Why Women Make Better Business Leaders | via One Minute MBA

There’s no question that women are making large strides in U.S. business and technology fields. Today’s generation of women professionals are more likely than any other to found, lead or advise a major U.S. firm. But while women continue to secure increasingly high-level leadership positions, there are still some glaring imbalances. For one, only twelve Fortune 500 companies are now headed by women. And numbers on the proportion of female tech startup founders are not any more encouraging; many high-profile incubators report that women founders receive less than 5% of their annual grant awards.

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But recent research from the Harvard Business Review and others suggests something that most of us already know–firms without women in high-level leadership positions are missing out on some meaningful growth opportunities. According to the research, women that excel in business often prove to have more highly developed communication skills than their male colleagues. Women are also often more likely to take initiative and make changes to the status quo. In fact, the study showed that firms with women on their boards saw 42% higher sales returns, a 66% higher return on invested capital and a 53% higher return on equity over firms that did not.

Learn more about the skills and perspectives that women bring to business by checking out Online MBA’s latest video.

Video Transcript Continuar leyendo «Why Women Make Better Business Leaders | via One Minute MBA»

Mindfulness Helps You Become a Better Leader

See on Scoop.it – Gabriel Catalano human being | #INperfeccion® a way to find new insight & perspectives

To keep your equilibrium, practice meditation (or something like it) every day.

Ever since the financial crisis of 2008, I have sensed from many leaders that they want to do a better job of leading in accordance with their personal values. The crisis exposed the fallacies of measuring success in monetary terms and left many leaders with a deep feeling of unease that they were being pulled away from what I call their True North.

As markets rose and bonus pools grew, it was all too easy to celebrate the rising tide of wealth without examining the process that created it. Too many leaders placed self-interest ahead of their organizations’ interests, and ended up disappointing the customers, employees, and shareholders who had trusted them. I often advise emerging leaders, «You know you’re in trouble when you start to judge your self-worth by your net worth.» Nevertheless, many leaders get caught up in this game without realizing it.

This happened to me in 1988, when I was an executive vice president at Honeywell, en route to the top. By external standards I was highly successful, but inside I was deeply unhappy. I had begun to focus too much on impressing other people and positioning myself to become CEO. I was caught up with external measures of success instead of looking inward to measure my success as a human and a leader. I was losing my way. Continuar leyendo «Mindfulness Helps You Become a Better Leader»

How To Get Paid What You’re Worth & Other Negotiation Tips

by Sean Blanda | 99U.com

Ilustration: Oscar Ramos Orozco

For most us, the thought of bargaining over money is an awkward and painful affair, something we try to get over with as quickly as possible like a root canal or watching a slideshow of our in-laws’ vacation.

But if we skip a few minutes of haggling, we can leave some serious cash on the table and, more importantly, short-change our true value as creatives. One study found that negotiating a raise of $5,000 for your first salary can result in more than $600,000 in additional lifetime earnings.A Cautionary Tale

In 1912, Teddy Roosevelt’s campaign printed three million pamphlets with his picture featured prominently. It was only after the pamphlets were printed that his staff noticed a small line of text that read «Moffett Studios – Chicago» under the picture. The campaign did not own the rights to the photo and licensing a photo for reprinting usually cost $1 per reprint.

A campaign manager was tasked with calling the photo studio and negotiating a fair rate for the use of the image. Shrewdly, the campaign manager contacted the studio and simply asked how much it would cost use the picture, never revealing that the campaign had already printed millions of fliers using the photo. Without further inquiry, the studio quoted a price of $250, which the campaign promptly accepted.

Had Moffett Studios been savvy negotiators they would have taken the time to gather all of the information before offering $250 and proposed a much higher rate instead.

How To Become A Better Negotiator

While the Moffetts of the world might appear a little naive, oversights of this sort are extremely common: we often fail to consider the full impact of a deal in the long run.

To make sure you get a better deal, here are a few tips on mastering the dark art of negotiation:

—

1. Separate the person from their position. This is one of the primary points of the popular negotiation book Getting to Yes. When we argue over positions, our egos are attached to what we are proposing. Instead, focus on the other party’s underlying interests. Find where interests overlap and work to develop solutions with the other party as a partner not as a combatant. An example from the book…. Continuar leyendo «How To Get Paid What You’re Worth & Other Negotiation Tips»

Getting Strategy Execution Right – logs.hbr.org

by Video | blogs.hbr.org

Michael Jarrett, INSEAD professor, on the most important imperative for your business.

400.000 followers no significan poder | vía mandomando.com

Suelo leerlo al bueno de Jeff Bullas. Me molesta lo demasiado simple de su lenguaje, pero lo leo.

Veo hoy vía RSS: 3 Secrets of a Twitter Madman | como consiguió 437,356 followers sin ser famoso

Frunzo el ceño. Me tiene harto la manía de hacer solo hincapié en la cantidad de followers (y recientemente, con la cantidad de contenido generado). Volvemos a las sumas en lugar de a la estadística, a aplaudir métricas en lugar de alcanzar objetivos, a los cañonazos publicitarios de los 90 en lugar de a la conversación digital del milenio. Otra vez con quien tiene mas grande la cifra de seguidores. Sigo. Pico y me pongo a ver el post.

Van 30 segundos

Ok. Dice Bullas:

Martin es casi un desconocido …bla bla bla … contenido de valor (ahá, la verdad revelada) … seguir a todo el mundo … filtrar y usar saludos automático (ya necesito un Alka-Seltzer)

*(Comparto ampliamente la opinión vertida por Armando…)*Gabriel Catalano

Continuar leyendo «400.000 followers no significan poder | vía mandomando.com»

The Magic of Doing One Thing at a Time

HBR Blog Network

TONY SCHWARTZ

Tony Schwartz is the president and CEO of The Energy Project and the author of Be Excellent at Anything. Become a fan of The Energy Project on Facebook and connect with Tony at Twitter.com/TonySchwartz and Twitter.com/Energy_Project.

_________________________________

Why is it that between 25% and 50% of people report feeling overwhelmed or burned out at work?

It’s not just the number of hours we’re working, but also the fact that we spend too many continuous hours juggling too many things at the same time.

What we’ve lost, above all, are stopping points, finish lines and boundaries. Technology has blurred them beyond recognition. Wherever we go, our work follows us, on our digital devices, ever insistent and intrusive. It’s like an itch we can’t resist scratching, even though scratching invariably makes it worse.

Tell the truth: Do you answer email during conference calls (and sometimes even during calls with one other person)? Do you bring your laptop to meetings and then pretend you’re taking notes while you surf the net? Do you eat lunch at your desk? Do you make calls while you’re driving, and even send the occasional text, even though you know you shouldn’t? Continuar leyendo «The Magic of Doing One Thing at a Time»

Case Study: When Key Employees Clash

The caller ID on Matthew Spark’s phone read «Kid Spectrum, Inc.» It was someone from the Orlando office, probably administrative director Ellen Larson. She had been in daily contact with Matthew since he purchased the company, a provider of in-home autism services for children, eight months ago. He appreciated Ellen’s eagerness to help him build the business, even if she was sometimes abrupt. Kid Spectrum’s previous owner, Arthur Hamel, had told Matthew that Ellen, with nearly two decades of experience in health services, would be one of his biggest assets.

HBR Blog Network
blogs.hbr.org

H. IRVING GROUSBECK

H. Irving Grousbeck is a consulting professor of management at Stanford Graduate School of
Business and a director of its Center for Entrepreneurial Studies.

______.______
Editor’s Note: This fictionalized case study will appear in a forthcoming issue of Harvard Business Review, along with commentary from experts and readers. If you’d like your comment to be considered for publication, please be sure to include your full name, company or university affiliation, and email address.

The caller ID on Matthew Spark’s phone read «Kid Spectrum, Inc.» It was someone from the Orlando office, probably administrative director Ellen Larson. She had been in daily contact with Matthew since he purchased the company, a provider of in-home autism services for children, eight months ago. He appreciated Ellen’s eagerness to help him build the business, even if she was sometimes abrupt. Kid Spectrum’s previous owner, Arthur Hamel, had told Matthew that Ellen, with nearly two decades of experience in health services, would be one of his biggest assets.

«Matthew, it’s Ellen. I don’t want to bother you again, but we have a situation down here.»
Matthew sat back in his chair and readied himself. The «situation» could be anything from the copier running out of ink to the building catching on fire.

«I’m calling about Ronnie,» she said… Continuar leyendo «Case Study: When Key Employees Clash»

Why «Generation Why Bother» Doesn’t Care

I’ve been stewing all week about a logically sloppy op-ed in Sunday’s New York Times. Every Sunday morning, I leap out of bed and skipper down the stairs to snatch the paper off the stoop, but last week it betrayed me. Todd and Victoria Buchholz’s «The Go-Nowhere Generation» takes a disparate set of data-points and tries to make the case with them that young Americans aren’t «occupying» anything but their parents’ couches and are bringing economic ruination on themselves by being risk-averse Debbie Downers.

For instance, in one particularly odd leap of logic, they cite a decline in drivers’ licenses as a cause of concern, and then link that decline to increased Internet use. «That may mean safer roads,» they quip, «But it also means a bumpier, less vibrant economy.» Really? Would the economy be more vibrant if Mark Zuckerberg spent his time in college driving around delivering pizza instead of sitting in his room inventing Facebook? And do we really want to lament that a younger generation is finding fewer reasons to fire up the ol’ internal combustion engine, fewer excuses to pump more carbon into the atmosphere?

Now, it is true that Americans are known to produce especially spoiled children. And there are a lot of discouraging data points about younger Americans out there. But the Buchholzes are maddeningly glib about the economic realities behind them. At one point they suggest that young Nevadans should escape their state’s high unemployment rate by hopping on a bus headed for low-unemployment North Dakota. But, as fellow HBR editor Justin Fox pointed out when we chatted about it, North Dakota is the third-least-populated state in the Union. There are 175,000 people currently seeking jobs and not finding them in Nevada. Next door in California, there are 2 million. The total workforce in North Dakota is just 390,000.

The youngsters the Buchholzes disapprovingly describe are not wrong to be less-than-enthused about the opportunities the economy presents. They have grown up in an era that has seen Americans working harder and harder; making less money for that work

by Sarah Green | http://blogs.hbr.org/hbr

I’ve been stewing all week about a logically sloppy op-ed in Sunday’s New York Times. Every Sunday morning, I leap out of bed and skipper down the stairs to snatch the paper off the stoop, but last week it betrayed me. Todd and Victoria Buchholz’s «The Go-Nowhere Generation» takes a disparate set of data-points and tries to make the case with them that young Americans aren’t «occupying» anything but their parents’ couches and are bringing economic ruination on themselves by being risk-averse Debbie Downers.

For instance, in one particularly odd leap of logic, they cite a decline in drivers’ licenses as a cause of concern, and then link that decline to increased Internet use. «That may mean safer roads,» they quip, «But it also means a bumpier, less vibrant economy.» Really? Would the economy be more vibrant if Mark Zuckerberg spent his time in college driving around delivering pizza instead of sitting in his room inventing Facebook? And do we really want to lament that a younger generation is finding fewer reasons to fire up the ol’ internal combustion engine, fewer excuses to pump more carbon into the atmosphere? Continuar leyendo «Why «Generation Why Bother» Doesn’t Care»

5 soluciones científicas para los problemas de la publicidad viral

http://news.omexpo.com

Los anuncios virales se han convertido en el objeto de deseo del marketing digital, pero son pocos los que saben realmente cómo desarrollar y sacar provecho a estos formatos en los que los espectadores deciden cómo y con quién compartenlos vídeos que acaban de ver.

Una incertidumbre a la que las nuevas tecnologías están poniendo fin. Thales Tiexeira ha explicado en Harvard Business Review cómo, con otros dos compañeros, realizó una investigación basándose en escáneres de eye-tracking para determinar qué es lo que la gente está mirando cuando ve un anuncio, y sistemas de análisis de expresión facial para determinar los sentimientos de los espectadores. Unas tecnologías que son capaces de analizar elementos aislados que hacen que la gente deje de ver un anuncio o lo comparta. Además, ayudan a descubrir qué tipo de anuncios funcionan de forma viral y qué tipo de personas son las más propensas a compartir estos contenidos con sus redes. Continuar leyendo «5 soluciones científicas para los problemas de la publicidad viral»

Producto, precio, distribución, promoción y… paternidad: las 4″P” del marketing ahora son 5

En la era de la Web 2.0, los consumidores lo tienen mucho más fácil para conocer la “paternidad” de sus marcas y se molestan en conocer los orígenes de las compañías en las que han depositado su confianza.

Un reciente estudio de Weber Shandwick y KRC Research confirma el creciente interés de los consumidores por la “paternidad” de las marcas. Según este informe, al menos el 70% de los consumidores asegura haber dado la espalda a una marca debido a su compañía matriz. Además, casi el 67% de los consumidores comprueba la “paternidad” de las marcas antes de adquirir algún producto o servicio, y el 61% reconoce sentirse molesto cuando no le es posible dar con esta información.

Cuando el consumidor descubre que un producto está fabricado por una empresa que no es de su agrado, las probabilidades de abandonarlo se multiplican también por dos, de acuerdo con el informe de Weber Shandwick y KRC Research.

Conscientes de la relevancia de la “paternidad” en el marketing, cada vez más marcas están apostando por enarbolar la bandera de la transparencia para acercarse a sus clientes.

Ya no basta con vender un determinado producto o servicio, sino que hay que explicar al consumidor dónde se vende, por qué se vende, cómo se fabrica, y cuáles son los principios y las causas que lo sostienen.

http://www.marketingdirecto.com

Todos conocemos ya las tradicionales 4 P del marketing: el producto, el precio, la plaza y la promoción. Para vender, una marca necesita un “producto” que se comercialice a un “precio”adecuado en una “plaza” también adecuada y que vaya acompañado de un campaña de “promoción”para darse a conocer entre el público objetivo.

Sin embargo, estas 4 P se han quedado “pequeñas” en el universo del nuevo marketing y han crecido hasta convertirse en 5. La nueva P del marketing es la “paternidad”. Y es que a los consumidores les interesa también quién es el “padre” del producto.

Teniendo en cuenta que el mercado está cada vez más lleno de competidores, elconsumidor termina decantándose por las marcas con mejores “padres”, explica Leslie Gaines-Ross en Harvard Business Review. Al fin y al cabo, las marcas son como los padres de los productos y los servicios, y sólo los buenos padres crían a buenos hijos.

Éste es un fenómeno completamente nuevo. Hace sólo una década, la “paternidad” de las marcas era desconocida para la mayor parte de los consumidores. Marlboro era Marlboro y Camel era Camel. Sus empresas matrices estaban en las sombra y nadie parecía tener opiniones formadas sobre las mismas. Continuar leyendo «Producto, precio, distribución, promoción y… paternidad: las 4″P” del marketing ahora son 5»

What is needed to move from ideas to innovation?

Por jabaldaia
http://abaldaia.wordpress.com/2010/10/31/2596/

Change management!

Many companies, despite being full of creativity and technology, lack of management skills in order to convert ideas into reality, that is, innovation.

Vijay Govindarajan author of “The other side of innovation” together with Chris Trimble begins his book referring to the image of climbers after arduous months of preparation work to reach their goal – reach the top of the mountain.

But like many businesses, not just in big, they forget to create reserves of energy for the descent steps.

It seems to be a fact that, in companies, often after a long way in building environments for creativity and acquisition of cutting-edge technologies, innovative management lack capable of sustaining the results of that effort.

How can we turn knowledge into creativity and creativity into innovation ?

Creativity is a skill that can be developed and a process that can be managed. It requires practice to develop the right skills and a supportive environment where they can grow.

Design Thinking can help organizations manage the innovation process and overcome some barriers in particular to help people learn to feel comfortable with uncertainty, ambiguity and what seems a paradox.

There are a number of challenges presented to organizations listed by Gary Hamel and which are described in full in February 2009 issue of Harvard Business Review, and some of which I took to find a path leading up ideas to innovation.

“ Eliminate the pathologies of formal hierarchy. There are advantages to natural hierarchies, where power flows up from the bottom and leaders emerge instead of being appointed.“

Creativity must be seen as an authoritative source such as knowledge and especially when this refers to practices that do not support an open world.

Por jabaldaia
http://abaldaia.wordpress.com/2010/10/31/2596/

Change management!

Many companies, despite being full of creativity and technology, lack of management skills in order to convert ideas into reality, that is, innovation.

But like many businesses, not just in big, they forget to create reserves of energy for the descent steps.

How can we turn knowledge into creativity and creativity into innovation ?

Creativity is a skill that can be developed and a process that can be managed. It requires practice to develop the right skills and a supportive environment where they can grow.

“ Eliminate the pathologies of formal hierarchy. There are advantages to natural hierarchies, where power flows up from the bottom and leaders emerge instead of being appointed.“

Creativity must be seen as an authoritative source such as knowledge and especially when this refers to practices that do not support an open world. Continuar leyendo «What is needed to move from ideas to innovation?»

El poder transformador de la economía de experiencias.

La experiencia del cliente no es simplemente una forma más de agregar valor a un producto o servicio. Es la base de un nuevo tipo de economía. Esa es la nueva postura de quienes a fines de los 90 describieron por primera vez “la economía de experiencias.

“Los clientes siempre obtienen más de lo que buscan porque el producto o servicio siempre viene con una experiencia.” Se refería a claves que afectan, para bien o para mal las percepciones del cliente y que surgen durante la compra y uso del producto o servicio. Claves funcionales (forman parte del producto o servicio), claves mecánicas (creadas por el entorno) y claves humanas (que surgen de la gente). Las tres se combinan para entregar experiencia del cliente.

La economía de las experiencias nació mucho antes de que tuviera nombre. Podría decirse que al menos uno de los originadores del concepto fue John D. Rockefeller Jr., hijo único del fundador de Standard Oil, cuando allá por los años 20 comenzó a comprar el pueblito de Tidewater para convertirlo en museo viviente sobre la vida en Virginia durante los años coloniales de 1770.

El pueblito transformado recibió el nombre de Williamsburg, la restaurada capital de la Virginia inglesa y desde aquel entonces atrajo a cientos de millones de visitantes. También dio origen a una economía local totalmente nueva basada en alimentar, alojar y entretener a todos esos visitantes además de brindar casas y servicios para toda la gente que trabajaba allí en brindar esos servicios. Toda Williamsburg y sus alrededores son demostración viviente del poder transformador de la economía de experiencias, afirma Theodore Kinni, director de Strategy and Business, en un anàlisis de la evoluciòn de este tema.

Nadie relacionó lo que ocurría en Williamsburg con un nuevo tipo de economía hasta 1998, cuando B. Joseph Pine II y James H. Gilmore, publicaron The Experience Economy: Work Is Theatre and Every Business a Stage, un libro que inmediatamente tuvo eco en la Harvard Business Review. Los autores hablaban de negocios exitosos – como el parque temático de Walt disney, que ofrecían mucho más que productos y servicios: brindaban experiencias memorables que atraían a millones de clientes.

The Rubbery Challenges of Innovation

Creativity in Leaders is Key

One is the latest bi-annual IBM CEO study which came out a few months ago. Based on interviews and surveys of over 1,500 CEOs from around the world, it focuses on the importance of creativity. In particular, creativity in leaders as they face ever more complex problems.

«The degree of difficulty CEOs anticipate, based on the swirl of complexity, has brought them to an inflection point,» says IBM. «Asked to prioritize the three most important leadership qualities in the new economic environment, creativity was the one they selected more than any other choice.»

By Adam Richardson – //designmind.frogdesign.com/blog

I have recently started blogging for Harvard Business Review which is an exciting forum to be part of, and certainly I’m humbled to be in such esteemed company as John Hagel, Roger Martin, Michael Schrage, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, and many others. The first installment looked at the benefits from not over-determining a product in an early-stage category, using the iPad as an example, and the second at the downsides of using skunk works to boost innovation.

The latest one just went up today and it looks at recent studies by IBM and McKinsey that illuminate two key challenges many organizations face when trying to manage innovation: creativity to come up with innovative ideas in the first place, and effectively implementing them so they reach the market in the manner originally envisioned.

“I remember a conversation with an engineer at a large company’s future technologies lab describing what they did as «rubber meets the sky», as opposed to «rubber meets the road.» The former is about coming up with creative new ideas, the latter about bringing them to the market. Both are needed, of course, and two recent reports shed light on the challenges that companies often still face when trying do both well. Continuar leyendo «The Rubbery Challenges of Innovation»

Quick Takes: Why Is Customer Service So Bad?

Andrew McAfee’s plea about customer service
“How can it still be the case, in 2010, that really well-understood technologies (telephony, voice prompts, etc.) are still detracting from customer service, rather than improving it, at some of the largest companies in the world?”

That’s MIT Sloan research scientist Andrew McAfee, wondering in his blog why the American Express Travel Services phone service offers such poor service. None of the possibilities make sense. Leaders aren’t aware? All they have to do is dial their number. They’re aware, but not bothered? “How could they not be?” McAfee asks. “They run a customer service business — it’s all they do — and they just released a study showing that, as their headline put it, ‘Americans Will Spend 9% More With Companies That Provide Excellent Service.’”

McAfee’s third possibility is the most intriguing: Leaders know about the problems, are concerned about the problems, but aren’t planning on doing anything about the problems.

“Maybe they don’t feel like they have the budget, the expertise, or the managerial bandwidth to take on a tech-heavy project now,” McAfee says. “Maybe the issues I experienced only crop up in the particular segment of Amex Travel I was dealing with, or when call volumes are particularly heavy, and so the company is willing to live with them for the time being. But I’m a heavy traveler, the kind of customer they probably want to attract and retain, and I’m sufficiently struck by this lousy tech leading to lousy customer service that I’m sitting around blogging about it.”

Andrew McAfee’s plea about customer service
“How can it still be the case, in 2010, that really well-understood technologies (telephony, voice prompts, etc.) are still detracting from customer service, rather than improving it, at some of the largest companies in the world?”

That’s MIT Sloan research scientist Andrew McAfee, wondering in his blog why the American Express Travel Services phone service offers such poor service. None of the possibilities make sense. Leaders aren’t aware? All they have to do is dial their number. They’re aware, but not bothered? “How could they not be?” McAfee asks. “They run a customer service business — it’s all they do — and they just released a study showing that, as their headline put it, ‘Americans Will Spend 9% More With Companies That Provide Excellent Service.’”

McAfee’s third possibility is the most intriguing: Leaders know about the problems, are concerned about the problems, but aren’t planning on doing anything about the problems.

Bouncing Back from a Negative 360-Degree Review

What the Experts Say
Before you begin the 360-degree review process, it’s important to have an open mindset. Remember that no one is perfect and every manager, no matter how seasoned, has room to improve. «The best leaders aren’t those who don’t have a lowest score on a 360. The best leaders have standout strengths,» says Susan David, co-director of the Harvard/McLean Institute of Coaching, founding director of Evidence Based Psychology LLC, and a contributor to HBR’s The Conversation blog. It’s your job to figure out what to do about those low scores. Larissa Tiedens, the Jonathan B. Lovelace Professor of Organizational Behavior at Stanford Business School and co-editor of The Social Life of Emotions agrees. «Being reflective and changing after a negative review is often more impressive than getting positive reviews from the start. Thus, a negative review is an opportunity to show that you can listen and learn,» she says. Here are several principles to follow if you receive a less than stellar 360-degree review.

Best Practices / by Amy Gallo

Unlike traditional reviews and other types of feedback, 360-degree reviews include input from a comprehensive set of people: peers, managers, direct reports, and sometimes customers. One of the most valuable aspects of this tool is that the opinions are voiced anonymously, which encourages a higher level of honesty than you might normally get.

However, the truth is not always pretty, and receiving a negative 360-degree review can be upsetting, especially when the opinions are echoed at many levels. But with the right attitude, you can still create a positive experience. How you handle a bad 360-degree review is far more important than the content of the review itself. Continuar leyendo «Bouncing Back from a Negative 360-Degree Review»