Was <em>Built To Last</em> Built To Last?

It's not just stock performance that makes the cream of BTL's crop -- the likes of Citi, AmEx, Wal-Mart, J&J, and GE -- stand out. These companies have taken leadership roles in their industries, offering innovative products while consistently outsmarting their rivals. Certainly, Wal-Mart and GE can be said to dominate their industries. And much of their success seems to resonate with ideas presented in BTL. According to Bob Corcoran, GE's chief learning officer, the company's dominance comes in part from a commitment to a set of operating mechanisms first invented in the 1950s -- a clear example of BTL's exhortation to "preserve the core." "The core, the principles, the rigor, the discipline, the system, is all there," Corcoran says. "And that system fundamentally created Jack Welch and Jeff Immelt."

The same is true of Wal-Mart, as Collins himself wrote in this magazine in June 2003: "The company's culture is as strong as ever. . . . If Wal-Mart were to maintain its average growth rate from the past 10 years, it would become the world's first $1 trillion company within a decade." But in a cruel twist of the book's logic, Wal-Mart may actually have too much of a good thing. As a result of its vision-driven zeal for offering customers the lowest prices, Wal-Mart has been blamed for a whole range of perceived transgressions -- from killing mom-and-pop stores to suppressing unions to shipping jobs to China. "I think they have made mistakes, even when they're trying to follow good values," Porras says.

"Gurus always grimace when a company goes from good to great to goofus."

Still, the fact remains that at least 7 of BTL's original 18 companies have stumbled (8 if you're cynical about HP) -- scarcely better than the results you'd get by flipping a coin. And that raises the infernal question that dogs the critical analysis of any business book: Have companies struggled because they ignored the principles in the book or because they followed them? "Gurus always grimace when one of the exemplary companies goes from good to great to goofus," says Darrell Rigby, a partner at Bain & Co. and an expert on management trends. "Was that because management stopped apply-ing the principles? Or because business conditions changed?"

BTL's authors, naturally, claim the former. "They're even more true today," says Collins of the book's ideas. "And they're more needed today than ever." The authors also say the book's validity doesn't depend on its list of visionary companies. Collins goes so far as to say that to focus on the companies at all shows a lack of understanding of the book. "BTL is not about these companies," Collins says, his voice rising. "For the most part, my experience has been that people haven't gotten hung up on the list of companies. At least intelligent, practicing leaders haven't gotten hung up on it." It is the principles, he says, that are critical, while the companies are simply a conduit for those ideas. If they had conducted the CEO survey at a different time, they very well could have had different companies. Simple as that.

Please don't mention that little point to the publisher, HarperBusiness, which is still including all of those company stories in the next edition, or to the companies, all of which wear their BTL association like a Silver Star, no matter what their recent results. Virtually every company on the list, when asked what made it a BTL company today, trotted out a laundry list of decisions, new products, and value statements as proof of its worthiness to belong to this elite club. A Marriott spokesperson cited the company's Core Values and Culture Council as an example of its adherence to the BTL principles. P&G sent a document citing each of the big ideas in the book with a variety of examples from its own experience. Under the heading "preserve the core/ stimulate progress," it included virtually every decision that CEO A.G. Lafley has made, from getting rid of Crisco and Jif to reaching out to external innovation partners.

Which brings up a deeper, more fundamental question about not only BTL but about any business book that becomes so widely adopted: If it's that easy to claim to have put in place these principles, do they actually have any meaning? (Fast Company, to be sure, celebrates many such books.) "Theeee most important part of the book is chapter four!" Collins declares today, stretching his words for unmistakable emphasis. "Preserve the core! And! Stimulate progress! To be built to last, you have to be built for change!" It would be hard to find anyone in the business world to disagree with that statement. And that can be a problem.