682 Posts found for Source: Harvard Business Review

An occupation earns the right to be a profession only when some ideals, such as being an impartial counsel, doing no harm, or serving the greater good, are infused into the conduct of people in that occupation. In like vein, a school becomes a professional school only when it infuses those ideals into its graduates. A business school does that effectively when it forces its … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Joel M. Podolny | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: MBA Related

…the things that happen the first time a group meets strongly affect how the group operates throughout its entire life. Indeed, the first few minutes of the start of any social system are the most important because they establish not only where the group is going but also what the relationship will be between the team leader and the group, and what basic norms of … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: J. Richard Hackman | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Teamwork

Many people act as if being a team player is the ultimate measure of one’s worth, which it clearly is not. There are many things individuals can do better on their own, and they should not be penalized for it. The challenge for a leader, then, is to find a balance between individual autonomy and collective action. Either extreme is bad, though we are generally … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: J. Richard Hackman | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Teamwork

I have no question that when you have a team, the possibility exists that it will generate magic, producing something extraordinary, a collective creation of previously unimagined quality or beauty. But don’t count on it. Research consistently shows that teams underperform, despite all the extra resources they have. That’s because problems with coordination and motivation typically chip away at the benefits of collaboration. And even … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: J. Richard Hackman | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Teamwork

People generally think that teams that work together harmoniously are better and more productive than teams that don’t. But in a study we conducted on symphonies, we actually found that grumpy orchestras played together slightly better than orchestras in which all the musicians were really quite happy.

That’s because the cause-and-effect is the reverse of what most people believe: When we’re productive and we’ve done something … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: J. Richard Hackman | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Teamwork

Are CEOs with MBAs actually stronger leaders? The answer might depend on the age of the CEO.

Inspired by the raging debate last year over the role of MBAs in the financial crisis, we tried to analyze whether having an MBA influences overall CEO performance. In a large-scale study of CEO performance since they took office, we found that other things equal, MBA CEOs had a … [ Read more ]

Content: Prospective MBA Content | Authors: Herminia Ibarra, Morten T. Hansen | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Miscellaneous MBA-related Resources

Marketers are good at using peer influence to sell products, but few executives understand that it can motivate customers to help companies achieve other goals, such as saving money. Even fewer seem to be aware that the improper use of peer influence can elicit behaviors contrary to what was intended.

Content: Article | Author: Noah J. Goldstein | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Marketing / Sales

Subsidiarity… means that power belongs to the lowest possible point in the organization. …Subsidiarity, therefore, is the reverse of empowerment. It is not the center giving away or delegating power. Instead, power is assumed to lie at the lowest point in the organization and it can be taken away only by agreement.

Content: Quotation | Author: Charles Handy | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Organizational Behavior, Power / Authority

Unfortunately, a threat that everyone perceives but no one talks about creates more anxiety than a threat that has been clearly identified and made the focal point for the problem-solving efforts of the entire company. That is one reason honesty and humility on the part of top management may be the first prerequisite of revitalization. Another reason is the need to make “participation” more than … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: C.K. Prahalad | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Adversity, Management, Organizational Behavior

An organization’s capacity to improve existing skills and learn new ones is the most defensible competitive advantage of all.

Content: Quotation | Authors: C.K. Prahalad, Gary Hamel | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Competition, Management, Strategy

There is an important distinction between barriers to entry and barriers to imitation.

Content: Quotation | Authors: C.K. Prahalad, Gary Hamel | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Competition, Strategy

Competitive innovation works on the premise that a successful competitor is likely to be wedded to a recipe for success. That’s why the most effective weapon new competitors possess is probably a clean sheet of paper. And why an incumbent’s greatest vulnerability is its belief in accepted practice.

Content: Quotation | Authors: C.K. Prahalad, Gary Hamel | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Competition, Strategy

In many companies, business unit managers are rewarded solely on the basis of their performance against return on investment targets. Unfortunately, that often leads to denominator management because executives soon discover that reductions in investment and head count—the denominator—“improve” the financial ratios by which they are measured more easily than growth in the numerator: revenues. It also fosters a hair-trigger sensitivity to industry downturns that … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Authors: C.K. Prahalad, Gary Hamel | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Compensation, Management, Organizational Behavior

Today the management, monitoring, and governance of a business are increasingly seen as separate functions to be done by separate bodies, even if some of the membership of those bodies overlaps. This is the corporate equivalent of the separation of powers. Management is the executive function, responsible for delivering the goods. Monitoring is the judicial function, responsible for seeing that the goods are delivered according … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Charles Handy | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Corporate Governance, Management

Dividing qualities into “strengths” and “weaknesses” implicitly ignores strengths overdone. Given this incomplete mental model, it is no surprise that most leadership 360s employ five-point rating scales in which high scores are the best. Such tools overlook a key lesson from decades of research on derailment: More is not always better, and executives lose their jobs when their strengths become weaknesses through overuse.

Content: Quotation | Authors: Robert B. Kaiser, Robert E. Kaplan | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Personal Development

We know a lot about how to engender human creativity: Equip people with innovation tools, allow them to set aside time for thinking, destigmatize failure, create opportunities for serendipitous learning, and so on. However, little of this knowledge has infiltrated management systems. Worse, many companies institutionalize a sort of creative apartheid. They give a few individuals creative roles and the time to pursue their interests … [ Read more ]

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

Transparency is often just as effective as a rigidly applied rule book and is usually more flexible and less expensive to administer.

Content: Quotation | Author: Gary Hamel | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Corporate Governance, Management, Organizational Behavior

Most companies strive to maximize shareholder wealth—a goal that is inadequate in many respects. As an emotional catalyst, wealth maximization lacks the power to fully mobilize human energies. It’s an insufficient defense when people question the legitimacy of corporate power. And it’s not specific or compelling enough to spur renewal.

Content: Quotation | Author: Gary Hamel | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Goals, Miscellaneous, Mission

While hierarchy will always be a feature of human organization, there’s a pressing need to limit the fallout from top-down authority structures. Typical problems include overweighting experience at the expense of new thinking, giving followers little or no influence in choosing their leaders, perpetuating disparities in power that can’t be justified by differences in competence, creating incentives for managers to hoard authority when it should … [ Read more ]

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

Management processes often contain subtle biases that favor continuity over change. Planning processes reinforce out-of-date views of customers and competitors, for instance; budgeting processes make it difficult for speculative ideas to get seed funding; incentive systems provide larger rewards for caretaker managers than for internal entrepreneurs; measurement systems understate the value of creating new strategic options; and recruitment processes overvalue analytical skills and undervalue conceptual … [ Read more ]

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