Leadership →
- 15 Sep 2011
- Research & Ideas
High Ambition Leadership
Higher-ambition business leaders skillfully integrate both economic and social value. Professor Emeritus Michael Beer explains what makes them special, and how you can learn what they know, in his new book, Higher Ambition: How Great Leaders Create Economic and Social Value. Q&A plus book excerpt. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 06 Sep 2011
- Research & Ideas
The Power of Leadership Groups for Staying on Track
Twenty-first-century organizations are breaking with traditional command-and-control hierarchies to develop a new generation of values-centered leadership, argues Professor Bill George, author of True North. The best way to get there? True North Groups. Open for comment; 0 Comments.
- 06 Sep 2011
- Research & Ideas
Cheese Moving: Effecting Change Rather Than Accepting It
In his new business fable, I Moved Your Cheese, Professor Deepak Malhotra challenges the idea that change is simply something we must anticipate, tolerate, and accept. Instead, the book teaches readers that success often lies in first questioning changes in the workplace and, if necessary, in effecting new changes ourselves. Q&A plus book excerpt. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 11 Jul 2011
- Research & Ideas
Non-competes Push Talent Away
California is among several states where non-compete agreements are essentially illegal. Is it a coincidence that so many inventors flock to Silicon Valley? New research by Lee Fleming, Matt Marx, and Jasjit Singh investigates whether there is a "brain drain" of talented engineers and scientists who leave states that allow non-competes and move to states that don't. Key concepts include: The research shows that inventors are leaving states that allow non-competes and moving to states that don't. The results are most pronounced among those inventors with the most patent citations—that is, those who are most productive, collaborative, and valuable to their firms. The researchers hope that their study will induce state legislators to consider regional rules regarding non-compete agreements. Open for comment; 0 Comments.
- 07 Jul 2011
- What Do You Think?
So We Adapt. What’s the Downside?
Summing Up Jim Heskett's readers ponder the question of whether the virtues of adaptability in a chaotic world undermine an organization's ability to commit. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 06 Jul 2011
- Research & Ideas
Are You a Level-Six Leader?
Asking the question, whom do you serve? is a powerful vector on which to build a useful typology of leadership. Visiting professor Modesto Maidique offers a six-level Purpose-Driven Model of Leadership ranging from Sociopath to Transcendent. Key concepts include: The most telling question to ask a leader is, whom do you serve? Yourself? Your group? Society? The answer to this question often reveals more about leaders than knowing their personality traits, level of achievement, or whether they were "transformational" or "transactional" leaders. The six levels of leadership are Sociopath, Opportunist, Chameleon, Achiever, Builder, and Transcendent. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 06 Jun 2011
- Research & Ideas
Why Leaders Lose Their Way
Bill George discusses how powerful people lose their moral bearings. To stay grounded executives must prepare themselves to confront enormous complexities and pressures. Open for comment; 0 Comments.
- 18 May 2011
- Working Paper Summaries
Embracing Paradox
CEOs are often innovation cheerleaders, hoping that new ventures will eventually help reshape the industry for the better. But in tough economic times, the other senior company executives often choose to ignore innovative ventures and focus instead on the traditional core business, which reliably generate cash flow. This leads to a situation in which the CEO turns into more of a broker than a leader—trying to negotiate deals between the heads of the core units and the new units. That's a recipe for failure, according to Michael L. Tushman, Wendy K. Smith, and Andy Binns, who argue that firms can thrive only if the whole senior management team can embrace the tensions between the new and the old. In this paper, they introduce three guiding principles to help executives grow their core businesses while still nurturing their new ones. Key concepts include: Principle 1: Develop an overarching identity. The corporate identity should be broad enough to inspire both the core as well as the nascent business. Principle 2: Hold tension at the top. Innovation business units should report to the top management team. The strategic battles about old versus new businesses should be fought at the top of the corporate food chain. Principle 3: Embrace inconsistency. The senior management team needs to recognize that innovative and core businesses require very different, often inconsistent operating modes and measures of success. Still, the company must make a point of leveraging resources that are common between the new and older businesses. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 02 May 2011
- Research & Ideas
Casino Payoff: Hands-Off Management Works Best
Micromanagers beware: Research of casino hosts by Harvard Business School's Dennis Campbell and Francisco de Asís Martinez-Jerez and Rice's Marc Epstein makes the case that hands-off management can work to improve employee learning and decision making. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 25 Apr 2011
- Research & Ideas
What CEOs Do, and How They Can Do it Better
A CEO's schedule is especially important to a firm's financial success, which raises a few questions: What do they do all day? Can they be more efficient time managers? HBS professor Raffaella Sadun and colleagues set out to find some answers. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 18 Apr 2011
- Research & Ideas
It’s Not Nagging: Why Persistent, Redundant Communication Works
Managers who inundate their teams with the same messages, over and over, via multiple media, need not feel bad about their persistence. In fact, this redundant communication works to get projects completed quickly, according to new research by Harvard Business School professor Tsedal B. Neeley and Northwestern University's Paul M. Leonardi and Elizabeth M. Gerber. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 04 Apr 2011
- HBS Case
Reinventing the National Geographic Society
How do you transform a 123-year-old cultural icon and prepare it for the digital world? Slowly, as a new case on the "National Geographic Society" by David Garvin demonstrates. Open for comment; 0 Comments.
- 01 Apr 2011
- Working Paper Summaries
When Power Makes Others Speechless: The Negative Impact of Leader Power on Team Performance
History has shown that possessing a great deal of power does not necessarily make someone a good leader. This paper explores the idea that power actually has a detrimental effect on leadership, especially with regard to how it affects open communication within a team. Research was conducted by Leigh Plunkett Tost of the University of Washington, Francesca Gino of Harvard Business School, and Richard P. Larrick of Duke University. Key concepts include: Members of teams with high-power leaders are likely to keep quiet in meetings, both because high-power leaders talk a lot, meaning there's not much time for others to talk, and because of the perception—fair or not—that powerful people aren't interested in anyone else's ideas. This can result in a dearth of ideas during brainstorming sessions. Leader power has a negative effect on team members' perceptions of the leader's ability and desire to engage in open communication. Because open communication is vital to any project, these perceptions can hurt team performance. These negative effects of leader power can be virtually eliminated simply by clearly communicating the idea that every team member is individually instrumental to any given task at hand. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 31 Mar 2011
- Research & Ideas
From SpinPop to SpinBrush: Entrepreneurial Lessons from John Osher
At a panel discussion on entrepreneurship, professor William A. Sahlman and several successful start-up veterans discussed the case of John Osher, father of Dr. John's Products, Ltd., and the wildly popular battery-powered toothbrush, the SpinBrush. Key concepts include: Look for gaps in the existing market or product lines to exploit. Anticipate product knockoffs and plan accordingly. Raise money when you don't need it, so you'll have it when you do. Be quick to market with the initial product and improve as you go along. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 07 Mar 2011
- Research & Ideas
Why Companies Fail—and How Their Founders Can Bounce Back
Leading a doomed company can often help a career by providing experience, insight, and contacts that lead to new opportunities, says professor Shikhar Ghosh. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 28 Feb 2011
- Research & Ideas
The Importance of ‘Don’t’ in Inducing Ethical Employee Behavior
In a new study, HBS professors Francesca Gino and Joshua D. Margolis look at two ways that companies can encourage ethical behavior: the promotion of good deeds or the prevention of bad deeds. It turns out that employees tend to act more ethically when focused on what not to do. That can be problematic in firms where success is commonly framed in terms of advancement of positive outcomes rather than prevention of bad ones. Key concepts include: In general, there are two ways a company can encourage ethical conduct among its employees: either the promotion of good actions and outcomes or the prevention of bad ones. Through several experiments, the professors found that inducing a prevention focus will lead to ethical behavior more than inducing a promotion focus. In encouraging ethical behavior among employees, it behooves firms to consider focusing on preventing negative outcomes, not only in creating a code of ethics but also in setting goals and framing task directives. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 03 Feb 2011
- What Do You Think?
Are We Going “Back to the Future” In Researching Management?
Summing Up Jim Heskett's readers wonder whether the best business management ideas over the next decade will be for cleaning up the messes from the previous one. (Online forum has closed; next forum opens March 10) Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 17 Jan 2011
- Research & Ideas
Being the Boss
Striking the right balance between good management and good leadership is a daunting but necessary challenge for anyone endeavoring to be a good boss. In Being the Boss: The 3 Imperatives for Becoming a Great Leader, Harvard Business School professor Linda A. Hill and former executive Kent Lineback discuss the steps to take and the roadblocks to avoid in order to meet that challenge. Q&A with Hill, plus book excerpt. Key concepts include: You have three key imperatives as a manager: manage yourself, manage your network, and manage your team. Formal authority on its own will fail to influence people and get results. It's important to manage your relationship with your boss, if only to avoid powerlessness, which can be as corruptive a force as power. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 04 Jan 2011
- Working Paper Summaries
The Learning Effects of Monitoring
It's a challenge that all good managers face: How do you strike the right balance between encouraging autonomy among your employees and mitigating the risk that they'll make bad decisions? Using both field and quantitative data from the MGM-Mirage Group, this paper discusses how management controls affect the learning rates of lower-level employees. Research, focusing on hotel casino hosts, was conducted by Dennis Campbell and Francisco de Asís Martinez-Jerez of Harvard Business School and Marc Epstein of Rice University. Key concepts include: Tightly monitored employees were less likely to make independent decisions, even if their job descriptions allowed them to do so. They were even less likely to adjust their decisions to account for information they could easily show to their superiors to justify those decisions. The lower frequency of experimentation in their decision-making leaves employees in tightly monitored environments with few opportunities to learn. The researchers question whether employees in these micromanaged environments made up for the lack of experimentation by paying more attention to and learning more from each experiment. The researchers found strong learning effects among employees in settings where they were monitored by their bosses somewhat loosely. In settings where they were more tightly monitored, employees learned very little. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
Gender and Competition: What Companies Need to Know
Do women shy away from competition and thus hurt their careers? New research by Harvard's Kathleen L. McGinn, Iris Bohnet, and Pinar Fletcher suggests the answer is not black and white, and that employers need to understand the "genderness" of their work. Open for comment; 0 Comments.