In traditional strategic thinking, beating the competition, by finding an attractive position in an attractive industry, is the name of the game. An updated perspective suggests you need to be paying attention to at least… Read more »
Thought Sparks
Networking with a Master
Keith Ferrazzi’s work on how people become successful is all about relationships. He’s written 4 books, which arc from person-to-person relationships and building a personal network to his latest in which he looks at the… Read more »
7 Ways to Take Smart Career Risks: Lessons from Sharon Price John, CEO of Build-A-Bear Workshop
Fear is one of the great barriers to career advancement. Sharon Price John’s fabulous career is full of lessons on how to get past those fears and get out of your own way. Being afraid… Read more »
Boris Johnson, How the Powerful Escape Consequences and Jeff Pfeffer’s Fantastic Book
One of Pfeffer’s 7 rules of power is that “Success Excuses (almost) Everything: Why This is the Most Important Rule of All. Which perhaps explains why Britain’s Boris Johnson was able to hang onto power… Read more »
You can’t tackle complex systems with linear thinking
As Daniel Kahnemann has pointed out to us, while the human brain is a remarkable organ, it also has its limitations. One of these is that it is built to conserve energy. What that in turn… Read more »
Eyes glaze over when we talk about inflation? You’re not alone. But what you don’t know can hurt you.
Chart credit: https://www.macrotrends.net/2497/historical-inflation-rate-by-year For anybody born after about 1985, meaning most folks under 40, all this talk about inflation seems kind of old-timey. Indeed, as Public Radio host Kai Ryssdal (citing a story in… Read more »
Thought Sparks Wrap Up – May 2022
Dear colleagues: It sure was nice to be back in person on our gorgeous new Columbia Business School campus. My course on growth and change, called Leading Strategic Growth and Change received an evaluation of… Read more »
Who knew there is so much in common between the rare successes in mega-projects and innovation?
Photo: The Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, designed by Frank Gehry Bent Flyvbjerg studies spectacular mega-project flameouts. I study (often) spectacular innovation mis-steps. Who knew the process that produces both has so… Read more »
Counting down Our Top Ten List of Discovery Driven Planning misses – Part 2 (5 through 1)
Through Valize, Ron Boire and I have been working with clients to use the tools we have developed to bring Discovery Driven Planning / Discovery Driven Growth to life. Although we’ve got years of experience… Read more »
Counting down Our Top Ten List of Discovery Driven Planning misses – Part 1 (10 through 6)
Through Valize, Ron Boire and I have been working with clients to use the tools we have developed to bring Discovery Driven Planning / Discovery Driven Growth to life. Although we’ve got years of experience… Read more »
Thought Sparks Wrap Up – April 2022
Dear colleagues: Just when you thought the world has learned the many lessons of discovery-driven planning, some huge, ambitious project gets shot down yet again – whether for business reasons or otherwise – and we… Read more »
Bright Promise and Dashed Hopes – The AT&T Media Strategy Saga
Big, expensive unions of large and unwieldy companies almost never work out well. The sudden termination of CNN+ is but the latest casualty in a long history of things that began with a lot of… Read more »