In ancient Greek mythology, Icarus had wings of feathers held together by wax which enabled him to fly. Entranced with his newfound ability, Icarus ignored his father's warnings and soared ever higher. His wings eventually melted and he fell into the sea and drowned. In his book The Icarus Paradox, Danny Miller suggests that a similar fate can befall highly successful companies: confident in their positions of market dominance or their own exceptional management, these companies can falter and fail, victims of their own success. This research examines Miller's work in detail and considers its relevance for practicing managers as well as for students of management.
Miller suggests that companies which enjoy high levels of success are often unable to maintain and nurture those elements which made them successful. Thus a company which built its success on a commitment to quality at the smallest level can become enmeshed in too much attention to detail and a loss of focus on the company as a whole. The individuals who guided the company to its success become icons, while others in the organization are accorded little respect. Companies which were once successful because of their ability to be flexible become increasingly rigid in their internal structure and decision making process, and unwilling to expand into new markets away from their core business.
Using four areas that exist in every organization, strategy, goals, culture and structure, Miller has developed four "trajectories" that track a company's rise and fall in accordance with the Icarus syndrome: focusing, venturing, inventing and decoupling (5).
The focusing trajectory takes a craftsman company and turns it into a tinkerer company. Craftsman companies are characterized by skilled engineers and efficient operations; tinkerer companies are characterized by rigidity and too much attention to detail. The venturing trajectory begins with a builder company, manag...