Brandon W. Jones

This article is very insightful because it explains all of the flaws in the statistical research behind the book Good To Great by Jim Collins. He did not set out to prove a specific hypothesis; instead he just found similar characteristics between 11 successful companies. This is very important because it is very easy to just read an article with new ideas and concepts and then accept them as the truth. It is very important to do a logical analysis of the methods used to derive the theory. If the theory is based on a solid statistical analysis it can be accepted, but if it is based on a flawed study it may be just commonalities of several test subjects. It is also very important to look at causality and not just associations. The two are very different and must treated as such.