by Fred Fuld III
The average investor may not be aware of this but Nokia was a major turnaround situation. The book, Transforming Nokia: The Power of Paranoid Optimism to Lead Through Colossal Change, by Risto Siilasmaa, goes into extensive detail about how this transformation took place.
Between 2008 and 2012, Nokia almost went bankrupt, dropping in value by over 90%, primarily due to competition from Apple (AAPL). At that time, Risto Siilasmaa too over and saved the company.
But the book is more than that. The author provides ways, base on his experience, the you can use in your business to deal with business struggles and major changes.
Chapter 10, “The Golden Rules,” is an important one where he covers the principles that should be applied in any business. My favorite is number 8 which relates to formality and substance relating to meetings, in which he writes “Any meeting where we don’t laugh out loud is a miserable failure!”
I also liked Chapter 11 in which he emphasizes the importance of using scenario mapping. The chapter is called “Plan B … and Plan C and Plan D.”
If you own your own business or are the head of a company, Transforming Nokia is a book you need to read.