This text looks at the past 30 years of industrial America from the perspective of the Fortune 100. It compares such companies as Westinghouse and GE, approximately the same size in 1970. Now, GE is one of the most respected companies in American and Westinghouse exists only as a brand. What challenges in the ensuing 30 years resulted in this amazing dichotomy? This title explains how and why some organizations met the particular challenges of each decade (high energy costs and inflation in the 1970s, the regulatory reforms of the 1980s, and the new economy of the 1990s) and some didn't.

Author Biography

NITIN NOHRIA is Richard P. Chapman Professor of Business Administration and Chair of the Organizational Behavior Department at Harvard Business School. He is the author of The Differentiated Network, winner of the Academy of Management's Best Book Award. DAVIS DYER is a founding director of The Winthrop Group, Inc., a Cambridge, Massachusetts-based firm specializing in business and technology history, and a faculty member at Monitor University, part of the Monitor Group. His most recent book is (with Daniel Gross) The Generations of Corning: The Life and Times of a Global Corporation (2001). FREDERICK DALZELL is a senior consultant with The Winthrop Group. He holds a PhD in American Civilization from Harvard University and is coauthor of a forthcoming study of Procter & Gamble.