Strategy

Featured Strategy Articles

Winston Energy Column

Blockchain and the Clean, Smart Grid

Andrew Winston

A blockchain platform for the energy sector could accelerate the transition to renewables.

Brain

How Human-Computer ‘Superminds’ Are Redefining the Future of Work

Thomas W. Malone

As smart technologies embed deeper into human processes, a more powerful form of collaboration is emerging.

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Can IT Be Too in Sync With Business Strategy?

Frontiers |

Huigang Liang et al.

IT alignment can produce organizational inertia — unless it’s accompanied by the right culture.

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The Strategic Agility Project

The Strategic Agility series from MIT Sloan Management Review draws on evidence and data analytics to answer a fundamental question: How can organizations achieve their strategic objectives? The series features the research of MIT Sloan School of Management’s Donald Sull and his team of researchers and data scientists. It draws on, among other sources, over 4 million Glassdoor employee reviews that provide insight on organizational culture and management practices of a large sample of important organizations.

Follow the conversation on Twitter with #StrategicAgility or sign up for email updates on this series.

Rethink Your Goal-Setting

When SMART Goals Are Not So Smart

March 21, 2018 | Martin Reeves and Jack Fuller

The traditional “SMART” approach to goal setting may no longer offer companies the best path forward. In a continually changing competitive environment, companies should develop their goals in the context of current conditions.

Changing Your Strategic Perspective

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Innovation Strategy

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If You Cut Employees Some Slack, Will They Innovate?

Yasser Rahrovani et al.

Giving people time and resources to pursue innovation projects can produce extraordinary outcomes — but only if you match your “slack strategy” to employee type. The authors found that different types of employees respond in different ways to slack innovation programs; that different kinds of slack resources are better suited to certain types of employees than others; and that different kinds of slack innovation programs produce different kinds of innovation.

young man watering a big light bulb on dark background

Building the Right Ecosystem for Innovation

Nathan Furr and Andrew Shipilov

As digital disruption expands, many legacy businesses seek partnerships with tech companies to maintain competitiveness in the digital sphere. But instead of a centralized “hub” partnership, some companies find greater success through an adaptive ecosystem model, where partners develop significant projects or innovations together. This type of strategy requires imagination and flexibility.

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Why Best Practices Often Fall Short

Jérôme Barthélemy

Many executives take the value of best practices as a given. We have an abiding faith in the idea that the most direct route to improved performance is to study what successful firms do and copy them. In reality, that is quite rarely the case.

Reimagining Your AI Strategy

RPA Robotic progress automatisation concept illustration. Human vs Robot. Robot pointing the right direction for business development

What’s Your Cognitive Strategy?

Frontiers |

Thomas H. Davenport and Vikram Mahidhar

While executives agree that cognitive technologies are a disruptive force, few companies have a strategy to address them.

Robotic playing chess with human

AI and the ‘Augmentation’ Fallacy

Philipp Gerbert

The fundamental disruption introduced by AlphaZero’s hyperlearning in the chess world can teach business executives about AI.

Artificial intelliegence chat bot technology

Rethink AI Objectives

Sam Ransbotham

Using AI to create humanlike computers is a shortsighted goal.

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Five Strategies for Getting the Most From AI

Jacques Bughin and Paul Michelman

This MIT SMR webinar offers strategies for how to get the most out of AI’s potential.

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Why Businesses and Governments Need to Stop Trying to Secure Their Networks

Frontiers |

March 22, 2018 | James T. Lotspeich

When SMART Goals Are Not So Smart

March 21, 2018 | Martin Reeves and Jack Fuller

What to Expect From Agile

December 11, 2017 | Julian Birkinshaw