Success is supposed to be the goal. So why does it so often destroy the very thing that made an organisation great? Eric Ries — author of The Lean Startup — returns with a new book and a sobering answer.
What if the greatest threat to a successful organisation is not competition, disruption, or poor strategy — but success itself?
Eric Ries, author of The Lean Startup and founder of the Long-Term Stock Exchange, has spent the past decade studying a force more powerful than management: a financial gravity that pulls even the most values-driven organisations away from their founding missions as they grow. In his new book Incorruptible, he explains where this force comes from, which organisations have learned to resist it, and what leaders can do — starting on Monday — to protect what they are building.
What we cover:
The one-legged stool — How shareholder primacy became the default setting of modern capitalism, why the evidence for it is shockingly weak, and what the three-legged stool of purpose, stakeholders, and investors actually looks like in practice.
The exceptions that prove nothing is inevitable — Grundfos, Bosch, Novo Nordisk, Costco, H-E-B. Why do these companies consistently outperform their conventionally governed peers — and what structural choices make the difference?
The US healthcare anomaly — The Our World in Data chart that shows the US spending twice as much per capita as comparable countries and achieving lower life expectancy. Eric explains the mechanism behind it — and why it appears in transit, journalism, and sport too.
Devoted Health — Former US CTO Todd Park's full-stack healthcare company, built on the principle that it can only profit by keeping patients healthy. A live demonstration that the alternative is commercially viable.
Mary Parker Follett and the invisible leader — The management theorist written out of history who knew more about purpose-driven organisations than almost anyone since. Her concept of the invisible leader — the shared purpose that guides behaviour when no manager is present — is the foundation of everything Eric argues in the book.
The culture bank — How H-E-B built the most trusted grocery brand in Texas not through marketing but through a hundred decisions to do the right thing, including sending customers home with full carts during a winter storm without taking payment.
You are not stuck in traffic. You are the traffic. — Why individual agency matters more than most people think in an age of surveillance capitalism, and what founders, leaders, employees, and consumers can each do to resist financial gravity in their own sphere.
📊 Life Expectancy vs. Healthcare Spending (Our World in Data): https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/life-expectancy-vs-healthcare-expenditure
📖 Incorruptible by Eric Ries: www.incorruptible.co — bonus chapter, implementation guides, and reader resources
🔗 Connect with Eric Ries: linkedin.com/in/eries
About Eric Ries Eric Ries is the author of The Lean Startup (2011) and The Startup Way (2017), and the founder of the Long-Term Stock Exchange (LTSE). His new book Incorruptible (2026) examines the structural forces that pull successful organisations away from their founding missions and provides a practical framework for resisting them.
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