Many companies’ decisions about share repurchases are handled mainly by management rather than boards — with repercussions for capital allocation. Boards should carefully balance the capital needed for repurchases against its use in value creation via internal development or external acquisitions — and be skeptical of repurchase programs financed by debt rather than profits.

What is the value of data? Many businesses don’t yet know the answer to that question. But going forward, companies will need to develop greater expertise at valuing their data assets.

Investors see a strong link between corporate sustainability performance and financial performance — so they’re using sustainability-related data as a rationale for investment decisions like never before.

Could science-based industries benefit from a financing model similar to one used to make Hollywood movies? “We propose that a form of governance centered on the project rather than the company may be a more efficient way to organize innovation in science-based industries,” write the authors. Their proposal addresses the fact that traditional venture capital “wasn’t designed to deal with the costs, risks, and slow payout of science-based industries.”

Companies that are able to radically change their entrenched ways of doing things and then reclaim leading positions in their industries are the exception rather than the rule. Even less common are companies able to anticipate a new set of requirements and mobilize the internal and external resources necessary to meet them. The article focuses on three companies that transformed themselves and compares them with three other companies from similar industries that hadn’t been required to make a dramatic shift.

The challenge for managers during a downturn is to find the balance between pursuing too many unprofitable investment opportunities and passing up too many potentially profitable ones.

Like most major change initiatives, going lean rarely looks good from the start. The operating efficiencies come quickly, yet sales and profits — for a while — get worse. The solution? Adopt a new financial reporting method that captures what’s really happening in the business.

Risk management helps people reach consensus and make better-informed decisions that lead to quantifiable results.

An executive’s “financial signature” is the key to how he or she evaluates risk and reward to build company value.

Often companies” budgeting processes don”t result in capital being invested optimally. The reason may be that strong personalities trump even well-designed systems. The authors profile five archetypes of bad behavior that line managers use to subvert logical decision making in order to grab resources. They also show how to counteract such behavior and instill values that lead to better use of investment capital.

Executives who carefully cultivate financial market and business cycle literacy are likely to manage their companies better than those who do not.

Under certain conditions, a firm’s capabilities and those of its potential partners can influence boundary decisions.