Why the Atkins approach is bad for business
Doing an Atkins diet is now as fashionable in business as it is in personal life. But in business – as on the female body – there are places where you want fat as well as those where you do not. Bottom line – rather than tinker with sustainability, it is still best to soak up resources and use the energy productively.
Bonuses are a problem diet for financiers
Heads, we win; tails, they lose! Managers, traders and advisers who take more of gains than of losses have incentives to support risky courses of action that are not in the best interests of the principals they represent. John explains why this scheme can never really align the rewards of the individual with the objectives of the organisation.
Obliquity
Strange as it may seem, overcoming geographic obstacles, winning decisive battles or meeting global business targets are the type of goals often best achieved when pursued indirectly. This is the idea of Obliquity. Oblique approaches are most effective in difficult terrain, or where outcomes depend on interactions with other people.
Customer inertia and the active shopper
When human nature conflicts with government policy or business strategy, human nature will usually win. From mobile phones to credit cards, customer inertia remains a dominant influence in many markets.
Boeing and a dramatic change of direction
John used to teach students that Europe could never regain supremacy in civil aircraft manufacture. He was mistaken. What went wrong with Boeing’s strategy?
Television networks are dying in a flurry of reality
Wouldn’t it be better if quality broadcasters embraced a future as publishers of quality rather than broadcasters of rubbish? John illustrates why broadcasters invent markets that suit their organisation, instead of inventing an organisation structure that suits their market.
A touch posting for any captain of industry
Sometimes there are stranded businesses - once successful companies whose competitive advantage has disappeared. Does Barclays new chief executive find himself in this position?
Big media can never be truly creative media
Is it inevitable that media industries will be dominated by conglomerates? This is the industry where scale creates more problem than its advantages
You can’t cut costs without cutting service
Successive cost cutting rounds may just be a way of funding the present at the expense of the future.
Vodafone triumphs, Britain picks up the bill
So farewell, Sir Chris. The imminent departure of Sir Christopher Gent calls for an examination of the rise of Vodafone.