiment
How does a connected company work?
Chapter 12 Wrangling complexity
The Complexity Issue
Agile Development
Service Orientation
Organizing for Agility
Most Companies are Not Built for Agility
Chapter 13 The future is podular
The Parable of the Watchmakers
The Podular Organization
Morning Star’s Self-Organizing Marketplace
The Nordstrom Way
Self-Organizing Teams at Rational Software
Democratic Management at Semco
Can Your Company Go Podular?
Chapter 14 Pods have control of their own fate
What is a Pod?
What Kinds of Companies have been Successful with a Podular Approach?
A Podular System Trades Flexibility for Consistency
Why aren’t more Companies Going Podular?
Chapter 15 Pods need platforms
What is a Platform?
What is the Value of a Platform?
A Platform is a Government
Chapter 16 How connected companies learn
The Growth Spiral
Level One: How Entrepreneurs Learn
Level Two: How Organizations Learn
Level Three: How Platforms Learn
Growth Spirals in the Connected Company
Chapter 17 Power and control in networks
Linking Things Changes Them
What is a Social Network?
Power and Control in Networks
Exercising Power in Networks
How do you lead a connected company?
Chapter 18 Strategy as a Pool of Experiments
Strategies Don’t Last Forever
Let a Thousand Flowers Bloom
A Portfolio of Experiments
Be Connectable to Everything
Strategy by Discovery
Chapter 19 Leading the connected company
Leading from the Edge
Edge Leadership
You are a Learning Field
Influence—Give Meaning and Moral Authority to the Purpose
Chapter 20 Managing the connected company
Management is a Support System
Designing the System
Operating the System
Tuning the System
The Job of Managers
How do you get there from here?
Chapter 21 The Risks of Connectedness
Networks are Neutral
Pod Failure
Too Much Autonomy
Not Enough Autonomy
Platform Failure
Failure of Purpose
Customers First
Chapter 22 Starting the journey
How to Get there from Here
The Organic Path
Top-Down, Leader-Driven Change
Pilot Pods
Network Weaving
It’s Time to Change

Appendix Bibliography
Appendix Discussion Questions

The future of work is already here.

Customers are adopting disruptive technologies faster than your company can adapt. When your customers are delighted, they can amplify your message in ways that were never before possible. But when your company’s performance runs short of what you’ve promised, customers can seize control of your brand message, spreading their disappointment and frustration faster than you can keep up.

To keep pace with today’s connected customers, your company must become a connected company. That means deeply engaging with workers, partners, and customers, changing how work is done, how you measure success, and how performance is rewarded. It requires a new way of thinking about your company: less like a machine to be controlled, and more like a complex, dynamic system that can learn and adapt over time.

Connected companies have the advantage, because they learn and move faster than their competitors. While others work in isolation, they link into rich networks of possibility and expand their influence.

Connected companies around the world are aggressively acquiring customers and disrupting the competition. In The Connected Company, we examine what they’re doing, how they’re doing it, and why it works. And we show you how your company can use the same principles to adapt—and thrive—in today’s ever-changing global marketplace.