Walk into any Borders or Barnes & Noble in the U.S. in January and right up front will be stacks of books in shiny silver-and-red jackets – Businessweek columnist Keith McFarland’s highly anticipated book Breakthrough Company - How Everyday Companies Become Extraordinary Performers. The book, inspired by the late business legend Peter Drucker, details what it takes to grow a company beyond its entrepreneurial roots into the big leagues. For SAS and eight other U.S. companies featured in its pages (four of them SAS customers), it’s a public relations bonanza. CEO Jim Goodnight and CIO Suzanne Gordon are quoted on why SAS is so committed to treating customers and employees well. SAS is also compared favorably with its analytics arch rival. “The results are telling,” the book says. “While SPSS posted revenues of more than $261 million in 2006, SAS posted its thirty-first straight year of growth, topping out at $1.9 billion in sales.” McFarland visited SAS’ Cary campus last December to interview executives, capping a five-year empirical study of more than 7,000 companies that have been listed in the Inc. 500 since Inc. Magazinebegan publishing the list. McFarland’s research identified SAS among nine companies from the Inc. 500 list which, through their performance, best illustrate “breakthrough” dynamics. The profiled companies, averaging about $900 million in annual sales, share four characteristics. Each company:
- Exhibits a sustained trajectory of growth in both revenues and profits.
- Is an industry sector leader in terms of products, customers and profits.
- Has reached “critical mass” of at least $100 million in annual sales.
- Is largely run by the same management team that was in charge when the breakthrough occurred.
Among those giving Breakthrough Company positive reviews are Stephen R. Covey, author of 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, and Forbes CEO Steve Forbes. Bob Eckert, chairman and CEO of Mattel, Inc., called it, “a book that refreshingly and persuasively backs up – with a wealth of hard evidence – its contrarian claims regarding how to elevate a growing business to undreamt of levels. ... Think Good to Great for those still small enough to think big.”