If your company isn't soaring as anticipated, look inside not out. Chances are your problems aren't due to market forces but rather issues such as a distancing from core principles, becoming deaf to your consumer's voice and sometimes a founder not empowering his people.

Those are some of the insights gleaned from The Founder's Mentality, a new book out from Chris Zook and James Allen, two Bain & Company partners in the firm's global Strategy practice. Zook and Allen set out to explore why companies that had achieved escape velocity – with anywhere from $50 million to $150 million in annual revenue – sometimes lost lift.