Are your customers in a concrete or abstract mindset as they think about purchasing your product? The answer can affect how much they buy.

CIOs who learn to balance formal and informal structures can create global IT organizations that are more efficient and innovative than organizations that rely primarily on formal mechanisms. Organizational network analysis provides a useful methodology for helping executives assess broader patterns of informal networks between individuals, teams, functions and organizations, and for identifying targeted steps to align networks with strategic imperatives.

The link between sustainability and innovation is commonly mentioned, but not commonly made. Here, new-product design guru Steven Eppinger describes the practice that breeds discovery.

Too many companies do not effectively target growing ethnic and immigrant markets within the U.S.

Energy sector innovation faces an important hurdle, according to MIT’s Ernest Moniz. How do we reconcile the cultural mismatch between innovators and the establishment?

Finance professor Andrew Lo addresses “physics envy” among economists — and the importance of understanding the levels of uncertainty you face.

Over the past decade, a number of the world’s respected companies have collapsed. A factor was these companies’ approach to risk management. Two different views have evolved on how risk should be assessed. The first — the frequentist view — is based on historical data. The second, or Bayesian, considers risk to be in part a judgment of the observer. Many measures are being deployed to prevent future crises — a shift from frequentist to Bayesian risk management should be part of this effort.

When should a company “nickel-and-dime” customers by charging separately for various extras, and when is it better to combine all of the charges into one total price? It depends on a variety of factors, such as whether customers comparison shop, whether they are more sensitive to the prices of some components (delivery) than to others, whether the price of one component is small or large relative to the others, and whether the company controls the costs and quality of a particular component.

How do you win with data? MIT SMR surveyed global executives about turning the data deluge and analytics into competitive advantage. Here’s an early snapshot of how managers are answering the most important question organizations face.

This article examines how three factors—emotions, trust and control—shape customer assessments of service experiences and their overall view of service providers. Drawing on research conducted at companies including Dell, the Seattle Supersonics and McKinsey & Company, the article posits that organizations seeking to excel in customer service need to attack the “soft side” of customer management with the same type of intensity they have previously used to reengineer workflow and supply chains.

As SAP’s first-ever chief sustainability officer, Peter Graf was prepared to lay out the business case for sustainability to stakeholders and customers of every kind. But he had to make the case to SAP’s own board of directors first.

Complex supply chains with many agents are more prone to problems, and on occasion, to spectacular collapse. Examples from the last few years include the subprime mortgage crisis; the failure of the Peanut Corporation of America; and dioxin-contaminated Irish pork. Without a doubt, today’s complex supply chains are vulnerable to opportunistic behavior leading to sometimes catastrophic failure. But there are five steps managers can take to protect their companies.

There has been enormous progress in embedding the use of analytics at lower levels of companies. But according to Thomas H. Davenport, professor at Babson College and one of the best-known thinkers about analytics and business intelligence, the upper levels of companies haven’t kept up.

Early returns are in from the first annual New Intelligent Enterprise Survey. Here are major highlights of what executives and managers said about how they are — or are not — capitalizing on information.

Effective social media measurement turns the traditional ROI approach on its head: “managers should begin by considering consumer motivations to use social media and then measure the social media investments customers make as they engage with the marketers’ brands.”

The key to achieving both of those goals together? Integrate societal benefits with company strategy.