Boxes and Arrows
NOVEMBER 22, 2011
The best products don’t focus on features, they focus on clarity. Problems should be fixed through simple solutions, something you don’t have to configure, maintain, control. The perfect solution needs to be so simple and transparent you forget it’s even there. However, elegantly minimal designs don’t happen by chance. They’re the result of difficult decisions.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 30, 2011
With Cyber Monday, the tablet wars kicked into full swing. Which one is the best? Is it the iPad? The Kindle? Who has the best technology? The best distribution? Who's the best overall? For most people, "being the best" is what competition is all about. So General Motors CEO Dan Akerson was simply echoing popular sentiment when, on the day the new GM went public, he threw down the gauntlet: "May the best car win!
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Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 30, 2011
At a recent dinner party, I was speaking with a friend who had just been promoted to vice president at a well-known New York hedge fund. The promotion was unexpected, involved an immediate 50% pay raise, and came with broad new responsibilities. When he should have been feeling optimistic and excited about his new position, why did he look like the unhappiest person in the world?
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 21, 2011
Here's a question guaranteed to make your stomach lurch: "Would you mind if I gave you some feedback?". What that actually means is "Would you mind if I gave you some negative feedback, wrapped in the guise of constructive criticism, whether you want it or not?". The problem with criticism is that it challenges our sense of value. Criticism implies judgment and we all recoil from feeling judged.
Speaker: Alex Salazar, CEO & Co-Founder @ Arcade | Nate Barbettini, Founding Engineer @ Arcade | Tony Karrer, Founder & CTO @ Aggregage
If AI agents are going to deliver ROI, they need to move beyond chat and actually do things. But, turning a model into a reliable, secure workflow agent isn’t as simple as plugging in an API. In this new webinar, Alex Salazar and Nate Barbettini will break down the emerging AI architecture that makes action possible, and how it differs from traditional integration approaches.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 1, 2011
Myth #1: Multitasking is critical in a world of infinite demand. This myth is based on the assumption that human beings are capable of doing two cognitive tasks at the same time. We're not. Instead, we learn to move rapidly between tasks. When we're doing one, we're actually not even aware of the other. If you're on a conference call, for example, and you turn your attention to an incoming email, you're missing what's happening on the call as long as you're checking your email.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 14, 2011
I grew up hungry to do something creative, to set myself apart. I also believed creativity was magical and genetically encoded. As early as the age of 8, I began sampling the arts, one after another, to see if I'd inherited some gift. Eventually, I became a journalist. For many years, I told other people's stories. I was successful, but I rarely felt truly creative.
Business Innovation Brief brings together the best content for business innovation and strategy professionals from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 28, 2011
On January 1, Virginia Rometty will become the first female CEO of International Business Machines Corp. Articles about her have lauded her ability to blend enthusiasm, charisma, clear communication, strategic thinking, and "cool-minded" decision making. But one New York Times story placed the emphasis on the role self-confidence may have played into her success: Early in her career, Virginia M.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 3, 2011
An interview with Heidi Grant Halvorson , motivational psychologist and author of Nine Things Successful People Do Differently. Download this podcast.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 21, 2011
This blog post is part of the HBR Online Forum The Future of Retail. When I announced that I was leaving Apple to take the reins as CEO of J.C. Penney this month, the business press (and lots of others) began speculating about whether I could replicate the Apple Store's success in such a dramatically different retail setting. One of the most common comments I heard was that the Apple Store succeeded because it carried Apple products and catered to the brand's famously passionate customers.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 8, 2011
" When your Daemon is in charge, do not try to think consciously. Drift, wait, and obey. " — Rudyard Kipling. In a culture obsessed with measuring talent and ability, we often overlook the important role of inspiration. Inspiration awakens us to new possibilities by allowing us to transcend our ordinary experiences and limitations. Inspiration propels a person from apathy to possibility, and transforms the way we perceive our own capabilities.
Speaker: Jason Cottrell and Gireesh Sahukar
Retailers know the clock is ticking–legacy SAP Commerce support ends in 2026. Legacy platforms are becoming a liability burdened by complexity, rigidity, and mounting operational costs. But modernization isn’t just about swapping out systems, it’s about preparing for a future shaped by real-time interactions, AI powered buying assistants, and flexible commerce architecture.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 22, 2011
My wireless connection to the internet had suddenly stopped working. At first I was frustrated — I had been in the middle of browsing some books on Amazon. But I quickly took it as a blessing. I had an article to write and the Amazon browsing was a distraction. I resisted the temptation to distract myself further by trying to fix it and got to work.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 17, 2011
An interview with Gary Hamel , director of the Management Innovation eXchange and author of the HBR article First, Let's Fire All the Managers. Download this podcast.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 21, 2011
It's not easy to live up to your fullest potential. There are so many obstacles that can get in the way: bosses that don't appreciate what you have to offer, tedious projects that take up too much of your time, economies where job opportunities are scarce, the difficulty of juggling career, family, and personal goals. But smart, talented people rarely realize that one of the toughest hurdles they'll have to overcome lies within.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 11, 2011
Here is General Mark Welsh , Commander of U.S. Air Forces in Europe, speaking after lunch at the Air Force Academy a few days ago. The video is 50 minutes long, but I encourage you to watch the whole thing. It may be the finest piece of public speaking you will hear this year. The general is everything we want a speaker to be — companionable, funny, illuminating, truth-telling, and spellbinding.
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Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 29, 2011
As discussed in my previous post, your personal value proposition (PVP) is why an employer should hire you or promote you over someone else. It's the foundation of your career strategy. A product's value proposition only works if it's true, if the business has the organizational competencies needed to deliver the value proposition. Likewise, a PVP only works if it's true — if you have the strengths required.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 2, 2011
"I won't do it," he said. "I don't care who they are; I won't buddy up to people I don't like and respect just because I want something from them.". This came from a senior manager at a Fortune 500 company. It was a theme we hear over and over from managers at all levels. They're reluctant to take part in what they call "political games." They consider organizational conflict and competition mostly ego-driven, adolescent games.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 21, 2011
Most corporate buildings don't do a good job of supporting collaboration, brainstorming, and innovative work methods. They tend to be dominated by cubicles or offices which are suited for individual work, or by hard-to-book conference rooms that teams can use but only for short periods of time. What's needed is a more flexible space that better supports teams and inspires more open thinking.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 10, 2011
Some fifteen years ago, in the early days of starting up Fast Company magazine, co-founder Alan Webber shared one of his rules of thumb with me: "A good question beats a good answer." That pithy wisdom sunk in and took hold immediately. The first thing you notice when you have your ears pricked for questions is that most people (especially businesspeople) are more interested in presenting solutions, making assertions, and sharing their vision.
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Innovation is key to overcoming crises. This guide outlines how businesses can navigate uncertainty by adapting strategies, embracing open innovation, and strengthening resilience. Learn how to reassess business models, engage external expertise, and build a robust innovation ecosystem. Explore the three phases of crisis response—from immediate adaptation to long-term transformation—and discover how collaboration accelerates progress while reducing costs.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 21, 2011
The Occupy Wall Street movement has both perplexed and frustrated observers and analysts by its persistent refusal to nominate an identifiable leadership who can in turn articulate a coherent agenda. What is the point, these critics wonder, of a movement that can't figure out where it's trying to go, and how can it get there without anyone to lead it?
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 1, 2011
Around this time last year, I wrote about how we need to get back to allowing conversation to occur without texting, emailing, browsing, Tweeting, Facebooking, or doing whatever else zeros and ones can do these days on smart phones, iPads, notebooks, etc. I am as guilty as the next person of falling for the perception that any response latency is unacceptable.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 16, 2011
On April 6, 2009, as the world was reeling from the impact of the global financial crisis, the Guardian ran a feature titled "Academies of the Apocalypse?" Arguing that U.S. business schools and recently-minted MBAs should shoulder most of the blame for the crisis, the article triggered a series of follow-on pieces in the world's most-respected publications, many lambasting the value of top business schools like Harvard, Stanford, Wharton, and MIT, and questioning the ethical and moral convictio
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 4, 2011
Four years ago Harvard Business School Professor Clayton Christensen predicted that online education would take off slowly and then hit everyone by surprise: the S-curve effect. And indeed, while it initially grew slowly, online education has exploded over the past several years. According to the 2010 Sloan Survey of Online Learning , approximately 5.6 million students took at least one web-based class during the fall 2009 semester, which marked a 21% growth from the previous year.
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The DHS compliance audit clock is ticking on Zero Trust. Government agencies can no longer ignore or delay their Zero Trust initiatives. During this virtual panel discussion—featuring Kelly Fuller Gordon, Founder and CEO of RisX, Chris Wild, Zero Trust subject matter expert at Zermount, Inc., and Principal of Cybersecurity Practice at Eliassen Group, Trey Gannon—you’ll gain a detailed understanding of the Federal Zero Trust mandate, its requirements, milestones, and deadlines.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 4, 2011
Whether you are a new middle manager or a new President-elect , the common wisdom is that you have three months to make an impact in your new role. And yet when preparing for job interviews , candidates make the mistake of believing that most questions will be about their past experience, not what they plan to do once hired. New hires have to impress their bosses, peers, and employees in less time than it takes some of us to arrange a meeting.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 30, 2011
The CEO of Coca-Cola recently stated that China is a better place to do business than the United States. Muhtar Kent's remarks were prompted by the complexities of America's tax code, its bureaucratic red tape, and its polarized political process. Coca-Cola still invests in the United States but, like most U.S. multinationals, it now invests far more heavily in the growth markets of the BRICS.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 4, 2011
When I was growing up, I looked for a savior in just about everyone. There were too many fruitless visits from child protective services. There were too many police cars that arrived to "quiet things down" only to let them flare up again the next day. There were too many visits to the hospital.The police men, the agency representatives, and even the hospital workers seemed unable to do anything about what they clearly knew was a problem.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 16, 2011
It's hard to find leaders of the human resources (HR) function who are active in helping their organization improve the way it works. I asked dozens of people who are in HR or in process improvement to share examples of HR change leaders, and I only found a few. Though it's rare, here's an indicator of what is possible. In 2009 Tony Scibelli, Vice President of Human Resources and Operations at Faxton-St.
Speaker: Yohan Lobo and Dennis Street
In the accounting world, staying ahead means embracing the tools that allow you to work smarter, not harder. Outdated processes and disconnected systems can hold your organization back, but the right technologies can help you streamline operations, boost productivity, and improve client delivery. Dive into the strategies and innovations transforming accounting practices.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 10, 2011
Television advertising has undergone significant changes in the last 30 years. However, it is arguably on the verge of its greatest changes ever. From where I sit as the Global Head of Digital AT Pepsico Beverages, charged with navigating our brands foray into the digital world, I see three big changes: The value we put on an advertisement will change as we seek to account for engagement metrics in the pricing.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 4, 2011
Management consulting is an industry built on facts. A "fact-based decision" (a phrase that returns 1.8 million Google results) requires legions of analysts to gather and crunch data, and it so happens that consulting firms supply precisely such people. Facts appear to de-politicize decisions, imposing objectivity and facilitating difficult choices.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 10, 2011
Some seemingly innocent organizational practices, like praising people for success, are are likely to not only reduce performance and increase cheating but also make people less adaptive at work. The good news is that a few simple changes can effect a tremendous shift. Carol Dweck, Professor of Psychology at Stanford, presented this study at the first day of the 2011 NeuroLeadership summit in San Francisco.
Harvard Business Review
NOVEMBER 1, 2011
In the real estate world, there is a saying: "The three considerations that most impact value are location, location, and location." In the world of social media, they are purpose, purpose, and purpose. Nothing impacts the success of a social media effort more than the choice of its purpose. Because purpose becomes the cause around which people will rally and be inspired to act, it is also the source of social media's business value.
Speaker: Ben Epstein, Stealth Founder & CTO | Tony Karrer, Founder & CTO, Aggregage
When tasked with building a fundamentally new product line with deeper insights than previously achievable for a high-value client, Ben Epstein and his team faced a significant challenge: how to harness LLMs to produce consistent, high-accuracy outputs at scale. In this new session, Ben will share how he and his team engineered a system (based on proven software engineering approaches) that employs reproducible test variations (via temperature 0 and fixed seeds), and enables non-LLM evaluation m
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