Based on their work across companies in the automobile, agriculture, and technology industries, the authors outline 11 lessons learned in the process of working in and with organizations in the process of transformation. These lessons are: The customer is always right except when they are not: deals with customer-facing issues What got you here may kill you there: Letting go of what made you good is hard. Execute on unconventional wisdom: debunk best practices and use of unconventional wisdom as an antidote for me too thinking. Who melted my cheese?: examines how the heat and pressure of mergers and acquisitions impacts transformation. HR stands for Human Resources not Hiring Requisitions: brings to light the central role of HR in transformation and why this is the biggest missing piece There is no strategy if nobody knows what to do: provides insight into how smart sounding, unintelligible presentations dont add up to effective action and what to do about it