BOSTON -- Harvard Business School Publishing HBSP, the highly regarded publisher of premier management content, is proud to announce the launch of the HBR IdeaCast, a new bi-weekly podcast featuring breakthrough management ideas and commentary from the authors and editors of Harvard Business School Publishing. The free podcast is available...
Here's a great post from Harvard Business Online on what's wrong with how most companies implement balanced scorecards. Balanced scorecards measure a company's non-financial performance, which includes customer satisfaction, and its financial performance, such as sales. The problem is most companies don't know how to measure how their non-financial performance...
Do you find Facebook a helpful tool for maintaining and growing business contacts, or are you contemplating what Harvard Online editor Paul Michelman is about to do: "Defriend" all his business contacts. As a business tool, says Michelman, Facebook is not working, and it's...
The Idea in Brief Your most valuable customers are those who buy the most, right? Not necessarily. According to Kumar, Petersen, and Leone, your most valuable customers are those whose word of mouth brings in the most...
Many people learn instinctively the importance of managing up -- that is, keeping your boss in the loop, in your corner, and under control. More difficult and subtle is the art and science of managing peers, subordinates, different generations, geniuses, and jerks. To varying degrees, all have...
Expanding on yesterday's blog on the diminishing ROI for business users of Facebook, Harvard Business Online blogger John Sviokla checks in with a positive look at its main competitor for business users, LinkedIn. His take: LinkedIn delivers tremendous reach to business professionals for a relatively small investment....
The Idea in Brief Many companies view acquisitions and alliances as interchangeable strategies for spurring growth. But each strategy has unique advantages and disadvantages. Firms that ignore those differences risk acquiring companies they should have collaborated with...
Have you ever feigned confidence to superiors or reports? Hidden the fact you were confused by the latest business results or blindsided by a competitor's move? If so, you've bought into the myth of the complete...
The Idea in Brief Incremental innovations (small, safe changes to your firm's offerings) make up 85%-90% of companies' development portfolios. But "little i" projects rarely produce competitive advantage. For that, you need "Big I" innovations--offerings new to...
The Idea in Brief Looking for fresh ways to motivate your employees? Give them work that allows them to use their varied interpersonal talents. But first recognize that people skills are more nuanced than many...
The Idea in Brief It's a popular approach to ensuring a smooth leadership transition: Hire a second-in-command who is designated as the next CEO. But the practice rarely works — of would-be CEO successors hired externally, 75% don't become chief executives...
Faced with stiffer competition and dizzying technological advances, companies often must change course to stay competitive. But most change initiatives backfire. That's because many managers take a one-size-fits-all approach to change. They assume they can combat resistance, a notorious obstacle, by involving...
What drives growth and profitability in a service business? Highly satisfied customers. And to keep those customers profitable, you need to manage all the aspects of your operation that affect customer satisfaction--what the authors call the...
I recently blogged on support for the idea that social networking sites -- or similar technology -- can create business value by promoting knowledge sharing and innovation within and between organizations. It's an idea that seems to be rolling down hill with some force, and you can be sure Google's...
In life, it is usually easier to say no than yes. But in product development the opposite is more likely true -- it's hard to turn down a major customer asking you to add more features to your product. Resist the temptation. Feature creep adds back-end...
The Idea in Brief Most entrepreneurs want to make pots of money and run the show. But Wasserman reveals that it's tough to do both. If you don't figure out which matters most to you, you could...
The Idea in Brief How many of us struggle harder every day to uphold obligations to our bosses, families, and communities--even as the quality of our lives erodes? And how many of us feel too...
Fifty-nine percent of recently surveyed companies executed a major market-segmentation initiative in the previous two years. Yet only 14% derived real value from the exercise. What's wrong with market segmentation? Segmentation typically focuses on consumer...
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