Mean Business: How I Save Bad Companies and Make Good Companies Great

by Albert J. Dunlap, John (Editor) Mahaney, Bob Andelman

Al Dunlap is an an outspoken, irascible executive with an incredible track record of injecting new life into tired companies. The business media have coined a new verb--"to dunlap"--when describing a fast company turnaround. In April 1994 he became CEO and chairman of Scott Paper, which had lost $277 million in 1993, was on credit watch for excessive debt, and whose stock had been comatose for seven years. In a mere nineteen months, Scott had record earnings, the stock had increased in value by $6.5 billion (over 200 percent), and Dunlap merged Scott with Kimberly-Clark in a stock swap that valued Scott at $9 billion and created the second largest consumer-products company in the United States.

Mean Business combines Dunlap's colorful personal history--his working-class background, employment, friendship with such people as Sir James Goldsmith and George Soros, his views on why too many executives think of themselves as corporate royalty--and his provocative ideas on management and leadership. His specific, tested program on how to evaluate and choose a management team, get the lowest costs from suppliers, improve the balance sheet, and develop a real strategy make this an invaluable book.

The controversy about corporate performance and how to achieve it is near the boiling point, as executives face the hard fact of business What is good or even excellent today won't be satisfactory tomorrow. Mean Business is absolutely essential for both companies in trouble as well as those at the top of their game.

Genres: Business, Management, Biography, Nonfiction

289 pages, Hardcover

First published August 27, 1996

Reviews

[Dave]

Read this and then read "The Notorious Career of Al Dunlap" by John A. Byrne. The contrast is striking. Dunlap is still a millionaire, but he'll never be a CEO again.

[Jeff Kinsey]

One of the best real life "this is what I did to save this company" case studies written. This one concerning Scott Paper and Al's ultimate success in selling Scott to Kimberly-Clark.

Love or hate Chainsaw Al Dunlap, he produced results using uncommon sense and by taking quick actions. Had Marissa Meyer followed just one-tenth of the insights in this book she could have saved Yahoo! Her failure to make any significant changes in the first month or two was my cue that she was destined to fail and I said so on many occasions. The same thing happened to Blackberry when Thorsten Heins was appointed CEO and stated, paraphrased, "I see nothing that needs to be changed." How stupid.

Yes, Al went on to apparently commit some accounting voodoo [plus more slight of hand in sales practices] at Sunbeam and was ultimately banned by the SEC from ever directing another publicly traded firm.

I am not sure what happen and we may never know all the facts.

It doesn't detract from the success story in "Mean Business" but should serve [perhaps] as another caution that absolute power corrupts absolutely.

[Mattjeff]

The first 4 chapters or so are excellent primers for anyone already in business. He really lays it out in almost brutal terms about where companies have gone off the rails. Whilst he is primarily discussing the big, inefficient companies he worked at, the lessons can be applied to almost any company that has been around a while.
However, after a while, the self congratulation and repetition in the rest of the book is a little wearing. Mercifully, the part of the book about himself is in the last chapter or two and can be skimmed or even ignored as it is dross.
Apparently many dodgy accounting practices surfaced after Dunlap left these companies many of which were his attempts to make his turnarounds look more spectacular and bolster his massive ego. However that should not detract from the huge dose of good sense discussed in the initial chapters.

[Yves]

Well-written and an awesome read, tracking the business live journey of Albert J. Dunlop, the ultimate business warrior, addressing the problem of poorly-performing companies as a specialty.

Called “Chainsaw Al” for his direct business style, there is no denying that his business philosophy works. Traditional businessmen (not pros …) find him extreme … I find him refreshing.

[Steven Thomas]

Legend in his own mind. Book was full of revisionist history and delusions of grandeur peppered with occasional insight into Business 101 ideals. Nothing really revolutionary. Time proved out he was nothing more than a raider.

[Mark Bunch]

A turnaround artist. The rules of corporate change.

[Aiden A]

Outdated intelligence so far so good.