Harvard Business Review

White Americans’ Mortality Rates Are Rising. Something Similar Happened in Russia from 1965 to 2005

In 2015 Princeton economists Anne Case and Angus Deaton published a stunning finding: The mortality rates for working-age white Americans have been rising since 1999. For mortality rates to rise instead of fall is extremely rare in developed countries except as a result of war or pandemic.<p>However, …

Before You Agree to Take on New Work, Ask 3 Questions

During the 2009 recession, I took a high-profile job with a marketing agency. On the surface, it looked like a dream opportunity. The clients were …

Why Your Company Culture Should Match Your Brand

Ask people how to develop a good corporate culture, and most of them will immediately suggest offering generous employee benefits, like they do at Starbucks, or letting people dress casually, as Southwest Airlines does. Rarely do people point to encouraging employees to disagree with their …

Case Study: When You Have to Choose Between Core and New Customers

It was the Monday morning after the Phoenix race. Erica Jackson, chief marketing officer of the Mendoza Marathon Corporation, had risen early to watch people line up to register for next year’s event and expected an enthusiastic crowd. But when she walked into the field, she saw only dour looks and …

Why Apple’s New HQ Is Nothing Like the Rest of Silicon Valley

“I think we have a shot at building the best office building in the world” were the words Steve Jobs used to describe Apple’s new headquarters in 2011. The grand vision at the heart of his last project is now being unveiled as Apple finalizes construction on Apple Park. Wired called the facility …

Leveraging HR Analytics in Strategic Decisions

ABOUT THE EVENT<p>Human Resource leaders are urged to apply big data and predictive analytics to talent, leadership, and organizational capabilities. …

The 15 best business books to read this summer

The best kind of summer reading is a book that's both informative and entertaining — a book that makes you feel smarter without boring you to tears.<p>They're not always easy to find, but lucky you — we've found 15 of them. Below, you'll see our favorites from psychologists, data scientists, CEOs, and …

The Benefits of Taking a Slower Approach to Innovation

In our experience, managers tend to focus their innovation efforts on processes that are either large in scale (new products and business models ) or swift in development (hackathons, rapid prototyping, or emerging platforms). There’s nothing wrong with this, per se, as both approaches can pay huge …

Class Ed.

On the evening of Nov. 8, the feminist legal scholar Joan C. Williams made an early exit from an election night party once she realized it was over: Donald J. Trump was going to win. Her editor at Harvard Business Review had been asking her to write something about gender and the election, but …

Why You Should Tell Your Team to Take a Break and Go Outside

Wellness programs are becoming an integral priority for most human resource managers. After all, research shows that a happier workplace is more productive. To this end, workplaces are adding health-related perks from exercise rooms to yoga classes. Leaders participate in mindfulness and compassion …

582: The Talent Pool Your Company Probably Overlooks

Why Startups Like Uber Stumble Over Problems They Could Have Avoided

News this week that Uber’s CEO was stepping down likely was not a surprise to those who have been following the company in the headlines.<p>In our work over many years, we have learned enough to know that you have to be on the inside of any company to have the full picture of what went wrong and how. …

Crowded Countries Tend to Be More Long-Term Focused

Oliver Sng—a research fellow at the University of Michigan—and colleagues at Arizona State University compared country and state population-density figures against data on residents’ willingness to invest in education, save for retirement, and otherwise plan for the future. Their analysis revealed …

Summer books of 2017: Politics

Gideon Rachman selects his mid-year reads

Is There a Platform in Your Product?

Five of the 10 most valuable companies in the world today—Apple, Alphabet, Amazon, Facebook, and Microsoft—derive much of their worth from their multisided platforms (MSPs), which facilitate interactions or transactions between parties. Many MSPs are more valuable than companies in the same …

How to Integrate Data and Analytics into Every Part of Your Organization

Many conversations about data and analytics (D&A) start by focusing on technology. Having the right tools is critically important, but too often executives overlook or underestimate the significance of the people and organizational components required to build a successful D&A function.<p>When that …

Can Insurance Companies Incentivize Their Customers to Be Healthier?

Behavioral economists know well the power of instant gratification and overoptimism that too often lead to poor decisions — like reaching for an extra slice of cake or putting off the dreaded morning run. The behavioral biases play out in a simple paradox: People overconsume health care but …

When Health Care Providers Look at Problems from Multiple Perspectives, Patients Benefit

<i>Mr. Smith was ready to be discharged home after his laryngectomy, an extensive operation that removes a patient’s throat due to cancer. In the opinion of Dr. Lu-Myers, he was a capable man who had passed his physical and occupational therapy evaluations with flying colors. Mr. Smith had fulfilled</i> …

6 Reasons Salespeople Win or Lose a Sale

Why does a salesperson lose a sale?<p>It’s a question I’ve studied for years, as part of the win-loss analysis research I conduct.<p>There’s a tendency to assume that the salesperson lost because their product was inferior in some way. However, in the majority of interviews buyers rank all the feature …

7 Ways to Capture Someone’s Attention

Your long-term success depends on winning the attention of others. If your boss doesn’t notice your work, how will you get a promotion? If your team …

The Talent Pool Your Company Probably Overlooks

<b>Robert Austin,</b> a professor at Ivey Business School, and <b>Gary Pisano,</b> a professor at Harvard Business School, talk about the growing number of pioneering firms that are actively identifying and hiring more employees with autism spectrum disorder and other forms of neurodiversity. Global companies …

How Cultures Across the World Approach Leadership

Rising Home Prices Aren’t ’Bubble Mentality,’ Shiller Says

Robert Shiller, a professor at Yale University, and Peter Wallison, a former Reagan White House counsel, discuss the state of the housing market and …

Liberal Arts Majors Are the Future of the Tech Industry

College students who major in the humanities always get asked a certain question. They’re asked it so often—and by so many people—that it should come printed on their diplomas. That question, posed by friends, career counselors, and family, is “What are you planning to do with your degree?” But it …

Looking Beyond H-1B Visas to Find Tech Talent

H-1B visa applications have declined for the first time in years, according to a recent report from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. The department announced last month that it received 199,000 applications this year — 37,000 fewer than last year.<p>This is concerning to tech companies, many …

SoulCycle’s CEO on Sustaining Growth in a Faddish Industry

I have a rule: Whenever I hear about something from three people, I need to give it a try. In 2008 I heard about SoulCycle from a few friends. At the time, it was two years old and had just one studio, on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. I was immediately curious. I loved group fitness classes, …

Ginni Rometty: “Don’t Try to Protect the Past”

When Virginia “Ginni” Rometty became the CEO of IBM, in early 2012, she dutifully adopted her predecessor’s strategy. Sam Palmisano, who held the position for a decade, had vowed in 2010 that IBM would roughly double its per-share earnings within five years. Two-plus years into her tenure, Rometty …

How To Prevent Chief Marketing Officer Failure

After having been a CMO and GM, I decided to go back to school and get a PhD with a focus on helping current and aspiring CMOs. As a former marketing leader, I felt that the academic community rarely investigated topics that mattered (in my role at the c-level) and that most of the managerial …

New Intelligence Now

Harvard Business Review

How to Get Up to Speed in Your New Leadership Role. With Michael Watkins, cofounder of Genesis Advisers and professor at IMD Business School. #HBRLive