Harvard Business Review

FEBRUARY 15, 2012

Given the unrelenting pace of change surrounding organizations in virtually every industry, companies are looking for executives who know how to innovate and introduce change, not simply caretakers who can manage the status quo. Senior management doesn't really encourage innovation, you'll hear. They won't let me take risks."

Innovation 18

Innovation Merchandising How To Proposal 18

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 6, 2014

Private label (retail-branded merchandise) has been growing for years – since Sainsbury and Marks & Spencer invented it over 100 years ago – increasing in quality and forcing down brand premiums. So with such a track record of strategic innovation, why has Tesco been blindsided by the hard discounters like Germany’s Aldi and Lidl?

Retail 15

Retail Merchandising Discount Price 15

Harvard Business Review

SEPTEMBER 4, 2015

Innovation is widely regarded as important to long-term business performance. So, to achieve higher performance, should company boards and investors choose CEOs with the expertise that would better qualify them to lead innovation? This work builds on earlier research into CEO qualifications.).

CEO 8

CEO Innovation Pharmaceuticals Merchandising 8

Harvard Business Review

MARCH 12, 2013

Innovative forms of financing, such as Kickstarter, will continue to grow, also invented by social entrepreneurs. Live performances will fuel economic booms; performers will make more money from merchandise sales at events than from albums, as Jazz Roots founder (and my friend) Larry Rosen observed.

Health Care 17

Health Care Merchandising Incubator Airlines 17

Harvard Business Review

NOVEMBER 15, 2017

Pioneers of new business models, such as Alibaba and Amazon, are launching innovations in rapid succession, such as voice ordering and real-time pricing, while simultaneously building scale and driving down costs. Danita Delimont/Getty Images. Few industries are being disrupted as drastically as the retail industry.

Retail 14

Retail Chief Executive Officer Supply Chain Operations 14

Harvard Business Review

MARCH 8, 2011

The surest way to build a company whose leadership will outlast your own is to focus your attention on the few essential things that your company can do better than anyone else.

Merchandising 15

Merchandising Budgeting CEO Pharmaceuticals 15

Harvard Business Review

NOVEMBER 14, 2012

The company is doing pretty well: it has over 800,000 active sellers and a 15 million-person marketplace across 150 countries, and last year its gross merchandise sales reached $525 million. For Etsy's leadership, this was an opportunity to engage their entire team by giving them ownership of how to make Etsy better.

Merchandising 10

Merchandising Brainstorming Commitment Proposal 10

Harvard Business Review

MARCH 14, 2013

Nike : To bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete* in the world. *"If Dunkin Donuts :> Make and serve the freshest, most delicious coffee and donuts quickly and courteously in modern, well-merchandised stores. If you have a body, you are an athlete.". Notice how you respond to each statement.

Mission Statement 13

Mission Statement Sports Merchandising Brand 13

Harvard Business Review

MARCH 12, 2013

Innovative forms of financing, such as Kickstarter, will continue to grow, also invented by social entrepreneurs. Live performances will fuel economic booms; performers will make more money from merchandise sales at events than from albums, as Jazz Roots founder (and my friend) Larry Rosen observed.

Health Care 9

Health Care Merchandising Incubator Airlines 9

Harvard Business Review

MARCH 1, 2017

This view differs substantially from the relentless focus on efficiency that has characterized management thinking for most of the last three decades, but it is absolutely essential if companies are going to spur innovation and reignite profitable growth. In the 1990s and 2000s, leadership’s focus on efficiency produced solid results.

Efficiency 8

Efficiency Productivity Products Company 8

Harvard Business Review

MAY 5, 2016

” That clean-sheet perspective emboldened Intel’s leadership to abandon memory and focus on microprocessors. They see disrupted incumbents from retail, finance, health care, transportation, professional services, and manufacturing requiring radical restructuring of assets, productivity , and innovation.

Levitt 8

Levitt Disaggregation Kaizen Call Center 8

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 1, 2016

At the MIT Leadership Center, I recently spoke with another leader, Guy Wollaert, chief exploration officer at Loggia Strategy & Design, about similar experiences he encountered at another highly visible brand, Coca-Cola. Successful leadership isn’t just about the leader, it’s about the team.

Diversity 8

Diversity Retail Discount Brand 8

Harvard Business Review

JUNE 21, 2013

It should be an enticing entry to the world of you and your content assets — your other writings, your talks, videos, seminars, special events, emblems, merchandise, teachings, and affiliations — a world that you can continue to expand and update, so that the book, while unchanging, takes on new meanings over time.

Books 8

Books Merchandising Video Sharpe 8

Harvard Business Review

JANUARY 27, 2017

The bad news: Petabytes of new data and algorithmic innovation assure that “autonomy creep” will relentlessly challenge human oversight from within. At one American retailer, an autonomous ensemble of algorithms replaced the entire merchandising department. Human leadership defers to demonstrable algorithmic power.

Outsourcing 8

Outsourcing Software CAPEX Competitive Advantage 8

Harvard Business Review

AUGUST 11, 2015

Mauro Porcini is PepsiCo’s Chief Design Officer—the first to hold the position—where he oversees design-led innovation across all the company’s brands under CEO Indra Nooyi. That’s where our work is really about innovation. I strongly believe that design and innovation are exactly the same thing.

Organization 8

Organization Brand Six Sigma Innovation 8

Harvard Business Review

JUNE 26, 2017

As the industry moved toward an emphasis on customer service and merchandising, the company fell behind, because its employees were focused more on increasing inventory turns and sales per square foot. For example, at a grocery store chain I worked with, employees were steeped in an operations culture that valued efficiency and productivity.

Brand 8

Brand Company Operations Merchandising 8

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 11, 2013

Under Johnson''s leadership, Penney''s share price plunged by half and the company lost $4 billion in sales. Pundits have ascribed Johnson''s debacle to hubris, incoherent pricing, drive-by leadership, overpromising, reckless haste, inept deal-making (ask Terry Lundgren ), and failing to listen to customers. It''s true.

Merchandising 12

Merchandising Retail Gordon Price 12

In the CEO Afterlife

NOVEMBER 4, 2012

But even artists have to eat, and the fuel of commerce and industry is innovation and novelty. Economically I probably helped shift some merchandise. This hybridization of the arts and business is nothing new of course – it’s been going on for centuries – but they have always been uncomfortable bed-fellows. Let’s trade.

Advertising 265

Advertising Creativity Industry Bottom-up 265