David B. Yoffie

'A good read, with lots of salient business lessons for small and large companies alike.'-Fast Company

'You may wonder what the heck judo has to do with the business world, but Yoffie and Kwak use the judo metaphor with perfect sensibility.'-Dallas Morning News

By mastering the principles of movement, balance, and leverage, practitioners of judo strategy learn to overcome more powerful opponents. David B. Yoffie and Mary Kwak argue that the same principles can help companies defeat larger and stronger competitors. Using vivid examples from various companies, the authors explain how buisnesses can build and defend positions of relative strength while transforming their opponents' capabilities into disadvantages.

David B. Yoffie is the Max and Doris Starr Professor of International Business Adminsistration at Harvard Business School. Mary Kwak is a Research Associate at Harvard Business School.

Contents

Preface
ackowledgments
1 An introduction to judo strategy… (altro)

"Judo strategy is a natural choice for smaller companies because it values skill over size and strength." This book is authored mainly by David Yoffie, a Harvard Business School professor. This book is ideal for an entrepreneur, and specifically a tech entrepreneur, as all of the case studies relate either to software, computer hardware, or e-businesses. The book is thankfully light on a lot of Asian words and deep judo philosophies. It goes into basic judo strategy within the martial art, and parallels them to the business world. It is designed for entrepreneurs who don't have size (the only photograph in the book is of a young girl flipping Vladimir Putin, who is a black belt in judo, in a real match!) in their business going for them, and are competing against larger or more entrenched companies. The three main sections are Principles of Judo, then specific Case Studies showing the Principles in Action, then a shorter section on 'Sumo Strategy' at the end, which are the tactics for large companies to respond to Judo Strategy, and use their size against the smaller upstarts.

An example section is the 'Puppy Dog Strategy" (i.e. look cute and harmless) which is specifically to avoid "...if you mount a full-scale attack on a stronger incumbent, your opponent will fight back--say by slashing prices -- and almost certainly win.

This book is a must read for a start-up CEO or CXO in a tech company or really any company that is trying to be an entrant to an established market. I rate it in the top 5 most useful books for start-up strategy.… (altro)