Stefan Thomke, professor at Harvard Business School, says running experiments can give companies tremendous value, but too often business leaders make decisions based on intuition. While A/B testing on large transaction volumes is common practice at Google, Booking.com, and Netflix, Thomke says even small firms can get a competitive advantage from experiments. He explains how to introduce, run, and learn from them, as well as how to cultivate an experimental mindset at your organization. Thomke ...
Apr 16, 2025•23 min
Founded in 2014, Thinx, Inc. makes absorbent underwear that can be worn during menstruation. But the feminine care market had seen virtually no innovation in half a century because of the taboo against discussing the topic of menstruation. As a result, the startup was competing against large incumbents like Procter & Gamble and Johnson & Johnson. Harvard Business School Associate Professor Rembrand Koning examines these strategic marketing challenges and discusses the importance of remov...
Apr 09, 2025•27 min
Venture capital firms notoriously embrace risk and take big swings, hoping that one startup will become a monster hit that pays for many other failed investments. This VC approach scares established companies, but it shouldn’t. Stanford Graduate School of Business professor Ilya Strebulaev says that VC firms have proven best practices that all leaders should apply in their own companies. He explains exactly how VC’s operationalize risk, embrace disagreement over consensus, and stay agile in thei...
Apr 02, 2025•25 min
When a company, division, or product line has been struggling for some time, it can feel nearly impossible to get things back on track. But big turnarounds are possible, provided you have a team willing to work hard, be creative, and embrace change. When he was president and CEO of Marvel , Peter Cuneo oversaw the resurgence and sale of the media company, but even before that he had a long track record for turning around many types of consumer-facing businesses. He shares the strategies that wor...
Mar 26, 2025•29 min
The use of artificial intelligence—specifically generative AI—is growing rapidly, and tech giants like Google have an important role to play in how that technology gets adopted and developed. Sundar Pichai is the CEO of Google as well as its parent company Alphabet, which he’s led as an AI-first company for several years. He speaks with HBR Editor at Large Adi Ignatius about shaping Google’s AI strategy, putting safeguards in place, and how work and leadership will change as AI advances. Key epi...
Mar 19, 2025•29 min
Getting a big, bureaucratic organization to innovate or adopt new technologies is hard. That’s why Harvard Business School professor Maria Roche wrote a case study about U.S. Air Force Major Victor “SALSA” Lopez . He helped launch a program that uncovers ways to use AI to strengthen U.S. defense efforts. Professor Roche and Major Lopez talked about the challenges of fostering innovation within a large bureaucracy in a conversation with host Brian Kenny on Cold Call back in 2023. Key episode topi...
Mar 12, 2025•27 min
Fueled by the promise of concrete insights, organizations are increasingly prioritizing data in their decision-making processes. But that process can easily go wrong. Many leaders don’t understand that their decisions are only as good as how they interpret the data. In this episode, Professor Michael Luca of Johns Hopkins Carey Business School and Professor Amy Edmondson of Harvard Business School share a framework for making better decisions by interpreting data more effectively. Luca and Edmon...
Mar 05, 2025•27 min
Many companies, especially in the tech world, have come to embrace the idea of growth at all costs. But according to research from Gary Pisano, professor at Harvard Business School, most firms fail to consistently increase revenues and profits over the long term, adjusting for inflation. In this episode, Pisano explains why it’s important for leaders to think more strategically about not just the rate of growth they want to achieve but the direction they want to grow in and their method for doin...
Feb 26, 2025•30 min
Imagine a company that, in a matter of weeks, can develop, prototype, build, and deliver innovative products. That’s exactly what Haier, one of the world’s largest home appliance manufacturers, achieved in 2019. When the city of Wuhan urgently needed mobile isolation wards to curb the spread of Covid-19, Haier leveraged their open digital supply chain platform to deliver in record time. In this episode, Kasra Ferdows, an operations management professor at Georgetown University, explains how open...
Feb 19, 2025•25 min
The insurance industry is centuries old and has historically been dominated by a few large incumbents. But the industry is experiencing disruption from smaller tech-driven companies—known as insurtechs—that are changing how insurance is bought and sold. In this episode, Harvard Business School professor Lauren Cohen explores how insurtech firm Hippo is challenging traditional insurance models. He explains how Hippo is eliminating the need for insurance agents and using AI to lower prices. And he...
Feb 12, 2025•27 min
It’s a holy grail for many businesses—the search for sustainable competitive advantage. But Chris Zook points out that it’s elusive for most companies. He notes that less than one in 10 companies even achieve a modest level of sustained and profitable growth over a 10-year period on average. Zook is the former head of Bain’s global strategy practice and coauthor of the book Repeatability: Build Enduring Businesses for a World of Constant Change . In this episode, he shares three key principles t...
Feb 05, 2025•19 min
For a long time in the restaurant industry, there were two types of dining experiences: fast food or table service. But Ron Shaich , founder and former chairman and CEO of Panera Bread, managed to create an entirely new category in between the two: fast casual. That innovative idea laid the groundwork for companies like Chipotle, Sweetgreen, and beyond. In this episode, Shaich breaks down his core strategies for successful innovation in the restaurant industry: pinpoint what your customers truly...
Jan 29, 2025•32 min
Imagine this scenario: Your company’s executive team has just announced their new master plan for growing the business. Now it’s your job, as a mid-level manager, to put it into practice. So where do you start? In this episode, strategy consultant Andrea Belk Olson explains how to make the most of a plan that you may or may not agree with and that you may or may not have had any input into. She also has advice about the questions you should ask yourself before taking action, how to handle resist...
Jan 22, 2025•47 min
In June 2022, the first ever LIV Golf event teed off outside of London. Offering players larger prizes and more flexibility, LIV Golf aimed to disrupt the sport. In response, the PGA Tour suspended all players who participated in the LIV Golf event, escalating tensions between the two entities. This conflict culminated in LIV Golf filing an antitrust lawsuit against the PGA Tour. Then, in a surprising turn of events, the two tours announced their merger in June 2023. University of Virginia assoc...
Jan 15, 2025•28 min
In the last half century, relationships between employers and their employees have evolved away from being rooted in long-term loyalty to a new paradigm of short-term alliances driven by uncertainty and competition. Entrepreneurs and coauthors Ben Casnocha and Chris Yeh argue that the new world of work isn’t so different from the typical conditions that many entrepreneurs operate in. And if you’re a manager, you may need a new strategy to hire and retain top talent. Casnocha and Yeh, coauthors o...
Jan 08, 2025•21 min
The consulting firm McKinsey has helped its clients navigate disruption in a wide range of industries. But what can we learn from how McKinsey , itself , responded to disruption in the management consulting industry in the early aughts? In this episode, the originator of disruptive innovation, the late Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen , joined former McKinsey managing partner Dominic Barton to break down how the firm shifted its internal strategy to prioritize flexibility an...
Jan 01, 2025•29 min
Why did some companies thrive during the Covid-19 pandemic while others struggled? Keith Ferrazzi , founder of the consulting firm Ferrazzi Greenlight, surveyed more than 2,000 executives to learn how they changed their operations during the pandemic. The results show that some companies had already been cultivating a kind of extreme adaptability before the pandemic. That practice helped them come out on top. In this episode, Ferrazzi outlines the concrete steps organizations can take to cultiva...
Dec 25, 2024•24 min
Glossier launched in 2014 as an e-commerce, direct-to-consumer makeup and skincare brand aimed at millennial women. From the start, Glossier’s founder Emily Weiss built a strong digital community around the brand. But after the company received its first major round of funding, Glossier was ready to scale up its marketing spending. The challenge: How to do that while also preserving the brand’s all-important authenticity? In this episode, Harvard Business School senior lecturer Jill Avery explai...
Dec 18, 2024•29 min
What does it take to succeed as a business while doing well by your employees? Harvard Business School professor emeritus Michael Beer has studied companies who invest in building long-term social value, and he says they offer some key lessons for other firms. In this episode, he breaks down how these companies set their strategies for new products and services. As he explains: “One of the key disciplines they have is what we called forging a strategic identity. So what does that mean? It means ...
Dec 11, 2024•16 min
Looking at business news over the past decade (including a few HBR articles), you might assume that just about every traditional company has fallen — or will soon fall — to competitors from the tech industry. But London Business School professor Julian Birkinshaw says that story of disruption and destruction is overblown. His research into Fortune 500 and Global 500 organizations shows that many industries haven’t been radically remade, despite the rise of a few tech giants like Amazon and Googl...
Dec 04, 2024•30 min
If you’re a fast-growing company in an emerging economy, you need a strategy for competing in your home market in the short term. But you also need a longer-term strategy that will help you grow beyond that initial market. John Jullens says the challenge is building both strategies simultaneously. Jullens is a longtime management consultant who specializes in corporate and business unit strategy. He explains why so many companies in emerging markets make the mistake of focusing on execution and ...
Nov 27, 2024•16 min
Khan Academy, the online global education nonprofit, launched in 2006 when founder Sal Khan created a few videos to help his cousin with her math homework. After a decade of growth brought Khan Academy’s user base to more than 15 million monthly visitors, Khan knew he needed expert help to formulate and lead a strategy for the organization’s future growth. He hired Ginny Lee from Intuit to serve as Khan Academy’s COO and president. Her mandate was to redefine the organization’s priorities, creat...
Nov 20, 2024•31 min
Leadership transitions are challenging for both organizations and the leaders who must directly navigate them. But Michael Watkins says they’re also a time of incredible opportunity — especially for those leaders who understand how to handle this crucial period. Watkins is a professor of leadership and organizational change at IMD Business School. He shares a framework for selecting a transition strategy that best matches the situation you’re facing — whether you’re building a new operation from...
Nov 13, 2024•11 min
In 1992, Canada, Mexico, and the U.S. signed NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement, and the global business landscape began transforming. Pankaj Ghemawat , a professor at NYU’s Stern School of Business, studies how companies have adjusted their strategies to that disruptive change — from rethinking their supply chains to learning to navigate unpredictable trade policy environments. He discusses how companies can plan for an evolving world of multi-country international supply chains and...
Nov 06, 2024•28 min
Disruptive innovation has proven to be such a powerful idea that the word “innovation” is often equated with the broader idea of market disruption. But that’s not always the case. INSEAD strategy professor Renée Mauborgne says there is a way to create new markets without destroying jobs, companies, and communities. She calls this idea: “nondisruptive creation.” Mauborgne explains how some entrepreneurs and companies have been able to grow billion-dollar businesses by creating new markets rather ...
Oct 30, 2024•24 min
Enel, Italy’s state-owned power company founded in 1962, was one of Europe’s largest coal users and polluters. Now it is recognized as a leader in renewable energy services and has integrated sustainability into its business model and operations. In this episode, former Harvard Business School senior lecturer Mark Kramer explains how Enel made that enormous strategic change — from its long-range planning to how it tackled the dreaded “innovator’s dilemma.” Kramer studied the company’s transforma...
Oct 23, 2024•22 min
Creating value is table stakes for any business. But is your organization also capturing the value you create? IMD professor Stefan Michel says that many businesses don’t actually know how. “Many companies spend a lot of time on innovating, in a sense that they create more value for customers,” he argues. “What they often miss is to think about how to capture that value.” Michel studies marketing and strategy at the Switzerland-based business school. Through his research, he created a framework ...
Oct 16, 2024•13 min
Climate change is causing severe weather, dangerously elevated temperatures, and water shortages around the world. Meanwhile, firms are struggling to reduce their carbon emissions while adapting their operations to these new conditions. To address both challenges at once, Harvard Business School professors Forest Reinhardt and Michael Toffel have proposed an unconventional path forward: learning from the climate change strategies of the U.S. Navy. They argue that the Navy’s scientific and sober ...
Oct 09, 2024•23 min
Do you know the difference between accurate forecasting and effective forecasting? Technology forecaster Paul Saffo says accurate forecasting is nearly impossible to do. But if you aim for effective forecasting, he notes, then at least you’re considering the full range of reasonable possibilities for the future, rather than jumping to one conclusion and preparing only for that outcome. “If you head straight towards accurate forecasting, you may end up in a much worse situation by overlooking thi...
Oct 02, 2024•16 min
AptDeco, a peer-to-peer marketplace for used furniture, launched in New York City in 2014. Despite its complexity and high costs, the company grew quickly. Co-founders Reham Fagiri and Kalam Dennis considered several different options for scaling the business—from expanding into new markets to rebranding with a sustainability focus. In this episode, Harvard Business School associate professor Ayelet Israeli and AptDeco co-founder Kalam Dennis discuss the path to scaling that AptDeco ultimately c...
Sep 25, 2024•26 min
