The Harvard Business School Working Knowledge website recently published the list with their 20 most popular stories of 2007. Below you will find my favorite stories: you can check the whole list here:
- Handicapping the Best Countries for Business: India? South Africa? Russia? Which are the best countries for a firm to invest in? In a new book, Professor Richard Vietor looks at the economic, political, and structural strengths and weaknesses of ten countries and tells readers how to analyze the development of these areas in the future. Read our Q&A and book excerpt.
- Jumpstarting Innovation: Using Disruption to Your Advantage: Fostering innovation in a mature company can often seem like a swim upstream—the needs of the existing business often overwhelm attempts to create something new. Harvard Business School professor Lynda M. Applegate shows how one of the forces that threatens established companies can also be a source of salvation: disruptive change. Plus: Innovation worksheets.
- Businesses Beware: The World Is Not Flat: With apologies to Thomas Friedman, managers who believe the hype of a flat world do so at their own risk, says HBS professor Pankaj Ghemawat. National borders still matter a lot for business strategists. While identifying similarities from one place to the next is essential, effective cross-border strategies will take careful stock of differences as well.
- What’s to Be Done About Performance Reviews?: What can we do to make performance reviews more productive and less distasteful? Should their objectives be scaled back to just one or two? Should they be disengaged from the determination of compensation and, if so, how?
- Understanding the ‘Want’ vs. ‘Should’ Decision: Pizza or salad? Consumers use different approaches to buying things they want (pizza) versus items they should buy (salad). In their research on online grocery-buying habits and DVD rentals, Harvard Business School’s Katy Milkman and Todd Rogers, along with Professor Max Bazerman, provide insights on the want-should conflict and the implications for managers in areas such as demand forecasting, consumer spending habits, and effective store layout.