Monopoly Rules

Sales Leaders' Roundtable and co-sponsored by Marketing Roundtable

February 8, 2006, 6:00 PM - 8:00 PM

Sales Leaders are usually the first to realize that the traditional strategies aren't working like they used to in the past. Learn to identify and capitalize on the monopoly opportunities right in your company's back yard. Learn more.

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Where

Gleacher Center
Room 100
450 North Cityfront Plaza Drive
Chicago, IL

Who

Milind M. Lele
Managing Director of SLC Consultants

Program

6:00 - 6:30 pm: Registration & Networking
6:30 - 8:00 pm: Presentation
8:00 - 9:00 pm: Cash Bar reception in the Midway Club

Registration

Questions

Ken Nordine, '97
312-546-4522

Event Details

Monopoly Rules:
Forget competitive advantage—it's monopoly you want!

We've all been taught that to succeed, you have to have a competitive advantage. In Monopoly Rules, Professor Lele shows that, in fact, that's not true; what you really need is a nice, legal monopoly.

Highlights:

A new look at monopoly and why it's essential for profits and growth.
The Southwest, Dell Computer and Enterprise Rent-a-car monopolies.
Competitive advantage is the means, monopoly is the end.
The different types of monopolies
Why traditional ways of creating monopoly are less and less effective
How sales leaders can help management identify 'the man in the gorilla suit.'

Behind every successful company is a successful monopoly! Somewhere in its products or markets, the company has a monopoly like the one enjoyed by the soda concession in a movie theater or the coffee shops at O'Hare. The more the number of customers this "monopoly" contains and the longer it lasts, the more profitable the company. No monopoly, no profits.

Traditionally, we have all believed that companies are successful if they have a (sustainable) competitive advantage. Professor Lele's research shows that, in fact, legal monopolies — in the sense of being the only seller in a particular space — are the real key to profits and growth.

This new view of monopoly is particularly relevant today because the traditional means of creating such monopolies — strong brands, unique products, proprietary technologies and so forth — are increasingly becoming less and less effective due to ever-intensifying competition. At the same time, non-traditional or "situational" monopoly opportunities are springing up all over the place.

Sales Leaders will be particularly interested in this talk because they are usually the first to realize that the traditional strategies aren't working like they used to in the past. Monopoly Rules will help them validate their instinctive feelings. It will also help them lead the charge in identifying and capitalizing on the monopoly opportunities right in their companies' back yards.

Speaker Profiles

Milind M. Lele
Managing Director, SLC Consultants

Professor Milind M. Lele has taught marketing and strategy at the GSB since 1983. He has been an Adjunct Professor at the GSB until 2001 .Over the past two decades, he taught Industrial Marketing (354), International Marketing (456), Advanced Marketing (450), and Business Strategy (460). He continues to teach in the GSB Executive Education programs.

Milind is also Managing Director of SLC Consultants, Inc., a strategy consulting boutique based in Chicago. He is the author of two prior books, The Customer Is Key (John Wiley;1987) and Creating Strategic Leverage (John Wiley:1992).