MIT Sloan Management Review articles from March 2004

MIT Sloan Management Review archives from March 2004

Leaders who inspire commitment: tapping traditional Asian values can instill cross-cultural managerial capabilities.(Leadership)
March 22, 2004... Recent research holds lessons for any company doing business in China: In a land where Confucianism originated over 2,000 years ago yet still exerts a major ethical and philosophical impact on the prevailing culture, managers who actively...

Japanese experiences with B2C e-commerce: can innovative partnerships increase store traffic and improve the retail revenue stream?(E-Business)
March 22, 2004... A four-year study of Japanese business-to-consumer (B2C) e-commerce initiatives reveals the innovative ways Japanese corporations exploit traditional aspects of Japanese business and consumer retailing--specifically, the consumer's preference...

Technology trajectories and the birth of new industries: markets develop according to the specific paths by which innovations in a given field occur.(Innovation)(Book Review)
March 22, 2004... How do new industries typically form? Who are usually the initial customers, and how is competition likely to evolve? Such questions have long interested researchers studying technological innovation and its impact on business. Adding to that...

Strategies for data warehousing: how can companies ensure that their data warehouse delivers as promised?(Information Technology)(Book Review)
March 22, 2004... More and more companies are integrating their data with those of supply-chain partners, acquired divisions or vendors to whom they've outsourced their IT function. This melding of data promises enticing advantages, such as real-time updating...

In praise of walls: it is dangerous to assume that the "death of distance" brought about by new communication technologies will mean the death of the company as we know it.(Contraria)(Cover Story)
March 22, 2004... In recent years, a vocal school of business experts has argued that leaps in information technology have made possible a new world of seamless collaboration among businesses, one that will bring enormous gains in efficiency and flexibility....

Offshoring without guilt: The debate about the ethics of offshoring misses the point that it represents the inevitable next generation of business practice.(In Context)
March 22, 2004... The new hot topic being debated in boardrooms, at meetings and in Internet discussion groups is "offshoring," the practice among U.S. and European companies of migrating business processes overseas to India, the Philippines, Ireland, China...

Do you have too much it? the success of a spanish clothing retailer shows that when it comes to it spending, less is often more.(In Practice)
March 22, 2004... In the late 1990s, companies often bought huge quantities of IT for reasons that had nothing to do with their business models or long-term strategies. In a common scenario, a company saw that its rivals had bought ERP or CRM applications,...

The innovation subsidy: seeking high reward for high risk may be glamorous, but the dominant innovation challenge for the firm may be finding others to pay for it to pay for it and mitigating the risk.(Fieldwork)
March 22, 2004... When Microsoft Corp. finally launched its muchawaited and long-delayed Windows 95 operating system in mid-1995, it was remarkably free of crippling bugs, something in which the company's technical managers understandably took great pride....

Achieving deep customer focus: customer-focused transformation is producing long-term, sustainable growth through a systemic, tested process. The approach gets all employees collaborating to identify the outcomes that customers need--and to help them get there.
March 22, 2004... Today's managers acknowledge the importance of customer focus for growing a business and competing. (1) Yet the often costly customer efforts they have implemented have not led to the expected gains. The reason: a superficial understanding of...

Strategic management of intellectual property: intellectual property now makes up a large proportion of many companies' market value, and IP management can no longer be left to technology or legal departments alone.
March 22, 2004... In recent years, the primary locus of value for many corporations has been found in their intellectual property rights. By one informed estimate from the late 1990s, some three-quarters of the Fortune 100's total market capitalization was...

Best practices in IT portfolio management: most organizations struggle to demonstrate business gains from investments in information technology. New research reveals how to meet the challenges of IT portfolio management to deliver tangible results.
March 22, 2004... Business executives love to hate information technology, yet IT expenditures continue to increase. In 2002, $780 billion was spent on IT in the United States alone, with IT budgets of individual companies, such as Citigroup Inc., reportedly...

In sight.(Scope: Noteworthy Titles from SMR--Past & Present)
March 22, 2004... SMR Editors expand on current articles and issues "Kiss Your Cubicle Goodbye: Tech Jobs Are Fleeing to India Faster than Ever" exclaimed the cover headline of a recent issue of Wired magazine. Similarly, a recent cover of BusinessWeek...

Vision a talk with Jay A. Conger.(Scope: Noteworthy Titles from SMR--Past & Present)(Interview)
March 22, 2004... Jay A. Conger, a professor at London Business School, has long been a globally recognized expert on leadership and corporate governance. In his most recent article for SMR, "When CEOs Step Up To Fail," (Spring 2004, Reprint 45310) Conger and...

Focus on organizational energy.(Scope: Noteworthy Titles from SMR--Past & Present)
March 22, 2004... Too often, the best management theories self-destruct when put into practice. Why? These articles from a variety of disciplines propose a likely missing link: Organizational energy. After all, no matter how great an initiative is, mere humans...

Panorama opportunities for further reading on current topics.(Scope: Noteworthy Titles from SMR--Past & Present)
March 22, 2004... NEW IN THIS ISSUE Management of Strategic Intellectual Property by Markus Reitzig Spring 2004, Reprint 45308 Related reading -- Sharing the Corporate Crown Jewels by David Kline More and more companies are discovering...

Top 10 best sellers: top article sales Winter 2004.(Scope: Noteworthy Titles from SMR--Past & Present)
March 22, 2004... BEST SELLERS FOR THE CORPORATE MARKET 1. The Power of Innomediation by Mohanbir Sawhney, Emanuela Prandelli, Gianmario Verona Identifies three distinct types of innomediary and observes how each one can help companies acquire...

When CEOs step up to fail: incoming CEOs at major companies are increasingly flaming out early in their tenures. But the blame for these costly and puzzling derailments cannot be placed solely on their shoulders.
March 22, 2004... The failure and subsequent departure of a CEO is a costly misadventure for any organization. The most immediate and devastating impact is often on the company's market capitalization. In a matter of weeks, a floundering CEO can destroy a...

Using supplier networks to learn faster: many companies keep their suppliers at arm's length. But partnering with vendors--sharing valuable knowledge with them through organized networks--can be a sustainable source of competitive advantage.(includes several related articles)
March 22, 2004... Last year, Toyota Motor Corp. posted profits that exceeded the combined earnings of its three largest competitors. In today's world of hypercompetition, how did Toyota accomplish this? In searching for the answer, many business gurus and...

The 2004 MIT Sloan Management Review/PricewaterhouseCoopers awards.
March 22, 2004... For the second consecutive year, MIT Sloan Management Review and PricewaterhouseCoopers join together to honor the SMR articles that have contributed most significantly to the enhancement and advancement of management practice. Choosing from...

New from the MIT press and the MIT Sloan School.(Management: Inventing and Delivering Its Future)(Book Review)
March 22, 2004... Management Inventing and Delivering Its Future edited by Thomas A. Kochan, George M. Bunker Professor of Management, MIT Sloan School of Management and Richard L. Schmalensee, John C Head III Dean, MIT Sloan School of Management ...

The hidden costs of organizational dishonesty: companies that engage in unethical practices face consequences far more harmful than is traditionally recognized. The resulting damage can easily outweigh the short-term gains.
March 22, 2004... Abrief scanning of The Wall Street Journal--or, tellingly, almost any other newspaper in the country--reveals the alarming prevalence and far-reaching impact of organizational dishonesty. Reports of malfeasance or criminal conduct in...

The evolution of the design-inspired enterprise: a focus on design--which translates to a focus on customers' true needs and unarticulated aspirations--ultimately creates better-informed, more nimble companies.
March 22, 2004... In the literature on design, product development and innovation, the word "design" refers to many things: a creative art, a phase of product development, a set of functional characteristics, an aesthetic quality, a profession and more. (1) In...

Games managers play at budget time: managers in need of capital for their operations can subvert even the best-designed budgeting processes. Executives must learn to identify their tactics and change the game.
March 22, 2004... One of the most thoroughly studied questions in business is how, at budgeting time, large corporations should choose among investment opportunities. In-house economists, management advisors and even Nobel laureates have worked on this problem...

Leading at the enterprise level: many companies have outstanding business-unit and functional leaders but far fewer who can act in the interests of the corporate enterprise as a whole.
March 22, 2004... For the past couple of decades, companies have focused on creating strong leaders of business units and influential heads of functions--men and women responsible for achieving results in one corner of an organization. But they have not paid...

New ways to evaluate innovative ventures.(Opinion)
March 22, 2004... An economy's capacity to innovate determines its capacity to thrive. A company's capacity to innovate determines its capacity to survive. The expected life span of a Fortune 500 corporation is only 40 to 50 years, and that life expectancy is...