"You have to keep a company scrappy at all times in order to be ready for whatever comes your way, and without fighting for growth, you lose that scrappiness."
This is an interesting valuing of growth that I haven't heard talked about too much: it's connection to be battle-ready at all times.
Now we know that Grove seemed to live in that mode all the time. He was always feisty and ready to do battle with what was needed to bring Intel (INTC) to the next level of growth.
So when he talks about being ready to do battle and being scrappy, it's really interesting to see him tie it into growth. He believed that to be in perpetual readiness required the fight over growing the company.
There's a lot going on in his belief here. There's the need to keep the company in a fighting state of mind at all times. There's the need to grow that all companies have. He also includes the thought that there is always a challenge that will come the way of a company that growth prepares the troops to be ready for.
He felt it was imperative to have this "scrappiness" as part of the culture of Intel. The idea of permeating this attribute throughout the huge Intel workforce by focusing on growth in a very proactive way is really a brilliant idea. It keeps your people on edge, in the good sense of the term: sharp, ready, able, expecting, confident, seasoned and paranoid.
It brings a dose of reality to a company and its people when they realize that their response and way they hold the importance of growth, is the very thing that brings that growth and the resultant characteristics with them to a company - they feed one another.
Other Andy Grove Resources:
Andy Grove's Rational Exuberance
The Digital Age . . . driven by the passion of Intel's Andrew Grove
The History and Influence of Andy Grove
Andy Grove enters new post-Intel role as activist capitalist
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