James W. Cortada is a senior research fellow at the Charles Babbage Institute, University of Minnesota–Twin Cities. He spent nearly forty years at IBM in various sales, consulting, management, and executive positions. His many books include IBM: The Rise and Fall and Reinvention of a Global Icon (2019) and Birth of Modern Facts: How the Information Revolution Transformed Academic Research, Governments, and Business (2023).

• PrefaceIntroduction1. From Theories of Corporate Cultures to the Realities of Life inside a Global Enterprise Part I. Cases from The Larger Picture of IBM’s Corporate Culture2. Role of Ethics in Corporate Culture: Enduring Beliefs at IBM 3. “The IBM Way”: Creating and Sustaining a Corporate Image and Reputation 4. Developing Managers in a Multinational Corporation5. How IBM Prevented Unionization of its American Workforce 6. Corporate Benefits in Boom Periods: IBM’s American Experience 7. Managing A Nearly Invisible Corporate Community: “IBM Families” Part II: Cases from IBM’s Material Culture8. From Lapel Pins to Coffee Cups: Links Between Corporate and Material Culture 9. Role of Postcards in Supporting IBM’s Image, Marketing, and Information Ecosystem10. Humor and Corporate Culture: IBM, Cartoons and the Good Laugh 11. Gray Literature in IBM’s Information Ecosystem Part III: How IBM’s Culture Went Global and Endured12. The Essential Strategy for Corporate Success Author’s Note: In the Spirit of TransparencyNotes Index

This splendid scholarship—rooted in Cortada’s four decades at IBM and his astute analysis as a historian—offers insights on how everything from market abundances, training, and social events to lapel pins, humor, and coffee mugs shaped and sustained IBM’s corporate culture.