“To reduce the impact not just of fuel price volatility but of other sorts of supply disruptions as well, companies should pursue greater flexibility all the way up and down the supply chain.”

— Simchi-Levi et al., “Is It Time to Rethink Your Manufacturing Strategy?.”

“Ironically, the rate at which value is achieved by the innovation is likely to peak long after the community’s attention to the original, organizing vision has dissipated. The basic insight here is the distinction drawn between the attention wave that forms around an IT innovation, and the actual adoption, implementation and value gained from its use.”

— Swanson, “The Manager’s Guide to IT Innovation Waves.”

“Once suppliers see improvements and savings from an energy efficiency program, they may be more willing to move onto bigger projects and take more ownership.”

— Plambeck et al., “Improving Environmental Performance in Your Chinese Supply Chain.”

“Given the choice, companies might be better off maintaining the image of being small. This could influence consumers to see the user interface as easier and more attractive than it otherwise would seem.”

— Murray and Häubl, “Why Dominant Companies Are Vulnerable.”

“Among the companies we studied, there were two distinct views on how best to evaluate and manage talent. One group assumed that some employees had more ‘value’ or ‘potential’ than others, and that, as a result, companies should focus the lion’s share of corporate attention and resources on them; the second group had a more inclusive view, believing that too much emphasis on the top players could damage morale and hurt opportunities to achieve broader gains.”

— Stahl et al., “Six Principles of Effective Global Talent Management.”

“In an era of soaring health-care costs, it may seem unreal that SAS can offer health care free of charge to employees and their families and actually save money. Yet in 2010, efficiency enabled SAS to directly generate in health-plan savings alone more than $1.50 for every dollar it spent to operate its health-care center.”

— Berry et al., “Do-It-Yourself Employee Health Care.”

“In contrast to other employees, high performers tend to think strategically about personal relationships, positioning themselves at key leverage points within organizational networks.”

— Schweer et al., “Building a Well-Networked Organization.”

“Simply substituting machines for human labor rarely adds much value or high returns; it results in only incremental productivity improvements.”

— Brynjolfsson and McAfee, “Winning the Race with Ever-Smarter Machines.”

(Reprint #:53299)