Tiger Woods completed an amazing comeback yesterday to win his fifth green jacket at the Masters Tournament – 14 years after his last win there. He did it after recovering from four back surgeries, rebuilding his golf swing, and competing against players 15-20 years younger than him. It hasn’t been an easy road.
Turnarounds in business are not easy either. I’ve been intimately involved in several turnarounds, including an $18 billion bankruptcy. And radical changes in strategy are also not easy – Kodak, Xerox, and Bausch & Lomb are all good examples. Apple’s current shift from a product focus to a services focus won’t be easy — it’s a shift IBM has found difficult.
Nonetheless turnarounds and significant strategic changes are often necessary. Success requires enormous amounts of determination and intense focus, just as Tiger demonstrated.