A View from Beneath the Dancing Elephant
Subtitle: Rediscovering IBM's Corporate Constitution
Publisher: MBI Concepts Corporation
Published: 2014
Place of publication: USA
Format: Paperback
Number of pages: 186
ISBN-13: 9780983373469
Description: Many IBMers see Louis V. Gerstner as the savior of their company—indeed, Gerstner sees himself that way. Who Says Elephants Can’t Dance? expresses this perspective quite well. What Gerstner never realized is that much of his success came from accidentally tapping into an eighty-year-old culture that he never understood. IBM’s founders, the Watsons, created this culture in the 1910s, and then codified it in the 1950s with the creation of three Basic Beliefs: Respect, Service and Excellence. But today’s IBM has lost its culture, its constitution and its way.

Surely a century-old corporation is more than its founding words; but great leaders do not seek to abolish a people’s constitution, rather they seek a return to its original intent. This book captures how that change occurred—a view from beneath the dancing elephant.
Table of contents: label: Preface
title: ix; label: Introduction
title: 1; label: A Resilient Social Ecology
title: 2; label: IBM’s Twentieth-Century Corporate Constitution
title: 7; label: Chapter 1: The Path to Growth
title: 17; label: A Test of Character
title: 18; label: A Bad Business Decision
title: 21; label: The Roaring Twenties
title: 23; label: The Great Depression
title: 25; label: World War II
title: 27; label: A Scaling Corporation
title: 29; label: Chapter 2: Life in the Redwood Forest
title: 35; label: Thoughtful Mistakes
title: 36; label: Building Commitment
title: 40; label: Building Family
title: 44; label: Building Excellence
title: 47; label: Chapter 3: A Culture Under Pressure
title: 55; label: IBM Stumbles Entering the 1990s
title: 56; label: Chapter 4: The Watershed Event
title: 67; label: A Defining Moment
title: 68; label: Did the Elephant Dance?
title: 77; label: Chapter 5: A Floundering Ship
title: 81; label: The New IBM Family Days
title: 82; label: IBM’s New Product Life Cycle
title: 94; label: A Blue Déjà Vu
title: 99; label: Chapter 6: Reigniting a True Blue Déjà Vu.
title: 115; label: Understanding IBM’s Economic Engine
title: 116; label: An Ideal Continuation of Tradition
title: 124; label: Afterword
title: 129; label: Elephants in Braille
title: 130; label: Appendix A: IBM CEO Information
title: 132; label: Appendix B: History of National Cash Register (NCR)
title: 142; label: Sherman Antitrust Trial
title: 142; label: Appendix C: IBM Traditional Anniversary Celebrations
title: 144; label: Appendix D: IBM Benefit Plan Summary Changes
title: 146; label: Appendix E: IBM Benefit Plan Detail Changes
title: 148; label: Appendix F: The $1,000-a-Day Man
title: 164; label: Appendix G: IBM Management Principles
title: 168