675 Posts found for Source: Harvard Business Review

In a world of exponential change, existing knowledge depreciates at an accelerating rate. The most powerful learning in this kind of world involves creating new knowledge. This kind of learning does not occur in a training room; it occurs on the job, in the day-to-day work environment.

Content: Quotation | Author: John Hagel III | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Knowledge Management, Learning, Personal Development

A lot of research suggests that those who speak the most in groups tend to emerge as leaders.

But does it matter who speaks up, or how they do it? In a forthcoming article in Academy of Management Journal, my colleagues Elizabeth McClean, Kyle Emich, and Todd Woodruff and I share how we explored these questions in two studies. We found that those who speak up … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Sean R. Martin | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Women in Business

We recently asked members of the HBR community to gauge the extent of “bureaucratic sclerosis” within their organization using our Bureaucracy Mass Index (BMI) tool.  Since then, we’ve received over 7,000 responses from a diverse group of participants. Here are our initial takeaways.

Content: Article | Author: Gary Hamel | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Organizational Behavior

A 10-year longitudinal study on executive transitions that my organization conducted found that more than 50% of executives who inherit a mess fail within their first 18 months on the job. We also uncovered numerous landmines for leaders in this situation. When a leader inherits a mess created by others, especially when arriving as an outsider, the situation can feel fragile and … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Ron Carucci | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Management

To motivate, manage, and reward B2B salespeople, many companies use sales incentive plans that link large commissions or bonuses to individual results metrics, such as territory quota achievement. As digital channels continue to reduce and redefine salespeople’s role in customer buying, these traditional sales incentive plans are becoming less effective at driving sales outcomes.

The right sales incentive plan creates a double win. Salespeople win because … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Andris A. Zoltners | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Compensation, Human Resources, Management, Marketing / Sales

At a certain point, everything that can be delegated should be; with rare exception. Conduct an audit using the six T’s to determine what tasks make the most sense to offload.

Content: Article | Author: Jenny Blake | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Personal Development, Productivity / Work Tips

The most serious mistakes are not being made as a result of wrong answers. The true dangerous thing is asking the wrong question.

Content: Quotation | Author: Peter F. Drucker | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Management, Personal Development

To gauge the impact of diversity and inclusion efforts, companies typically track metrics on the hiring, attrition, promotion, and composition of the current workforce. While such statistics are useful, they don’t provide a fully accurate picture. In reality, diversity and inclusion are not merely the number of nonwhite male employees you have. Rather, a truly inclusive organization contains a diverse cross-section of employees who actually … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Bogdan Yamkovenko | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Human Resources, Organizational Behavior, Women in Business

Wisdom is about pattern recognition. And the older you are, the more patterns you’ve seen. There’s an old saying I love: “When an elder dies, it’s like a library has burned down.” In the digital era, libraries — and elders — aren’t quite as popular as they used to be. But wisdom never grows old.

Content: Quotation | Author: Chip Conley | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Wisdom

We need to start treating innovation like other business disciplines — as a set of tools that are designed to accomplish specific objectives. Just as we wouldn’t rely on a single marketing tactic or a single source of financing for the entire life of an organization, we need to build up a portfolio of innovation strategies designed for specific tasks.

It was with this in mind … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Greg Satell | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Innovation

Why is it so hard for leaders to send clear, effective signals to followers? There are three main ways in which leaders too often send confusing signals to their organizations. Get them right, and you can signal clearly and effectively; fail to pay attention to how and what you are signaling in these three modes, and you will have confusion at best — and at … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Elsbeth Johnson | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Change Management

The best teachers all have at least one thing in common: they ask great questions. They ask questions that force students to move beyond simple answers, that test their reasoning, that spark curiosity, and that generate new insights. They ask questions that inspire students to think, and to think deeply.

As a business leader, you might have years of experience and the confidence of your … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: James E. Ryan | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Leadership, Management

What I notice when I work with […] companies applying those [Six Sigma, TRIZ, 5 Whys, root cause analysis] was those tools tend to make you dig deeper into the first understanding of the problem we have. […] That they kind of get caught by the details. That, in a way, is a bad way to work on problems because it really assumes that there’s … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Thomas Wedell-Wedellsborg | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Innovation, Management, Problems / Solutions, Thought

A vast body of research shows that the hiring process is biased and unfair. Unconscious racism, ageism, and sexism play a big role in whom we hire. But there are steps you can take to recognize and reduce these biases. So where should you start? And how can you help others on your team do the same?

Content: Article | Author: Rebecca Knight | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Human Resources

If stepping into a new leadership role has you feeling a little nervous, multiply that feeling by ten to estimate the apprehension rippling through your new team. While you may be wondering whether you are up for the challenge, the people anticipating your arrival are wondering, “What’s going to happen to me?”

As you manage first impressions, existential anxiety can be paralyzing to the workforce. So … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Karen Cates | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Leadership, Management, Organizational Behavior, Personal Development

Narcissists can be disastrous for groups and organizations alike, because they typically want complete transformation even when the system is not broken. But when those narcissists are communal, it can temper much of the downside of narcissism. Instead of avoiding narcissists, organizations may be better served in selecting the right type of narcissist. Our research suggests that finding communal narcissists could bring the best of … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Randall S. Peterson | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Human Resources, Organizational Behavior, Personality / Behavior, Teamwork

Narcissists can be valuable when change is necessary and systemic, but more trouble than they’re worth at almost any other time.

Content: Quotation | Author: Randall S. Peterson | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Human Resources, Organizational Behavior, Personality / Behavior

How pervasive is bureaucracy in your organization? How much time and energy does it suck up? To what extent does it undermine resilience and innovation? Which processes are more trouble than they’re worth? To find out, take the assessment below. At the end of it, you’ll see how your results compare to other readers’.

Content: Article | Author: Gary Hamel | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Management, Organizational Behavior

our approach to prediction seems stuck in the past. Most business forecasts fail to include measurable outcomes and are not recorded, so it is hard to know if we are even getting better at them.

Research from organizational psychologist Philip Tetlock, the co-author of Superforecasting, suggests an alternative. Studying forecasting tournaments where anonymous experts predicted future events, Tetlock found that some forecasters could … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Danny Hernandez | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Decision Making, Management, Productivity / Work Tips

Engagement is often an ambiguous term. Depending on how it’s measured, engagement could represent job satisfaction, emotional investment in the cause, willingness to invest discretionary effort, or advocating for the company as a good place to work. While many studies suggest that increased employee engagement leads to improved business results in aggregate, a deeper look at the data suggests that this may not always be … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Ryan Fuller | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Human Resources, Organizational Behavior