Winning at Service
Lessons from Service Leaders
Chapter One
Introduction
In the twentieth century the service industry evolved from representing
10%-20% of the Western European economy (GDP) to being the heartbeat
of the industrialized world. In economic importance, service industries have,
by far, outgrown manufacturing, raw material extraction and agriculture. By
the turn of the millennium the total services sector constituted
approximately 65% of the total European Union (EU) GDP and 70% of
the total workforce in the European Union. In this book we speak about a
large but little publicized part of the services sector: companies that provide
organizations and individuals with services such as food services and security
service. Over the last century, most food services and security companies
stayed small, or disappeared. But four European service companies - Securitas,
Group 4 Falck, Compass Group, and Sodexho Alliance - grew on
average at an aggregated rat ... read full excerpt from Winning at Service : Lessons from Service Leaders ebook
