On the Brink: A Fresh Lens to Take Your Business to New Heights

Corporate culture and culture change have become the pressing issues of our time. The fast pace of change is attacking companies of all sizes. Leaders are facing the challenges of adapting their organizations to generational changes, the uncertainties of new technologies, shifting client behaviors, and the realization that supply is often stronger than demand. 

?And, people just hate to change. They are willfully blind to what is happening all around them.  But, the future is, indeed, coming soon, if not today, and change they must. 

Andi Simon is a corporate anthropologist who has empowered thousands of business leaders to see their companies with fresh eyes, identify their next big ideas, and—most importantly—turn innovative solutions into executable change. In her groundbreaking book, On the Brink: A Fresh Lens to Take Your Business to New Heights, Andi presents her unique methods for harnessing innovation and revitalizing business growth. Taking readers on a journey through seven case studies, Andi shares how she helped these businesses discover new and profitable growth opportunities by exploring the untapped resources that were right in front of them. 

Businesses, not-for-profits, entrepreneurs are paying close attention. They frequently talk about the need to innovate and change is if these are the sweeping secret sauce to solve all their business problems; however, they often don’t know where to start or how to expand beyond creative brainstorming to strategically identify and act upon new business opportunities. In this book, Andi will take the reader through the theory, methods, and tools of corporate anthropology to see how this new perspective can help a stalled company see possibilities with fresh eyes to re-ignite their growth.

From a medical center facing multiple years in the red to a rural university battling decreasing enrollment to an equipment manufacturer whose award-winning product just wasn’t selling—the stories of these seven companies struggling to innovate and grow provide invigorating testimony to the power of corporate anthropology. 

Whether searching for a way to revitalize a business or to expand a successful company into new and profitable directions, the strategies outlined in On the Brink will give readers the fresh approach they need to achieve meaningful business breakthroughs.

Dr. Andrea Simon, author of On The Brink: A Fresh Lens to Take Your Business to New Heights is a corporate anthropologist who specializes in working with the leadership of organizations that need or want to change. 

Her company, Simon Associates Management Consultants (SAMC), applies the theories, methods, and tools of corporate anthropology and ethnographic research to businesses and not-for-profit organizations. Dr. Simon formed SAMC to help companies and organizations adapt to changing times. Her proprietary ChangeMap™ process enables companies to envision a future and then ''reverse plan'' to ensure that the vision is achievable.

Dr. Simon is a trained practitioner in Blue Ocean Strategy® and since 2007, has given over 400 CEO workshops and speeches on the topic and consulted with a wide range of clients to help them redesign their strategies, implement business change, and open new markets. The 7 case studies profiling her work with a focus on hospital marketing, healthcare marketing, Blue Ocean Strategy® and Innovation Games™ are included in On The Brink. 

She has appeared on Good Morning America and has been interviewed for The Washington Post, Business Week, ABC Good Morning America, Bloomberg News, the Los Angeles Times, Entrepreneur, Inc Magazine, The Daily News, John Wiley Press, and Forbes, and has been a contributor for Forbes, Fierce Health, and The Huffington Post.

Andi’s highly successful podcast, “On the Brink with Andi Simon,” has a global audience for thought leaders, authors, C-suite executives, and entrepreneurs, all of whom share their ideas about how to take you and your company to new heights.

A widely engaged speaker, she has conducted workshops and speeches for Vistage International, TEC, and The Executive Council, and has presented keynote speeches and workshops nationally & globally. Past engagements include the Inside Public Accounting, The Family Firm Institute, IACC, ABIT, Society for Healthcare Strategy and Market Development, and the Forum for Healthcare Marketing, among others.

She and her husband, Andrew Simon, have launched the Simon Initiative for Entrepreneurship at the Skandalaris Center at Washington University in St. Louis. The mission of the initiative is to help entrepreneurs — particularly women, underserved minorities, and people of diverse backgrounds — to achieve entrepreneurial success through access to the capital, mentors, and resources necessary to take an idea from observation to innovation. 

Learn more about Corporate Anthropologist Dr. Andi Simon, her work with innovation consulting & On The Brink at www.andisimon.com and her company at www.simonassociates.net. Her podcast can be found at www.andisimon.com/podcast.