How to Kill Your Company
Not your company.
Not your department.
Not you.
I've been studying the autopsies of fallen giants and household names, and it's never some mysterious outside force that took them down.
I've been studying the autopsies of fallen giants and household names, and it's never some mysterious outside force that took them down.
It was internal.
Psychological.
Preventable.
This post is a manual for what not to do.
This post is a manual for what not to do.
And it lines up almost perfectly with the five stages of decline from Jim Collins’ book, How the Mighty Fall.
It’s eerie how consistent the pattern is.
Let’s look at some low-hanging fruit.
At their peak, these companies were kings. Blockbuster had 9,000 stores and made $6 billion a year. Kodak controlled 90% of the film market. Yahoo was the front door of the internet.
And they believed the hype.
Blockbuster laughed Netflix out of the room when offered a $50M acquisition. Kodak literally invented the digital camera, and then buried it for more than 20 years. Yahoo thought search was beneath them and handed the reins to Google.
The fatal belief: “We’ve already won.”
Stage 2: The Undisciplined Pursuit of More
Success makes you greedy. Not for money (though that’s part of it) but for expansion, attention, credit.
Yahoo tried to be everything to everyone. News, search, email, media, social. They spread themselves so thin they lost grip of the one thing that mattered: identity.
Kodak chased margins instead of innovation. Blockbuster tried to prop up physical stores with half-baked digital experiments, too little too late.
They weren’t building. They were grasping.
Stage 3: Denial of Risk and Peril
There’s always a moment when the warning signs start blinking red.
Customers shift.
Let’s look at some low-hanging fruit.
- Blockbuster
- Kodak
- Yahoo
At their peak, these companies were kings. Blockbuster had 9,000 stores and made $6 billion a year. Kodak controlled 90% of the film market. Yahoo was the front door of the internet.
And they believed the hype.
Blockbuster laughed Netflix out of the room when offered a $50M acquisition. Kodak literally invented the digital camera, and then buried it for more than 20 years. Yahoo thought search was beneath them and handed the reins to Google.
The fatal belief: “We’ve already won.”
Stage 2: The Undisciplined Pursuit of More
Success makes you greedy. Not for money (though that’s part of it) but for expansion, attention, credit.
Yahoo tried to be everything to everyone. News, search, email, media, social. They spread themselves so thin they lost grip of the one thing that mattered: identity.
Kodak chased margins instead of innovation. Blockbuster tried to prop up physical stores with half-baked digital experiments, too little too late.
They weren’t building. They were grasping.
Stage 3: Denial of Risk and Peril
There’s always a moment when the warning signs start blinking red.
Customers shift.
Convenience starts beating brand.
Internal processes show cracks.
And still, leaders double down on the old model, because it’s comfortable.
Predictable.
Safe.
Blockbuster didn’t take Netflix seriously until the walls were caving in. Kodak executives thought digital would “cannibalize” film, so they ignored it. Yahoo outsourced their future to a competitor, then watched users fall in love with Google.
Denial isn’t passive. It’s a choice.
Stage 4: Grasping for Salvation
When the panic sets in, it rarely brings clarity.
Blockbuster didn’t take Netflix seriously until the walls were caving in. Kodak executives thought digital would “cannibalize” film, so they ignored it. Yahoo outsourced their future to a competitor, then watched users fall in love with Google.
Denial isn’t passive. It’s a choice.
Stage 4: Grasping for Salvation
When the panic sets in, it rarely brings clarity.
It brings flailing.
Blockbuster tried to launch its own digital service, but by then, Netflix had already changed the game. Kodak tried a last-minute pivot to printers and B2B services. Yahoo went on a spending spree, buying anything that looked shiny and new.
It wasn’t strategy. It was desperation.
Stage 5: Capitulation to Irrelevance or Death
By the time reality sets in, it’s usually too late.
Blockbuster: bankrupt. Kodak: bankrupt. Yahoo: sold for a fraction of its peak value.
None of these deaths were sudden. They were slow, visible, and avoidable.
So What Do We Learn?
These stories aren’t just corporate mythology, they’re warning signs that still apply right now.
Blockbuster tried to launch its own digital service, but by then, Netflix had already changed the game. Kodak tried a last-minute pivot to printers and B2B services. Yahoo went on a spending spree, buying anything that looked shiny and new.
It wasn’t strategy. It was desperation.
Stage 5: Capitulation to Irrelevance or Death
By the time reality sets in, it’s usually too late.
Blockbuster: bankrupt. Kodak: bankrupt. Yahoo: sold for a fraction of its peak value.
None of these deaths were sudden. They were slow, visible, and avoidable.
So What Do We Learn?
These stories aren’t just corporate mythology, they’re warning signs that still apply right now.
Because the same symptoms are popping up all over again, just wearing different clothes:
- Companies ignoring how people actually communicate. (Hint: it’s not email.)
- Legacy teams scared of automation, clinging to spreadsheets instead of system upgrades.
- Leadership that confuses internal loyalty with actual innovation.
- Professionals building their own tools on the side because what they’re given doesn’t work.
If your company isn’t making space for these signals, it’s probably walking the early stages of the same path.
The New Playbook: Stay Paranoid. Stay Humble. Stay Adaptive.
Here’s how to avoid becoming the next cautionary tale:
The mighty fall when they stop listening, stop adapting, and start believing they’re too big to fail.
You’re never too big to fail. But you can be too awake to fall for it.
The New Playbook: Stay Paranoid. Stay Humble. Stay Adaptive.
Here’s how to avoid becoming the next cautionary tale:
- Set traps for hubris. Build systems where someone has to ask, "Are we assuming we’re untouchable?"
- Audit focus ruthlessly. Are you chasing shiny objects or actually deepening your core value?
- Watch customer behavior like a hawk. They’ll tell you where the disruption is coming from—usually with their feet.
- Embrace internal hacks. If your people are building workarounds, don’t squash it. Fund it. Learn from it.
- Modernize how you work. Messaging, automation, transparency: if you aren't evolving, you're dying. Email is a dead communication platform.
The mighty fall when they stop listening, stop adapting, and start believing they’re too big to fail.
You’re never too big to fail. But you can be too awake to fall for it.
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