ed by entrepreneurs and which are innovative and creative, and ends with imperialist companies, who expand into businesses they have little experience with and who are excessively concerned with profit. The inventing trajectory starts with pioneer companies which have strong research and development areas and which are able to produce products that are state-of-the-art with an immediate market. These pioneer companies become escapists under the Icarus syndrome, in which their creative scientists and engineers work on projects that may lack immediate market potential and which are unable to generate the necessary revenue for the company's success. The last type of trajectory, decoupling, begins with salesmen organizations. These companies have strong marketing skills and broad markets. These become drifters, which are characterized by highly bureaucratic structures that leave little room for marketing creativity (4).
While the four trajectories that Miller uses are very different in the specifics, there are similarities among them. For example, all trajectories contain a momentum that emphasizes a company's initial strengths. It is when that momentum is allowed to carry these strengths to extremes that the company begins to feel the effects of the Icarus paradox (174).
Because the factors that contribute to a high performance company's success are the same factors which can bring about its downfall when taken to extremes, they must be managed carefully. High performance companies that are able to either survive without succumbing to the Icarus paradox, or those which are able to recover from a downward slip, are those companies that possess the management acumen and the structural integrity required to manage and implement programs that prevent extremism (176).
At the management level, this requires individuals who are willing to recognize that their internal biases and background may prevent them from being successful l...