Bo Burlingham - Small Giants: Companies That Choose to Be Great Instead of Big

Movies have credits, and books have acknowledgments, but I feel as though many of the people involved in the production of this one deserve something moresay, a standing ovation. Lets start with the people who came up with the idea. Credit for that goes to Patrick Nolan, the director of trade paperback sales for Penguin, who had the original inspiration, and Adrian Zackheim, founder and publisher of the Portfolio division of Penguin, who contacted me after reading a cover story I had written in Inc. magazine on Zingermans, entitled The Coolest Small Company in America. He said he saw the possibility of a book growing out of the article. I didnt get it at first, but I agreed to meet with him. Over breakfast at Pershing Square Restaurant in Manhattan, he articulated the idea so clearly and so brilliantly that, by the time I left, my involvement was a foregone conclusion. After conferring with my wife, Lisa, and my literary-agent-head-cheerleader-guardian-angel, Jill Kneerim, I got started.

By then, a whole bunch of other people had already had an impact on what would eventually become Small Giants: former Inc . editor in chief George Gendron, who had assigned the Zingermans article and helped guide me through the research; Leigh Buchanan, whod edited the piece; and Georges successor, John Koten, whod put it on the cover with a particularly catchy cover linenot to mention Ari Weinzweig, Paul Saginaw, and their colleagues at Zingermans, including Maggie Bayless, Dave Carson, Frank Carollo, Amy Emberling, Holly Firmin, Mo Frechette, Stas Kazmierski, Ron Maurer, Todd Wickstrom, and Lynn Yates. Subsequently both Ari and George played crucial roles in helping me think through the themes of the book and identify companies I should look at. George, in particular, came through (as he always has) with those incisive observations at crucial moments that are the mark of a great editor. In addition, I received much valuable support and advice from Jack Stack, CEO of SRC Holdings Corp. (formerly Springfield ReManufacturing Corp.), my mentor and sometime coauthor, as well as numerous other friends, relatives, and colleagues, including Peter Carpenter, John Case, Susan Donovan, John Ellis the elder, John R. Ellis the younger, Richard Fried, Gary Heil, Michael Hopkins, Joe Knight, Joel Kotkin, Sara Noble, John ONeil, Bill Palmer, and Greg Wittstock.

Norm Brodsky, another mentor and sometime coauthor, contributed on several different levels. He suggested companies to look at; he helped flesh out themes; he gave me important feedback at various stages of the process; and his company, CitiStorage, turned out to be a prime example of a small giant, something I didnt realize when I started. Among those who helped me realize it were his colleagues at CitiStorage, including Brad Clinton, Peter Gunderson, Mike Harper, Bruce Howard, Manny Jimenez Sam Kaplan, Noelle Keating, Patty Lightfoot, Patti Kanner Post, Louis Weiner, and lastbut far from leastElaine Brodsky.

The first person I actually interviewed for the book was Gary Erickson of Clif Bar Inc., who immediately turned the tables on me, asking me a series of questions that helped get me on the right track from the start. He was able to do it because he was in the midst of writing his own book, Raising the Bar, which addressed many of the same issues I would wind up grappling with. Dean Mayer and Leslie Henrichsen were of great help as well, serving early on as guides through the wonderful world of Clif Bar.

As it turned out, the Erickson interview was just the beginning of one of the most stimulating, uplifting, thoroughly enjoyable reporting episodes of my career. Never have I had the opportunity to hang out with so many interesting people at so many fascinating companies, one right after the other. If youve already read the book, you know what Im talking about, and you can easily imagine why the experience was exhilarating. Here I would simply like to give credit to the people who helped make the reporting phase so much fun:

• at Anchor Brewing in San Francisco: John Dannerbeck, Fritz Maytag, and Linda Rowe
• at ECCO in Boise, Idaho: Karen Campbell, Rob Corrigan, Michelle Howard, Todd Mansfield, Bob Ohlson, Mike Pironi, Mike Scoll, Chris Thompson, Jim Thompson, Richard Vinson, and Ed Zimmer
• at Hammerhead Productions in Studio City, California: Thad Beier, Dan Chuba, and Jamie Dixon
• at New Hope Contracting in Dorchester, Massachusetts: Chris Howell, Rob Moreno, Chris Painten, Gene Pettiford, Danny Power, Peter Power, and Steve Quinn
• at O. C. Tanner Co. in Salt Lake City: Adrian Gostick, Kent Murdock, Gary Peterson, and Shauna Raso
• at Reell Precision Manufacturing in St. Paul, Minnesota: Bob Carlson, Jim Grubs, George Moroz, Joy Moroz, Bob Wahlstedt, and Steve Wikstrom