Move Over, Michael Porter
Kyle Rasmussen MBA'08
Issue date: 10/11/06 Section: Johnson News
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Somewhere, in a five-star Caribbean outpost, under the sun-soaked palms and bamboo tree huts, Michael Porter is drinking a teal-colored beverage(the ones with the cute little umbrellas dangling over the side), savoring his youthful academic lore, and laughing at MBA students across America.
Some say Michael Porter is the next Hemingway (if Hemingway had decided not to write literature and to instead become a professor at Harvard Business School.) They say he pulls the undiscovered elements out of the universe and turns them into flawless, heart-shaped diamonds. They say he
can cure cancer. Yet, as you stare at Mr. Porter's perfect frameworks, and memorize his priceless little tidbits on competitive strategy, consider the following: Michael Porter is not just laughing at MBA students across America; he is laughing at everyone.
In fact, Michael Porter may even be laughing at himself.
Why shouldn't Michael Porter be laughing?Well, I'll tell you why: because, while Michael Porter has provided the world with the premier framework for evaluating competitive threats, Mr. Porter failed to consider the biggest threat of all, a threat
to the very existence of his 5 Forces, a threat to the intellectual fiber that binds the strategic realms of business together, a threat that is located right here in Ithaca, NY, right here at Cornell, right here at the Johnson School: Kyle Rasmussen, your humble narrator, MBA student with the Class of 2008, and the inventor of the greatest framework mankind has ever known: Rasmussen, an amateur lounge singer turned professional student, created the "5 Faces Framework" as a self-guided conceptual tool to use for solving virtually any and every problem the world has ever faced (no pun intended).
Worried about your case interview with McKinsey? No problem - applythe 5 Faces.
Is your roommate torturing you with bad music? No sweat - apply the 5 Faces.
Can't figure out why the sky is blue? No big deal - apply the 5 Faces.
Some say Michael Porter is the next Hemingway (if Hemingway had decided not to write literature and to instead become a professor at Harvard Business School.) They say he pulls the undiscovered elements out of the universe and turns them into flawless, heart-shaped diamonds. They say he
can cure cancer. Yet, as you stare at Mr. Porter's perfect frameworks, and memorize his priceless little tidbits on competitive strategy, consider the following: Michael Porter is not just laughing at MBA students across America; he is laughing at everyone.
In fact, Michael Porter may even be laughing at himself.
Why shouldn't Michael Porter be laughing?Well, I'll tell you why: because, while Michael Porter has provided the world with the premier framework for evaluating competitive threats, Mr. Porter failed to consider the biggest threat of all, a threat
to the very existence of his 5 Forces, a threat to the intellectual fiber that binds the strategic realms of business together, a threat that is located right here in Ithaca, NY, right here at Cornell, right here at the Johnson School: Kyle Rasmussen, your humble narrator, MBA student with the Class of 2008, and the inventor of the greatest framework mankind has ever known: Rasmussen, an amateur lounge singer turned professional student, created the "5 Faces Framework" as a self-guided conceptual tool to use for solving virtually any and every problem the world has ever faced (no pun intended).
Worried about your case interview with McKinsey? No problem - applythe 5 Faces.
Is your roommate torturing you with bad music? No sweat - apply the 5 Faces.
Can't figure out why the sky is blue? No big deal - apply the 5 Faces.