This book is the culmination of thousands of interviews and discussions, with managers, colleagues, and students over the span of a decade. During this time, it has been a particular pleasure to collaborate with former students who became collaborators and coauthors. I thank Martin Escobari, who helped on the Mittal and Brahma cases, and also co-authored a book on companies that thrived in the turbulent Brazilian market. My co-author Stefano Turconi has done an outstanding job of collecting and synthesizing data on Zara, the fast-fashion sector, and the cruise industry, where we have been helped immeasurably by Barbara Muckermann. In my study of Chinese entrepreneurs, Yong (Harry) Wang did an excellent job of supervising research teams based in Shanghai and Beijing, translating company documents, and working with the companies to ensure the accuracy of our data and analysis.

I owe an enormous debt to the executives, owners, and outside directors who were so generous with their own time in interviews, provided company data, arranged interviews with their colleagues, and reviewed our findings for accuracy. A few executives deserve special acknowledgment for contributing above and beyond the call of duty, particularly Carlos Siffert, Luiz Kaufmann, Carlos Alberto Sicupira, and Marcel Telles. In addition I would like to thank Terry Opdendyk, João Bosco Silva, Maurício Botelho, Alexandre Behring, Mário Bavaresco Júnior, Raul Calfat, Sílvio Carvalho, Newton Chiaparini, Renato Cuoco, Ana Maria Diniz, Carlos Ermírio de Moraes, Luís Ermírio de Moraes, Luis Gemignani, Aymar Giglio Junior, Jackson Gomes, Ronald de Jongh, Wilson Kuzuhara, Guilherme Leal, Antonio Matias, Caio Mattar, Ruy Moraes Abreu, Henri Penchas, Antonio Luiz Seabra, Alfredo Setubal, Roberto Setubal, José Tambasco, Fernando Tracanella, Luiz Antonio Viana, Ying Han, Xingsheng Zhang, Ying Wu, Johnny Chou, Ruimin Zhang, Mianmian Yang, Zhidong Wang, Chuanzhi Liu, Mary Ma, Yaochang Yu, Qinghou Zong, Zongnan Wang, Boquan He, Charles Zhang, Ezequiel Sanchez Cascales, Jesus Echevarria, Stefano Sutter, Dilip Patel, Micky Arison, Maurice Zarmati, Bob Dickinson, Roberta Jacoby, Tim Gallagher, Brendan Corrigan, Brenda Yester, Meshulam Zonis, Chris Hayman, Mary Bond, Anne Kalosh, Lakshmi Mittal, and Aditya Mittal; and I am grateful to the others who were so generous with their time, but are too numerous to thank individually.

Among my colleagues I owe a special debt of gratitude to Stanford professor Kathy Eisenhardt, whose work on strategy in uncertain markets has been an inspiration to me over the years. At the Harvard Business School, I thank Carliss Baldwin and Jonathan West, with whom I met twice a month to work through the classic texts about managing in a turbulent world, including the work of Frank Knight, Karl Popper, Friedrich Hayek, Joseph Schumpeter, and others. My former colleagues in the Entrepreneurship Unit at Harvard, particularly Howard Stevenson, Bill Sahlman, and Bob Higgins, provided invaluable insights into the process of pursuing an opportunity. At the London Business School, my colleagues Andrew Scott and Hélène Rey helped navigate the voluminous research about turbulence in macroeconomics. Phil Rosenzweig provided useful comments on my research design. Dominic Houlder and Ben Bryant, now a professor at IMD, both helped enrich my findings on portions of this research. I acknowledge with gratitude funding from the London Business School, the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at Harvard University, and the Harvard Business School Division of Research.

I am very grateful for the generosity of Keith Johnstone and Neil Mullarkey for their time and insights through many discussions about improvisation. My understanding of John Boyd and his influence on doctrinal change in U.S. Marine Corps benefited immensely from the insights and comments from Jim Murphy, Brigadier General Robert Schmidle USMC, Will Duke, Chet Richards, Colonel Michael D. Wyly USMC (ret.), Scott Gebicke, Victor Meyer, and Brigadier General Charles Campbell USAF (ret.). I thank Steve Fuller for reviewing the chapter on Karl Popper.

The executive participants in Achieving Strategic Agility, London Business School’s week-long “boot camp” on managing in turbulent markets, have provided invaluable insights, examples, and challenges on how the ideas in this book play out in practice. I benefited immensely from discussions with executives from Oracle, Emirates, Standard Chartered Bank, BT, SKF, and Mars, who participated in the Global Business Consortium. Several students have contributed their time and effort to research and write case studies or conduct projects related to this research. I thank Aaron Wen, Nelson Liu, Ying Zhang, Liyang Jin, Yong Yuan, Jason Hu, Charles Xu, Allen Qian, Julia Zheng, Greg Ye, Alex Araujo, Fernando Martins, Andre Delben Silva, Marcella Escobari, Mauro Goncalves de Oliveira Filho, Cinnamon Russell, and Giles Jepson.

Ben Loehnen, my editor at HarperBusiness, did an outstanding job. In addition to suggesting the title, Ben pinpointed weaknesses in earlier drafts and explained clearly why passages didn’t work. Researching, conceptualizing, and writing this book have been an all-engrossing effort for a decade. I thank my wife, Theresa, and our children, Charles, Phillip, Elizabeth, and Genevieve, who tolerated endless dinnertime discussions about “the book,” and extended periods when research and writing consumed much of my time and energy.