With penetrating insight, Kotter and Heskett trace the roots of both healthy and
unhealthy cultures, demonstrating how easily the latter emerge, especially in f
irms which have experienced much past success. Challenging the widely held belie
f that "strong" corporate cultures create excellent business performance, Kotter
and Heskett show that while many shared values and institutionalized practices
can promote good performances in some instances, those cultures can also be char
acterized by arrogance, inward focus, and bureaucracy -- features that undermine
an organization's ability to adapt to change. They also show that even "context
ually or strategically appropriate" cultures -- ones that fit a firm's strategy
and business context -- will not promote excellent performance over long periods
of time unless they facilitate the adoption of strategies and practices that co
ntinuously respond to changing markets and new competitive environments.
