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Managing With a Conscience

Leading Blog

Frank Sonnenberg makes the case in Managing with a Conscience , that the only sustainable way to succeed is the right way—not cutting corners—emphasizing the intangibles like trust, creativity, focus, speed, flexibility, relationships, loyalty, and employee commitment. Management should announce an open-door policy.

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Collaboration as an Intangible Asset

Harvard Business Review

So it is with most breakthrough innovations and banner financial years. Interestingly, intangible assets are all the rage these days on Wall Street. There is no line on the balance sheet for "ability to innovate" or "skill at managing brand." If you can't measure it, how can you manage it?

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The Answer to Short-Termism Isn’t Asking Investors to Be Patient

Harvard Business Review

Too many companies prioritize quarterly earnings over long-term innovation, human capital investment, and brand development, and many people believe short-term shareholders are to blame. Critically, short-term selling by shareholders need not entail short-term behavior by managers. What about innovation? Tim Evans for HBR.

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A Novel Idea for Putting Sidelined Cash to Work

Harvard Business Review

To drive shareholder value and be a catalyst for economic recovery, our nation's largest companies must deploy their assets in a productive manner, either internally for innovation and organic growth, or externally for corporate venture capital investments, research partnerships, joint ventures and alliances, or acquisitions.

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What’s Driving Superstar Companies, Industries, and Cities

Harvard Business Review

The superstars tend to be more involved in global flows of trade and finance, more digitally mature, and they dominate the lists of the most valued companies, the most valued brands, the most desirable places to work, and the most innovative companies. Productivity can help; but it is not enough to achieve superstardom.

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Startups Could Fundamentally Change the Way Big Investors Operate

Harvard Business Review

Innovation has the potential to transform the investment industry. Yet the world’s largest funds are closed off from these innovations. Research we have collected in recent months shows that pension funds, sovereign wealth funds, and endowments expect imminent breakthrough innovations in investment technology.

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On Creative Accounting: Two Creativity Myths

Harvard Business Review

Say that in a roomful of managers, and you get nervous laughter. Wall Street's " financial innovations " of recent years seem to have given creativity a bad name. The Balanced Scorecard's primary form of novelty is that it takes into account the intangible assets that are so crucial for information-age companies.