Our economy cannot use resources or belch carbon at the pace it has if we want to keep the planet livable. The way we got here is now killing us. There’s a tension between the growth that nearly all economies and companies pursue — accepted almost axiomatically by economists and politicians — and the limits of the planet we depend on.

Facing sizable skills gaps in their current and future workforces, companies have stopped waiting for the traditional education system to supply the workers they need. Amazon, AT&T, and others have stepped in with their own solutions to fill those gaps. These companies may be shaping the future of not only their own workforces, but of yours as well.

This week’s must-reads for managers: why more employees would trust a robot over their manager; which U.S. city is a tech powerhouse with diverse talent; and how to make digital transformation succeed.

Recruiting women directors can create positive feedback loops that pave the way for future diversity, and strengthen a board’s role in supporting long-term innovation and creativity.

The 2020 Future of Leadership Global Executive Study and Research Report finds that leaders may be holding on to behaviors that might have worked once but now stymie the talents of their employees. Organizations must empower leaders to change their ways of working to succeed in a new digital economy.

Communication, collaboration, and relationship-building can be major organizational challenges. This conversation will expose the frustrations and opportunities our readers face. Discuss visual communication tools and strategies on Tuesday, Jan. 28, at 11 a.m. ET/8 a.m. PT

Research from MIT Sloan Management Review and Cognizant finds leadership behaviors fall into three categories: eroding, enduring, and emerging. Together, enduring and emerging behaviors are essential elements of the new leadership playbook

In a city that’s experienced tough economic times, entrepreneurism is blooming. But in resource-constrained environments like Detroit, individuals approach entrepreneurship in different ways than they do in affluent regions such as Silicon Valley. The accessibility and use of material resources within the entrepreneurial ecosystem shapes the experiences of its members in unique ways.

As technology and society continue to rapidly transform, it can also be overwhelming for managers and organizations to think about what to tackle next. With that in mind, we asked recent expert authors what is one critical area where leaders and organizations should focus their efforts in 2020 and beyond.

This week’s must-reads for managers: spark creativity on your teams, the problem with job interviews, becoming a clear and present leader, staying on top of your market, and how to succeed without being the smartest person in the room.

A large-scale study in Europe of funding decisions finds that VCs evaluate male and female entrepreneurs by different standards. Savvy entrepreneurs can anticipate potentially biased responses to their pitches and plan accordingly. Certain tactics keep audiences engaged and confident of the idea’s potential, positioning the petitioner to succeed.

Focusing on getting the creative process just right can hamper your team’s innovation. Instead, understand your motivation, encourage creative tension, and welcome unexpected contributions to help you foster a creative culture, navigate uncertainty, and embrace the curious and the unknown.

Traditionally, many management roles have involved defining individual tasks and specific processes for completing them. Today, leaders need three very different management approaches, particularly as they rely more on empowered teams. Instead of defining jobs, they need to be establishing missions. Instead of making decisions, they need to be facilitating decisions. And instead of allocating resources, they need to be eliminating obstacles.

In the 2010s, MIT Sloan Management Review readers gravitated toward articles that will help them prepare for the future of work — and succeed in an ever-evolving present. Topics of particular interest include digital transformation and competition, global talent management, emerging jobs in the AI era, and strategy execution.

In 2019, MIT Sloan Management Review readers gravitated toward articles that will help them prepare for the new world of work. The most popular articles of the year focused on making strategic decisions, finding growth in nondisruptive creation, and embracing the value of obvious insights.

This week’s must-reads for managers: designing AI systems with customer privacy in mind, reshaping the role of CEO, what employees are saying about job automation, and how not to hate the holidays.

Employees on the front line of automation say they are excited about the upsides of learning new skills and roles. But to make the transition work, they want advance preparation and at least some personal coaching. They also need the new technology to operate properly.

We do plenty of strategic thinking about our careers but surprisingly little when it comes to our relationships. Strategy might sound like a cold word to use to describe managing our personal lives, but as you’ll hear in this week’s Three Big Points podcast, the ideas driving Jennifer Petriglieri’s research into why some dual-career relationships work better than others are quintessentially human.

MIT Sloan Management Review’s Winter 2020 issue explores the dilemmas managers face in using blockchain, machine learning, and marketing analytics effectively; strategies to recognize potential threats to your business; the underpinnings of successful organizational transformation; and meeting the emotional and educational needs of your employees.

We need to learn at work, but it’s costly and time consuming, and we worry we might be found lacking. What if we can’t pick up the skills we need? Further, most organizations are not as hospitable to learning as their rhetoric suggests. Part of the problem is that we seldom acknowledge that it doesn’t just happen at work — it is work. Employers can better support learning, and individuals can do it more effectively, by understanding that there are two types of learning and that each needs its own space.