BCG
JANUARY 19, 2017
The turnaround of the LEGO Group is one of the famous business stories of this century. A victim of overexpansion and brand dilution, LEGO was on the brink of bankruptcy in 2004, when Jørgen Vig Knudstorp became the CEO. He was a 35-year-old former academic and consultant who quickly gained a reputation as a turnaround artist.
Harvard Business
APRIL 19, 2016
That’s nearly double the rate from 2004 to 2007. Outsiders, in effect, have become more of an intentional leadership choice than a stereotypical hire in a turnaround or crisis situation. (Planned successions exclude mergers and acquisitions, as well as situations when CEOs are abruptly forced out.)
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Harvard Business
NOVEMBER 24, 2017
An example of strategic burnout can be found at Lego around 2004. A turnaround subsequently lowered strategic stress to a productive level by discontinuing many of their seemingly unrelated projects, re-focusing on their core business, as well as streamlining operational processes that improved coordination activities.
Harvard Business
SEPTEMBER 8, 2016
After studying and working with hundreds of companies in free fall, we’ve identified concrete steps that leadership teams can take to engineer successful turnarounds and transformations. When Knudstorp took over as CEO in 2004, he quickly settled on a course of action: return the company to its core. Build a Re-Founding Team.
Harvard Business
OCTOBER 10, 2016
Voser took a detour to be CFO for ABB from 2002 to 2004 and then returned to Shell to become CEO in 2009. Voser was impatient for a new experience which attracted him to ABB and there he learned a whole new level of turnaround leadership. In his own words, “it was a truly formative experience.”
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