IN LATE 2017, a headline in the South China Morning Post declared that “China’s chance to lead global innovation may lie with 5G mobile technology development.” The accompanying story began as follows: “China is on the cusp of recasting itself as a l

BOMBARDED WITH STIMULI from every direction, it is not surprising that we often resort to categorical thinking to simplify incoming information. The problem is, this common habit can manifest itself in a tendency to group individuals on the basis of

THE 2020S HAVE ARRIVED, and there are no spoilers. It is likely that the years to come will be marked by geopolitical and economic uncertainty, with continued disruptions from digital challengers. How can business leaders ensure that their organizati

NO ONE WOULD ARGUE that online and mobile banking have transformed the financial services industry. Tech-savvy customers welcome online banking for its convenience, and banks view it as a way to increase efficiency. But despite the rapid growth of di

INNOVATION IS WIDELY ACCEPTED as the driving force for organizational growth and competitiveness. Yet academics and practitioners alike continue to lament the slow pace of innovation and seek remedies to accelerate it. One reason for the disappointin

WHAT HAPPENS when new and fast-improving technologies create opportunities to unleash untapped sources of revenue—some of them long trapped by market inefficiencies? As digital components become relentlessly better, cheaper and smaller, this is a que

MANAGEMENT ISN’T WHAT IT USED TO BE. And that just might be the understatement of the century. Every single executive, entrepreneur, manager and employee out there — without exception — must recognize that the century-old traditional management syste

FROM BANKING TO RETAIL, healthcare to manufacturing and education to professional services, digital technologies and innovative business models are upending organizations around the globe. The humbling fact of life for the modern leader is that virtu

Creative destruction—the idea that successful innovators sow the seeds of their own destruction—was defined by Joseph Schumpeter over 70 years ago. Is this still a phenomenon today? Gary Pisano: Absolutely. Schumpeter nailed it when he coined that te

In a 2017 essay (“AI: Scary For The Right Reasons”), you wrote that AI might improve metrics like GDP growth and productivity, but at the same time, it may worsen less visible metrics such as income disparity. Are you still concerned about that? Even

AT ITS CORE, machine learning is concerned with using large data sets to learn the relationships between variables, make predictions and interact with a changing environment. And it is becoming an increasingly important tool in business — so much so

You have said that in today’s environment, “every company is an algorithmic company, whether it knows it or not.” Please explain. Mike Walsh: We often assume that only purely digital companies like Google or Netflix can be called ‘algorithmic’ becaus

Chief Digital Officer, Partners HealthCare MY COLLEAGUE, BEST-SELLING AUTHOR Atil Guwande, recently wrote an article for the New Yorker titled, “Why Doctors Hate Their Computers.” In it, he points to a number of workflow-related issues that are probl

THIRTY YEARS OF RESEARCH and practice have led me to a conclusion that sums up my approach to organizational problem solving: The questions people ask about situations they want to change reveal a lot about what they are thinking and feeling. This in

THE STATE OF LEADERSHIP has been in the spotlight in recent years, for good reason. With employee engagement at an all-time low, the 2019 Edelman Trust Barometer once again demonstrated a serious crisis of confidence in institutional leaders to help