Business Strategy

How to Increase the Odds of Startup Success

by

Nine out of ten startups fail. Or, if you prefer to look at the bright side, one out of ten startups succeeds. The crucial questions is now: what could you do to increase the odds of being the one in ten? There is no easy answer, and you will get ten different answers, if you … Read more

How Strategic Leaders Use Storytelling

by

Storytelling has proven to be an effective leadership tool in business communication. Or like US psychologist Howard Gardner said: “Every great leader is a great storyteller”. Thus, it is not surprising that executives at many major companies, like 3M, Nike, and Procter & Gamble, have embraced storytelling. A number of strategic leaders at these and … Read more

The Power of Strategic Questions

by

Let me start with a question: how frequently do executives and employees ask general, business-related questions in your organization? If your answer is ‘Not too often’, I would recommend to ask yourself ‘Why?’ and ‘How could we change this?’. A tool for strategic leaders Questions are an indispensable tool for strategic thinking. Questions are the … Read more

Balanced Scorecard Revisited – How to Use BSC in Strategic Management

by

One of the most popular tools for strategy implementation is the Balanced Scorecard (BSC). More than two decades after it was presented to the public by Robert S. Kaplan and David P. Norton in 1992, the BSC has turned out to be one of the most popular management tools, which is not only used by … Read more

How to Use Key Performance Indicators for Strategy Implementation

by

Key performance indicators (KPIs) have become commonplace in large and medium-sized companies worldwide. However, despite the widespread use of KPIs, many companies still have not managed to get a high benefit from KPIs. Frequently, KPIs are just seen as a tool for measuring performance on an operational level. This approach misses the benefits KPIs can … Read more

The Strategic Importance of Corporate Core Values

by

Despite their widespread use, corporate core values are probably one of the most underrated factors for competitive advantage. Rise of Corporate Values After the Dot-com Bubble All major companies nowadays have defined corporate values for themselves. See for example the results of a study conducted by Booz Allen Hamilton and the Aspen Institute already in … Read more

The Five Major Strategic Challenges for HR

by

Human resource management plays a key role for the sustained success of a company. While this has always been true, the relative importance of HR in today’s business environment of fast change and high complexity and uncertainty has even further increased. At the same time, the challenges for HR have changed, as two recent studies … Read more

Why Artificial Intelligence is Relevant for Your Business Strategy

by

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been around for a long time. The term was coined in 1955 by John McCarthy. The concept goes back to the early days of computing when British computer pioneer Alan Turing hypothesized about intelligent machines in his seminal paper on “Computing Machinery and Intelligence” (1950). Progress of AI has been slower … Read more