Doing Both: Capturing Today's Profit and Driving Tomorrow's Growth

Product Author Bios

Inder Sidhu is Senior Vice President of Strategy and Planning for Worldwide Operations at Cisco, the $40 billion worldwide leader in networking for the Internet. He is also a member of the company’s Operating Committee.

From 2006-2010, Inder co-led Cisco's Emerging Countries Council, which drives business success in fast-growing geographies like China, India, Russia, Brazil, Mexico, and the Middle East. From 2006-2009, he co-led the Enterprise Business Council, which is responsible for Cisco’s corporate business, representing about half of the company’s total revenue.

In 2010, Sidhu published Doing Both: How Cisco Captures Today's Profit & Drives Tomorrow's Growth (FT Press). In this New York Times bestseller, he identifies common business dichotomies and explores how successful companies avoid difficult tradeoffs and instead achieve bigger outcomes by “doing both.” Using this framework, he offers a unique view of Cisco’s consistent record of innovation and high performance.

Since joining Cisco in 1995, Sidhu has held executive leadership positions in the Sales, Services, and Business Development groups. He has served as the Vice President and General Manager for Worldwide Professional Services, Vice President and General Manager for Advanced Engineering Services, and Vice President for Strategy and Business Development, Customer Advocacy.

Before joining Cisco, Sidhu was with McKinsey & Company, an international management consulting company. He has also worked at Intel and Novell.

Sidhu is a frequent guest lecturer at Harvard Business School, Stanford University, and the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley. He also serves on the Board of Directors of Goodwill of Silicon Valley.

Sidhu holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi; a master’s degree in electrical and computer engineering from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst; and a master’s degree in business administration from the Wharton School of Business of the University of Pennsylvania. He also is a graduate of the Advanced Management Program at Harvard Business School.

Innovate for the future or optimize the present? Reach new markets or build existing ones?

Don’t choose. Don’t settle. Do both.

 In Doing Both: Capturing Today’s Profit and Driving Tomorrow’s Growth, Cisco Senior Vice President Inder Sidhu shows you how. Over the past seven years, Cisco’s Doing Both strategy has doubled revenue, tripled profits, and quadrupled earnings per share. This insider guide reveals how Cisco did it—and how you can, too.

Doing Both means approaching every decision as an opportunity to seize, not a sacrifice to endure. It means avoiding false choices, reduced expectations, and weak compromises. It means finding ways to make each option benefit and mutually reinforce the other.

Sidhu explains why “doing both” is today’s best growth strategy. Drawing on Cisco’s hard-won insights and the experiences of companies like Procter & Gamble, Whirlpool, and Harley-Davidson, he presents a complete blueprint for “doing both” in your company, through:

·    Sustaining and Disruptive Innovation

·    Existing and New Business Models

·    Optimization and Reinvention

·    Satisfied Customers and Gratified Partners

·    Established and Emerging Countries

·    Doing Things Right and Doing What Matters

·    Superstar Performers and Winning Teams

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments   xiii

Author’s Note to the Reader   xvii

Chapter 1 Doing Both   1
Chapter 2 New & Improved and The Next Big Thing   7
               Sustaining and Disruptive Innovation
Chapter 3 Current Accounts and Future Conquests   33
               Existing and New Business Models
Chapter 4 Tuning and Transforming   57
               Optimization and Reinvention
Chapter 5 Satisfied Customers and Gratified Partners   77
               Direct Touch and Leveraged Influence
Chapter 6 The Beaten Path and The Road Less Traveled   95
               Established and Emerging Countries

Chapter 7 Doing Things Right and Doing What Matters   113
               Excellence and Relevance
Chapter 8 Michael Phelps and The Redeem Team   137
               Superstar Performers and Winning Teams
Chapter 9 West Point and Woodstock   151
               Authoritative Leadership and Democratic Decision Making
Chapter 10 The Journey Begins   169

Epilogue   173

About the Author   177

Endnotes   179

Index   187